Animators shot photos of New York streets as reference, using cameras set eighteen inches off the ground to get a dog's point of view.
The first Disney film to have its own department set up expressly for the purpose of generating computer animation.
When Oliver wakes up after sleeping on the truck tire, he sees people crossing past the alley where he's slept. One of those people is Roger from Les 101 Dalmatiens (1961) (look for the guy with the brown hair, blue shirt, and blue pants).
One of few animated films to feature a front-and-center shot of New York City's Twin Towers. After the tragedy of 9/11, when shots of the iconic towers were being removed from many films to avoid upsetting people, Disney opted not to attempt to edit out the towers, mostly because it would ruin the film's original main title card and because it would be too time-consuming and costly to do. By 2001, Oliver & Company had already been widely distributed on VHS, so there was no point in editing it. Many New Yorkers later commended Disney not altering the film because they felt it was a good portrayal of the way New York used to be before 9/11, and they wanted it left as it was with the towers visible.
The last animated Disney Classic to use line overlay, also called cel overlay, a technique used to make the backgrounds match the lines of the xeroxed objects in the film.