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Photo from last week, but I forgot to upload it until now. Construction is going strong on the pocket park:

Seen on reddit courtesy of /u/ImOnFire15:

The sign is now up!

The Milam Street Block of One Market Square Garage / Hines Chronicle Building / Chase Tower / Capitol Tower.

There is a concept in real estate called "highest and best use," which is a fancy way of saying that land will be developed into whatever brings the greatest financial return. Office highrises bring a greater return than any other use (or they do in downtown Houston at any rate, given what the relative rents are). Given that the block Hines purchased is the highest price ever paid for land in Houston, that it's on the tunnel system, and that it is in close proximity to the highest rent office buildings in the city, I think we can say that the HBU here is office. That does not guarantee that it won't be developed as something else, such as residential. Basically, the office market would have to plummet so far that the carrying costs over the projected holding period until the market returns outweigh the comparative advantage of office, and something else becomes the highest and best use.

Standing inside Whole Foods Post Oak

Well I'd hate to see us belittle an orangutan here too

Just a clarification, the "1200 units" will be the total including the existing buildings to the east and southeast (689 units in Bayou Park and 436 in Memorial Heights). This new building only adds 232 units; the garden apartments that used to be there had 120 units. So this section of land now sees twice as many housing units, plus a nearly 100,000 square foot H-E-B, plus nearly 40,000 square feet of other commercial space (mostly offices and a bit of retail). That's a nice improvement in density and should be great for this location!

That area certainly has changed. It's true what is said about Houston. If you haven't seen Houston in five years , you haven't seen Houston. Things do change here.

I took this photo earlier in the month and never got around to posting it, but nobody else has provided updates so it's still a good 6 weeks more current than anything else out there. This is the new parking garage and office building, mostly finished. Not the greatest photo but I was just walking by, and this was the best view I could get from the side I was on:

Don't forget there are plans to re-route 45 and remove the portion separating this area from downtown. Downtown is eventually going to extend to this area so they are probably thinking about what is going to happen. Plus, if Regent Square ever happens I'm thinking we will start to hear some kind of proposal to add mass transit up Allen Parkway connecting it to downtown.

What I'm starting to see is an incredible shift in the quality of life in this city. It's overall becoming more aesthetically appealing at every level in every neighborhood. Houston just needed some serious TLC. So what's awesome is all these neighborhoods are densifying and becoming more settled and unique. Each neighborhood is developing it's own character and expectation, and that's what was really missing in this city for a VERY long time. So these lights are added charm and individuality to this Post Midtown area.

sure ANYTIME !

It seems like it's about time to start having some mixed use. We are now getting to enough people already living downtown that the old "downtown after 6 is such a great place to get mugged / marvel at empty streets / vandalize empty buildings / publicly urinate with no consequences" schtick seems to be going away.

I missed with it slightly

It appears Travis will be closed this weekend.

Normally shear walls are hidden around elevator shafts, stairwells, or the external framing of the structure. It looks like theres a "notch" in the backside of the building and they decided to put it there. The shear wall, btw is a system for stiffening a building against lateral loads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shear_wall Link above for some generic info. Quick edit because I didnt see your second question: Are they typical? Answer is, yes. Pretty common. Your house has several around the perimeter, Granted, they look different. But, the perimeter studs when a structural plywood/panel boards is attached to the outside, it fundamentally acts like a shear wall, in essence stiffening your house against lateral loads.

That vertical concrete division is interesting. Anyone know what that is?

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All that gold makes it look a bit Trumpian. * *not a political comment. It's intended to merely be an observation of resemblance to one of the Trump Organization's favored color schemes.

I find it fitting that this development, on Gillette Street, seems to have taken inspiration from a stack of razors. Well done.

There goes the next one... Sorry the photo isn't better.

2929 Weslayan won the Houston Business Journal's Landmark Awards Multifamily category.

Enjoy the colored panels because soon it will be a stark white. Setting the disappointment high early on.

Okay, thanks so much for the info. I was getting confused again LOL!

The design from the corner entrance of the store to the street intersection is nice. Let's not be too greedy with getting rid of the ease of access parking. Businesses have to provide the quick stop easy-in, easy-out parking option to keep shoppers happy. The Whole Foods on Post Oak has parking in front (in addition to structured) and that doesn't seem to diminish the more urban feel of Blvd Place. The parking lot may have to do with required setback as well--if you can't build your building there because of planning standards, you might as well put parking.

are you talking about next to the crane? Thats the shear wall of the structure.

Thanks for the clarification.

I agree. But, be careful not to speak anything negatively about the orange one here on this forum as they seem to frown on that particular freedom of speech, sadly... Just sayin.

^^^ the latest renderings / concepts of HOTEL ALESSANDRA are exquisite, posh, and ultra plush. this undoubtably is going to be a very high-end 5* boutique hotel. once completed, i cannot wait to see how it shall be lit up at night. should be a gorgeous site to behold.....

Hell of a block for a curtain call development.

I'm not a fan of the front side parking. I with they could have incorporated parking underground and made the HEB fully open to pedestrians much how they're doing the Midtown Whole Foods.

I'm planning on being downtown tonight to shoot so I'll get a picture of it if it's lit up.

^ DFW job growth far outpaced Houston, Austin and San Antonio combined. YOY job growth by Texas metro, February '16 - February '17: DFW - 119,000 Austin - 27,000 San Antonio - 21,700 Houston - 19,300

Im not sure because I haven't been downtown in a while, but I heard my buddy is going downtown in the 500 ton with luffer this weekend to tear down a Bellows tower crane. Does anyone know where this might be? Don't know if I'll be there on the job or not, but if I go I'll take some pictures or ask him to take a few.

Hopefully with downtown becoming more of a neighborhood and destination we can see some smaller more niche companies move into downtown. Companies that many only take up 10-30,000 sft with a good number of their employees living in or very close to downtown.

Park District - slightly distorted view of PwC Tower (right) and Residences at PD (left): Facebook The Ascent: jsoto3 Victory Parkside: CTroyMathis The Union: Bleu Ciel: Alexan Katy Trail: No. 10 Harwood: Hilton Canopy / Residential @ Cityplace: The McKenzie:

I think we (or at least some of us) might be surprised at how quickly Hines develops this site. I say that for a number of reasons. (1) Hines has not typically been in the business of banking land for some theoretical future use. (2) The overall vacancy rate of downtown office buildings is almost irrelevant to whether a new office building gets built. All it takes is one big or several mid-size leases; see, e.g., Capitol Tower now under construction. And that assumes the new building will be offices, which leads me to... (3) I don't think Hines has ever given any indication that they necessarily plan an office building on this site. They could very well have residential, hotel or mixed-use in mind.

Dj and party on top: Marriott Marquis by Marc longoria, on Flickr

Houston by Marc longoria, on Flickr

I hope these aren't the typical zoomey early renderings eventually replaced by an Alessandra type development or a Randall Davis bait and switch. I'm always a little leary of early development renderings.

views from near the top

Exterior lighting is back on tonight http://2929weslayan.com/gallery

*slow claps* Houston stepping up their game! Very nice to see!

Definitely showing taller than 36 floors. Hopefully this breaks the 500 foot mark.

God is real after all

http://www.chron.com/business/real-estate/article/An-early-look-at-proposed-upscale-development-11098038.php#photo-12789635