OKC Crews Begin Cleaning Bricktown Canal

For the first time in five years, the Bricktown Canal has no water. City Parks crews pulled the plug at 8 a.m. Tuesday, and began draining the one-mile long canal.

Parks Unit Supervisor Greg Crotchett says the Bricktown Canal holds three-million gallons of water. It took about ten hours to drain most of it into the Oklahoma River.

Crews will spend most of the next two weeks cleaning out the canal, with front-end loaders and high-pressure fire hoses.

“This time we found a couple of bicycles, uh tables and chairs,” said Crotchett. “Found lots of cellphones, lots of sunglasses, skateboards.” 

Patterned after San Antonio’s Riverwalk, the Bricktown Canal opened on Fourth of July weekend of 1999.