Oklahoma is part of country defying national growth trends  The
Oklahoman Editorial Modified: March 1, 2013 at 3:51 pm • 
Published: March 3, 2013  BUFFALO Commons, won't you come out
tonight?  No? Too busy making a living?  In the late 1980s, a
Rutgers University professor and his wife proposed that a large
portion of the Great Plains region, which includes Oklahoma, be
turned into “the ultimate national park” and restored as a
“buffalo commons.” The area was depopulating so rapidly, argued
Frank and Deborah Popper, that we might as well let the bison
have it back.  Today, the Great Plains is one of four U.S.
corridors recognized for extraordinary economic growth by the
Manhattan Institute's Joel Kotkin. Not every square mile in the
Great Plains would have been included in the commons, and not
every county in the area is thriving today. But many of them
are, down the spine of the country from Canada to Mexico.  New
Jersey, home to Rutgers, and New York City, home to the
Manhattan Institute, aren't far from e