The International Council of Shopping Centers' annual conference in Las Vegas is the biggest commercial real estate convention in the world. Chances are good that if a national retailer or restaurant moves here, the deal had its roots at ICSC.

So what better place to take the pulse of commercial development?

As usual, a number of locals went there to try to attract new stores to Tulsa. I recently talked to a few of them, including Mendy Parish, a broker with CB Richard Ellis/Oklahoma; Ed Tinker, city manager for the city of Glenpool; Rickey Hayes, principal of retail development consulting firm Retail Attractions LLC; and Delise Tomlinson, executive director of the Tulsa Metro Chamber's Downtown Development program.

The takeaway from all four? Activity improved a lot after last year's nearly comatose ICSC.

They told me that the feeling of gloom was mostly lifted, and that developers and potential tenants weren't talking about possibly making deals at some point, they talked about how to get those deals done.

And there were more stores in attendance. The discount stores and cheap sandwich shops were joined by more elaborate, more upscale concepts that are starting to emerge from their recession hibernation and think about growing again.

Then again, commercial concepts are thinking smaller. Parish noticed it was more common for restaurants to seek out less square footage for new sites, and Wal-Mart, the king of the big box store, is experimenting with vastly smaller prototypes.

And while retailers and restaurants are looking, they're being picky. Financing is still tight, and Hayes said that cities need to be prepared to offer incentives like free land, infrastructure help, access roads and sales tax rebates, or at least try to minimize the red tape.

By the way, Parish and Hayes told me that national tenants have heard about the ongoing slugfest between Tulsa Mayor Bartlett and Tulsa's City Council. Not only are they baffled by it, but also it can make tempting new tenants that much harder.

Still, tenants are interested. And Tomlinson said a number of them are interested in downtown Tulsa. Because the area's starting to see significant residential development, mixed-use developers are taking note and doing more research into the area.

So what could Tulsa be getting? Beyond the low-risk fast food places and discounters, Parish said she's fielding serious interest from specialty grocers, restaurant chains that aren't already here and some more upscale retailers.

Of course, it's early in the process now. Some might bail out before building. But this is still a lot more encouraging than the previous few years.