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Updated construction shot from saturday.

At sunset .

reddit u/fronzsolid posted this cool pic of Main St.

Count me as one for team glass. That said, this tower has the potential to easily be the best residential tower in town in terms of architecture in my mind. The bar is low.

According to this article they have secured a anchor tenant. https://www.bisnow.com/houston/news/commercial-real-estate/6-houston-projects-to-watch-in-2020-104550

I am sure Hines will make this look good. The stone will look nice, but Glass is would have been cool too. Hines is a pro. I like stone. I appreciate diversity of materials.

I think it will look fantastic from street level. We will find out soon enough.

A little crane jumping this morning

Sawyer Yards Drive In by reddit u/_jviews

They got their financing before Covid-19 and there's no reason to stop now. If you stop know, all the work you did and money you spent just sits there and goes to waste, and you can't pay the loan off. Who knows what things will be like in a year when this thing is finished. If there's a Great Depression, then maybe all the people who would normally be travelling to L.A. or Seattle will cut back their family vacation to downtown Houston and Post HTX.

Yeah for sure. People laugh but Houston needs to be more photogenic/instagrammable. Something well put together, unique features, and a skyline view will attract the type of tourists & hype we need. Plus a local yokel like myself will visit.

Ngl the stone fits better from a pedestrian and curvature standpoint, looks way more inviting than the glass bottom version. There's nothing valued engineered about this project, just different design choices. The difference in between the glass and stone is how well it transitions from the high rise to the base, which the stone does a million times better. Honestly the stone is going to having a more lasting effect than the glass. In about 20 years the glass base will look dated but the stone will be timeless.

I can't find the thread that had renderings and site plan, but the developers are seeking setback and visibility triangle variances. It will go before the Planning Commission on Thursday, 5/28. The location is the Southwest corner of Austin/Webster intersection where Midtown Bail Bonds used to operate.

Apparently the greater downtown Chicago area had 18,000 residents in 1982 and about 110,000 today. The dimensions of the area they're using for downtown Chicago are roughly equivalent to downtown Houston plus Midtown and Eado. We are probably somewhere around 18,000 in those 3 areas combined. https://www.brookings.edu/research/big-city-downtowns-are-booming-but-can-their-momentum-outlast-the-coronavirus/

Would have loved to have been a fly on the wall during the actual proceedings. The original argument against TCR was that under the current statutes it couldn't be classified as a railroad because it wasn't a “interurban electric railway”. Imagine trying to explain that to a judge. I would imagine it went like this. Plaintiff: We are in opposition because we do not believe TCR qualifies as an "interurban electric railway". Judge: Is it the case that the Shinkansen is a type of train that is powered by electricity? Plaintiff: Yes your honor the Shinkansen is a type of train that is powered by electricity. Judge: This train is planned to go from Houston to Dallas, correct? It would stand to reason to say this is interurban by definition right? Plaintiff: Yes the train is planned to go from Houston to Dallas. Yes by definition that would be interurban your honor. Judge: Does the Shinkansen sit on rails and use those rails to travel to and from its destination? Plaintiff: Yes your honor the Shinkansen does indeed sit on rails and use those rails to travel to and from its destination. Judge: Let me get this straight then. It uses electricity. It sits on rails, and travels on them. It also travels between urban destinations which means its interurban by definition. This stands to reason that TCR would qualify under the current statutes as an "interurban electric railway" correct? Plaintiff: Yes your honor. Judge: Then why are you claiming that this isn't an "interurban electric railway"? Plaintiff: Reasons... Judge: Why are you claiming that this isn't an "interurban electric railway"? Plaintiff: Feelings... Judge: Case dismissed.

Not sure if this was posted or not but... Texas Appellate Court Allows Eminent Domain for High-Speed Rail Project https://thetexan.news/texas-appellate-court-allows-eminent-domain-for-high-speed-rail-project/

You're looking at a flat slab post-tensioned parking garage.... FYI this one is being done by the second largest concrete contractor in town (Keystone Concrete). The re-shores and formwork system they use may appear to be janky but they are highly engineered.

The aquarium of the americas is great. Something else I had considered back when I used to get a little ridiculous with ideas (I still think the topgolf on the roof of GRB idea would have been great, haha.. they could have even built the structure for the bays on the Houston first parking garage to support the weight) was a satellite campus for moody gardens in downtown.

IH 10 @ Waco, we don't see many from this side of town but it looks gorgeous from this angle.

This might be the case, but everything you say assumes that the client, which dictates the direction of the project, would be TXDOT. TXDOT is not the client. The city, state, and the feds are the clients. TXDOT is merely the instrument that designs, engineers, and is used as a financing mechanism to build the highway. Your argument would be like asking a hammer to do a better job at hammering a nail. The hammer is an instrument used to handle nails. Its a tool that is only as good as the wielder. People don't like to think about this, but its the city that requests highways to be built. Its the state which asks highways to be built, and its the feds that ask for highways to be built. TXDOT doesn't make any of these requests. All it can do is design, plan, and engineer what the client wants. What has happened over the years is that people in power haven't asked TXDOT to do anything else except what they have always done. To use the hammer analogy again, its like the city, state, and feds have asked TXDOT to approach every situation as a nail when that isn't always the case, and if something goes wrong they again blame the hammer and ask the hammer to be a better hammer. These people asking TXDOT to "do more" are merely passing the buck and shouldering the blame onto TXDOT for there own failed plans of the past and don't want to take responsibility for their actions. Now could TXDOT have pushed back over the years and come up with more innovative approaches to designing infrastructure, sure. Everything could be better, but if you work in my industry it always starts with the client. Whatever the client wants is what the client gets. We are merely consultants tasked with realizing a vision. If the client doesn't have the vision to do something different then it will be difficult to break the mold and convince them otherwise. We haven't done a good job with asking our clients to be innovative. Instead we keep bashing our heads against the wall asking TXDOT to do everything when they aren't the ones with power. This is how things usually play out: City: We want to rebuild our infrastructure. Lets call TXDOT. TXDOT: Hi I hear you need new infrastructure. Lets talk. City: Great. Do you have any recommendations TXDOT? TXDOT: Glad you ask. Here is what we typically do in these situations. Its fast, its cheaper, and it won't take us too much time to draw up. City: Perfect. When do we get started TXDOT? TXDOT: Now! Everything in this situation is passive and is what has been happening for years. Each party is complicit in this because its the path of least resistance. So if the path of least resistance is do what you did before + add a lane of highway, then that is what the city and TXDOT will move forward with. Instead the conversation should look like, and this time around has look more like this: City: We want to rebuild our infrastructure. Lets call TXDOT. TXDOT: Hi I hear you need new infrastructure. Lets talk. City: Great. Do you have any recommendations TXDOT? TXDOT: Glad you ask. Here is what we typically do in these situations. Its fast, its cheaper, and it won't take us too much time to draw up. City: ...do you have any other ideas? We are thinking about going in another direction. What if we do these things that we haven't done before. TXDOT: ...Here is what we typically do in these situations. Its fast, its cheaper... City: ...no no no. We want to do something else now. We want to do these new things. Do you have any recommendations for these? TXDOT: Well. Not really. We will get back to you on that while we give it a try... City: When do you think we can get this done. TXDOT: Well if we did what we initially recommended we can... City: No we want to do these new things. How long? TXDOT: Raincheck? City: Oh we also want this, and this, and this, and this. State: Don't forget this! County: Don't forget this! Community: Don't forget this! Chron: Don't forget this! TXDOT: ....omg please slow down. wait! The city, state, and the feds (as well as the county) are the clients. Not the other way around. We are now asking TXDOT to do something nobody else thought to ask them to do until now. Lets cut them some slack. There are so many cooks in this kitchen asking for so many new things TXDOT has never had to deal with in years, I'm sure its a nightmare. Whats worse is that its the clients fault for never asking for more up until now, yet at the same time they blame TXDOT for not doing more. Sounds like an abusive relationship with a crazy girlfriend.

It's also always good to remember that the eminent domain is for a rail easement - they can only use it for a railroad

Just out of principal by what is already in the books for established rail companies, and the rights that oil companies get, this should be granted to TCR as well. I don't like it when new companies get blocked from the same powers as the big boys simply because they don't have an established lobby to push there weight around. While it seems they are going to avoid ED when possible its nice to know they will have it in there back pocket as an emergency measure. I've always thought it was wrong that this power is allowed for some, but oh because we don't like this new upstart company they don't get to have it. If these people don't like ED then nobody should be allowed to have it.

A near solid 10 stories of stone is inviting. Give me a break.

View from Buffalo Speedway & W. Alabama. Notice the CBD background.

Madison Reed hair care bar set to open in Rice Village June 1 https://communityimpact.com/houston/bellaire-meyerland-west-university/impacts/2020/05/22/madison-reed-hair-care-bar-set-to-open-in-rice-village-june-1/

Some Permits for the Hotel/Condo tower. Good chance this part is going up soon.

There are indeed two buildings going up at the same time. The 8-Story apartments at 3540 West Dallas, and the 24-Story tower with an address of 3705 Allen Parkway. Apartments on West Dallas: Tower on Allen Parkway:

This is really coming along quickly. Landscaping for the Standard, benches, the bridge and the pergola.

Last night's sunset

A friend who bought a unit in The Revere was told their unit should be finished by late June. She wasn't clear if anyone else had started moving in, or if that was just her unit, or whether that's the entire project. She's not a sophisticated new const buyer. They bought about a year ago.

Oh my that reflection is something great in the making. It's almost like they did it on purpose.

The north tower crane is being jumped 4 sections. It was running out of room. 1st pic shows it using a weight to balance the crane. They were installing the tie-in while I rode by.

The idea is that medicine needs more engineers in the field to make treatment more advanced and cheaper. (Aggie engineer here, student when this all was announced although I'm in aerospace, not medicine) They pitched it to us that in engineering school our way of thinking is changed to a creative problem solving capacity and that we seek to understand instead of just memorize (I've been told by friends that med school professors love having engineers in their classes for this reason). Rather than just knowing what the body does, in med school engineers seek to understand the how and why. They say this would allow us to use that creative problem solving ability to attack the problems head on. Instead of just providing treatment, physician engineers would constantly come up with new solutions- hardware, using data, or otherwise- to treat patients. Essentially, applying the problem solving ability of engineers to the medical field. Really what it is is broadening the pool that medicine pulls from, adding people of new backgrounds, which will definitely make the field better.

Not only money but the medical field was way behind the tech curb and is now drastically changing with new technology being introduced. Doctors will increasingly need to know robotics and automation. Houston could be the new technology-medicine hotbed for innovation with all of our medical institutions adapting to new technologies in the field.

https://today.tamu.edu/2020/05/18/texas-am-system-brands-landmark-campus-in-texas-medical-center/ Texas A&M System Brands Landmark Campus In Texas Medical Center The five-acre mixed-use Texas A&M Innovation Plaza in Houston will be home to the Engineering Medicine program. By Texas A&M University System Communications StaffMAY 18, 2020 The Texas A&M Innovation Plaza in the Texas Medical Center area will include the renovation of an 18-story building, plus $401 million in private sector money to build two new towers. Texas A&M University System The Texas A&M University System has announced the name of its landmark 5-acre campus in Houston, Texas, at the prominent intersection of Holcombe Boulevard and Main Street near the Texas Medical Center (TMC). Setting a new standard for collaboration in engineering, medicine, research and education is the first all-new mixed-use campus for the Texas A&M System in Houston: Texas A&M Innovation Plaza. The Texas A&M University System initiated the new campus by acquiring and renovating an 18-story office building at 1020 Holcombe Blvd. to be the home for EnMed, a unique two-degree program that provides students the chance to earn a master’s degree in engineering from Texas A&M University and a medical degree from the Texas A&M College of Medicine. The EnMed Building will open later this year. Complementing the academic, research, discovery and innovation missions of the EnMed Building, Texas A&M Innovation Plaza will provide a welcoming, secure and vibrant experience to the campus population and visitors alike, with generous green spaces and lifestyle amenities not commonly found in the TMC area. With groundbreaking scheduled in late 2020, the System’s public-private partnership (P3) developer is bringing additional investment of $401 million to fulfill unmet needs in the area with two complementary towers totaling an additional 1.9 million square feet. “EnMed is just the first example of innovation that Texas A&M System intends to bring to the Texas A&M Innovation Plaza,” said Texas A&M System Chancellor John Sharp. “We are excited to have such a visible location in the Texas Medical Center.” Scheduled to be complete in June 2022, a 19-story, 714-bed student housing tower will overlook a scenic plaza flanked by a large garage with retail and dining at grade with convenient, affordable parking for 2,800 vehicles. Texas A&M medical students and Prairie View A&M University nursing students will be given priority for housing, but students from other institutions could fill open slots, if available. Scheduled to be delivered in January 2024 is a 17-story, 515,000 square-foot integrated medical building that will be built atop the 13-story parking structure. With generous, efficient floorplates and robust building technologies, this integrated medical building will be ideally suited to medical, clinical, biomedical, technology and office uses. Accessible via Main Street, Holcombe Boulevard and Fannin Street, Texas A&M Innovation Plaza is also adjacent to the METRO TMC Station, providing convenient connectivity via bus and light rail service to the TMC, Museum District and Downtown Houston. The developer for the P3 projects is Medistar Corporation. American Triple I Partners, founded by Texas A&M alum Henry Cisneros, is part of the financing team.