It's hardly exaggerating to say that Oklahoma City will soon be a brand-new city from a meetings perspective. Construction will begin next spring on a completely new convention center, set to open in 2020. The center will have 200,000 square feet of exhibit space, a 35,000-square-foot ballroom, and 50,000 square feet of additional space. Adjacent to the building will be a new 605-room convention center headquarter hotel from Omni Hotels & Resorts.

With so many developments recently completed or opening soon, you can see why answers to the question "What's new in Oklahoma City?" become a little long-winded. Oklahoma City has earned a bit of a reputation for these kinds of projects, with more than $5 billion of public and private investment in quality-of-life improvements over the past two decades. "New" is what we do around here, and the best is yet to come.