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Holiday/Days/Heaven On Earth Inn At 801 St. Joseph Pkwy.


MontroseNeighborhoodCafe

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On 4/22/2020 at 8:52 AM, Montrose1100 said:

It's in a prime location for low income housing, don't know why the city/housing authority hasn't snagged it up yet.

 

Because I'm pretty sure that's about the last thing the Downtown Management District wants it to become. But also experiences in Chicago and elsewhere have shown that low-income towers are hard to keep secure and can become crime hotspots. Lower-rise options work much better and lead to healthier low and mixed-income communities.

 

It needs to become student housing for Rice, UH, UH Downtown, or even Baylor Medical School (probably private serving all of the above).  It's right on rail lines to all of those.

 

 

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I always liked the idea of a senior independent living situation, for many of the same reasons you liked student housing. Near transit and the theaters and the restaurants of downtown. But I fear that the structure itself may be the question now, especially after the reported contract fell through last year. And tearing it down and building something new is unlikely considering all of the available parking lots / development sites nearby.

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On 4/29/2020 at 10:52 PM, Naviguessor said:

The problem with senior living in high rises...fire alarms and actual fires. 

 

There are lots of senior housing facilities that are high rise. I'm from NYC which has a bunch, but they exist in many smaller cities. Here's one just down the road a ways.

https://thetowersonparklane.com/

 

Though I am of the opinion that the current building will need to start completely failing so as to reduce the price, and then be knocked down for a new development. Though maybe the owners will want to dump it quickly in a post COVID world and someone will be willing to take the gamble. A very long shot at best.

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On 4/29/2020 at 8:15 PM, Brooklyn173 said:

But I fear that the structure itself may be the question now, especially after the reported contract fell through last year.


The website says under contract again.

Edited by cloud713
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On 4/29/2020 at 10:52 PM, Naviguessor said:

The problem with senior living in high rises...fire alarms and actual fires. 

 

Well, we have them all over town.  Even those that are not designated as senior living facilities have a lot of residents who are seniors (predominantly so, in a lot of cases).

18 minutes ago, cloud713 said:


The website says under contract again.

 

Website?

Edited by Houston19514
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  • 3 months later...

I checked the Phoenix Development Partners site and it seems they have a lot of experience renovating older buildings in the Chicago-Milwaukee corridor. I noticed a renovation of theirs for student housing, and considering the small size of the units discussed here, I wonder if that market that might be their focus?

 

https://phoenixdevelopmentpartners.com/#home

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33 minutes ago, zaphod said:

That would be seriously wild if 2020 was the year they redeveloped this thing.

I was just thinking that. What are the chances it actually gets developed this time? I'd almost rather they just demolish the thing and be done with it, but this looks like a good plan. We do live in the strangest timeline after all . . .

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Who knows.

 

The idea of building a lot of small units gave me the idea that they could turn it into a dorm for the homeless. They'd have an efficiency unit and there would be onsite security guards. Eligibility would be based on history of involuntary institutionalization, substance abuse, etc. Get them off the street, that would go way further in de-trashing that area than anything else proposed thusfar.

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9 hours ago, zaphod said:

Who knows.

 

The idea of building a lot of small units gave me the idea that they could turn it into a dorm for the homeless. They'd have an efficiency unit and there would be onsite security guards. Eligibility would be based on history of involuntary institutionalization, substance abuse, etc. Get them off the street, that would go way further in de-trashing that area than anything else proposed thusfar.

 

Problem with that if you block the druggies/alcoholics/the ones most likely to trash the place and start fires, those are the ones that stay on the street, furthermore it would just be a way to spend the night, while the day is spent panhandling (unless they are denied doing so, in which case it becomes a de facto jail). That's not to say that the homeless should get nothing, but building housing for the homeless is, at best, more complicated than it seems, and at worse, will just make the problem worse at the taxpayers' dime.

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4 hours ago, IronTiger said:

 

Problem with that if you block the druggies/alcoholics/the ones most likely to trash the place and start fires, those are the ones that stay on the street, furthermore it would just be a way to spend the night, while the day is spent panhandling (unless they are denied doing so, in which case it becomes a de facto jail). That's not to say that the homeless should get nothing, but building housing for the homeless is, at best, more complicated than it seems, and at worse, will just make the problem worse at the taxpayers' dime.

There's been success elsewhere in "housing-first" initiatives to help the homeless, but they were small lots with 6 or 7 tiny cabins on it, not a highrise apartment building.  Last thing you want to do with extreme poverty is concentrate it that much

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I drove by a week ago and there were some workers around the building. I just assumed they were boarding everything up to make sure that homeless people couldn't get in. 

 

This is such an eyesore and whenever someone comes to visit they always ask about "that gross building with the windows missing." 

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Is anyone familiar with the Torre de David in Caracas, Venezuela? It is never finished residential tower that was "colonized" by some homeless in the city. The government was either powerless or indifferent to prevent it though the residents were relocated in 2014, some 20 years after some had first move in. There was book published about the building available on Amazon of course. https://www.amazon.com/Torre-David-Informal-Vertical-Communities/dp/3037782986

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I can't tell if there's anything in the pictures out of the ordinary from how it usually looks, maybe Brooklyn just knows something we don't.

Also, they could be cleaning it up to try and sell it to the investors better, hasn't it been gutted and re gutted a few times?

I'd love to see something done with the place but who knows at this point.

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