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The other surface lot is being torn up! Working on the complete site is great news. Also noticed the permit posted.

It sounds like s3mh actually wants to live in Spring. Or Cypress. Or Katy. A subdivision where all the noise and retail is on "a six lane road with 20 acre lots on each side" and the houses are on their little dead end cul-de-sacs and you have to drive everywhere. Too bad for them. That's not what the Heights has ever been. It's not a subdivision. It's a real, old-fashioned neighborhood, where you can walk or bike to most things. And that absolutely includes bars and entertainment and anywhere that serves alcohol. Putting bars on 6 lane roads is basically asking people to drive drunk. And I don't buy your excuse that Fitz's was fine because of sound dampening. I've been to Fitz's. Fitz's was fine because it was already there. Noise is not the problem. Change is.

Website is up with renderings: http://www.themillhouston.com/

Hey I'm not the one who brought up "a six lane road with 20 acre lots on each side". That specific development pattern of purely residential neighborhoods arrayed along relatively few, giant roads with oversized shopping "plazas" is absolutely descriptive of Spring, Cypress, and Katy. I didn't pick those places randomly. I had FM 1960 in particular in mind. FM 1960 is, to me, the perfect example of everything wrong with how we have developed our communities since the 60s or so. Cypress and Katy are sort of not as bad, but that's because their equivalent corridors are mostly feeder roads with some four lane boulevards. And they're not nearly as walkable as the Heights, if for no other reason than the fact that they lack a street grid. "A couple blocks" is not a concept that makes sense in most of Katy or Cypress because most residential streets dead end into cul-de-sacs. And again, White Oak is a commercial corridor. It has had live music on it for more than a century. If live music and alcohol don't belong on White Oak, then where in the Heights do they belong. Because it is a more traditional neighborhood with a true street grid, any location would be "next door", or at least within a block, of someone's home. And that's a good thing! That's part of what makes the Heights a great place to live!

Demolition permit issued for 2204 Austin St.

Looks as if BKR recently purchased the lot bounded by Washington, Lakin, Center, and Wichman.

Target remodel.

I saw a post on Reddit with a bunch of photos of barren shelves and didn't bother stopping by . . . but if I had known they had a ton of vinyl left, I would have gone. I've found some hidden gems there in the past! I hope they relocate inside the loop somewhere. I would strongly encourage them to check out the East End . . . and not just because that would put them in my backyard. There are bound to be some attractive spaces with reasonable rent that might fit their expectations.

I was looking through Metro's website for updates on MetroNext, and found this powerpoint from a meeting that apparently happened about a week ago. According to the presentation, the whole project is already funded through the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s Transportation Improvement Program (and as I understand it, the root of much of that money is TXDOT), and the first public meeting is happening by the end of February. We've already seen preliminary designs for the two middle stations, and the whole thing seems pretty straightforward. It's the only major project from MetroNext that's under the "in progress" category . . . anyone think we'll see ground breaking this year?

Horizon Tower Parking Garage and Site registered with the state. Glad to see this. Full speed ahead!

Building permit issued.

Parking garage building permit issued.

Bellaire P&Z mulls changes to create north Bellaire zoning district https://communityimpact.com/houston/bellaire-meyerland-west-university/development/2021/01/15/bellaire-pz-mulls-changes-to-create-north-bellaire-zoning-district/

https://realtynewsreport.com/rnr-real-estate-briefs-hou-dal-aus-sat-and-more-9/

Would be really cool if Houston could build something similar to San Antonio's Pearl District somewhere on the East End. Seems like the perfect vibe for it. Feels like we don't really have any grand farmer market type areas established and San Antonio's is absolutely massive with many tents and offerings. At first this project kind of reminded me of it but I am not so sure anymore.

Best downtown skyline in Texas. Nice pic. I have some good friends that live at MST.

of course there's a mattress store in a rendering of a Houston road.

Go to “other media” in the bottom right of the comment creator, click on that and you can see “add image from url.” If the image is already hosted from another site you can right click on the image and copy it’s url and then paste it in there. It will then convert the link into the image that you copied the url of. If you have taken the photo and it is not hosted anywhere you can create a free account in an image hosting site like “Imgur” and then do the same. In fact Imgur makes it incredibly easy to copy the url and will have an option to copy the url right next to the photo once published. This is how people like Hindesky can have have 100 billion high resolution images in their comments.

People like the guy quoted in the article referring to buying a nearby home as “invest[ing] in that area” are the problem. When you view your home primarily as an appreciating asset instead of just a place to live, property values become the be-all, end-all and lead to this absolute NIMBY-ism on display here. I rolled my eyes so hard while reading that quote that I think I dislocated my eyeballs.

Also, S3mh seems to really misunderstand the hilarity of giant anatomically correct penises.

$12 what now?

*rolls eyes* Yes, something on someone else's property is "literally in peoples backyards". Sure. White Oak has been a retail/restaurant/entertainment corridor for a long time. If you live within a block of that, there are certain benefits and compromises that come with that. Benefit: lots of stuff within walking distance Compromise: Additional noise and busier street parking. This is how cities work.

The Ashby high rise land is finally being put to use!

I passed by this morning and snapped a surreal photo:

my gosh i miss Day For Night! I got to work with BJORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (*life complete*)

I think Cspwal and Rechlin might be reading too much into the maps. While they are at times a bit ambiguous about it, in the clearest statement, the MetroNext website says that the Inner Katy BRT will "enable you to connect between Downtown and Uptown without transferring."

If Washington ever gets BRT or LRT it would be separate. Think of this as an express line between Downtown and the Northwest Transit Center with only two stations in between. Anything on Washington would have way more stations and would be much more about serving people who live along the Washington Corridor.

I think that is still in design/negotiation with TXDoT.

https://www.ridemetro.org/Pages/METRORapid-Inner-Katy.aspx OMG. They actually didn't f*** that part up. THANK YOU. This is huge allowing a rapid connection between uptown and downtown without any transfer. I was so worried they would make you get off at the Northwest TC

I know you are trolling, but these jokes were tired 10 years ago..... As Kinkaid said above, a more practical developer could of found countless profitable uses for this property. It was essentially affordable grad apartments before for 30+ years........my bet is that Rice buys it up eventually and develops another 5 or 6 story complex for grad students, with a small market or retail along Bissonnet.

I’ve been trying to say that as well. Like I get the “inconvenience” some people feel. But I only have real sympathy for those with handicaps. Otherwise walking a block or two shouldn’t be an issue. ESPECIALLY downtown.

when they did day for night, there was no on site parking, and way more than 5000 people in attendance. I'm sure phase1 retains the surface lots, but I'd guess future phases will include a parking structure to replace at least one of the surface lots, and the other surface lots will be replaced with usable space.

Well, it does make it easier to give directions...

This is a commercial corridor. It has been for a long time. Fitzgerald's, before it was torn down? a 5 minute walk down the street. Before it was Fitzgerald's? It was a dance hall. There's been live music on White Oak longer than anyone currently in the neighborhood has been alive. And you can't possibly believe that a bar would lose business if you put up a 7' penis on your property. If anything, the opposite would be true. Everyone would want to go to the bar next to the giant penis!

FWIW, the last I saw, the concert venue is planned for a later phase, along with a planned hotel conversion of the office tower.

That’s an old rendering here is the new one Also I didn’t realize just how big they are.

I will never understand this project for what they spent fighting lawsuits they could have built this years ago... anywhere else in Houston... I can name off half a dozen places near the area , just off the top of my head

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/Caydon-launches-Melbourne-inspired-condo-tower-in-15884504.php Melbourne-based Caydon is moving ahead with the second phase of its Laneways development in Midtown with the launch of the Fitzroy Residences, a 32-story tower at 2701 Main St. that will bring 191 condo units and a 190-room boutique hotel by Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants. The project, announced in March 2019, is tentatively slated to break ground across from Midtown Park this summer and could be completed by the end of 2023, according to Caydon. The company is opening a sales office after delaying the launch due to COVID. The groundbreaking was initially set for early 2020. Caydon's first U.S. project, the 27-story Drewery Place apartments with ground-floor retail, opened in 2019. Named for the alleyways lined with cafes, restaurants, shops and street art in urban Melbourne, Laneways will contain 2.5 million square feet in five buildings on three city blocks bordered by Main, Fannin, Tuam and McGowan. "We’ve already had a successful sales period during our friends and family phase, which has proven there’s a demand for more attainable luxury condos in Midtown, as well as those interested in locating from the outer suburbs into larger units and wanting to live in hybrid building that offers a resort-style lifestyle," Emma Alexander, Caydon's director of sales and marketing and acting COO, said in an email. The project, which is being marketed by Jacob Sudhoff, CEO of Douglas Elliman Texas, is on the Metro Rail line between downtown Houston and the Texas Medical Center along the emerging Innovation Corridor. It will contain 16 studios, 128 one-bedroom homes from 630 to 1,099 square feet, 86 two-bedroom units from 1,107 to 2,167 square feet and four three-bedroom penthouses from 1,686 to 2,243 square feet. Planned amenities include coworking spaces, a meditation room, yoga and fitness deck, two outdoor swimming pools, a fitness center, concierge service, catering kitchen and dining facilities. Kimpton will operate a restaurant on the ground floor and a pool bar on the podium level. The 558,056-square-foot building will be north of Drewery Place, 2850 Fannin. Hotel rooms will be on floors 10 through 18, above the lobby, five levels of parking, and three floors of condo and hotel amenities.

South side of the street. There should be a new permit being pulled for 920 Westheimer which is a remodel of the Hue/Rosemont facade. And if it hasn't started already there should be information on 1001 California which is the new Library building. I don't have access to the computer at the moment so I can't look them up.

Marriott won't buy it. Marriott is not generally in the business of owning hotels. More news from Houston Business Journal: Robert Williamson, senior vice president of investment management for Midway, called the closure temporary. “We view this as a unique opportunity to reevaluate operations, explore ways to enhance our offerings, maximize value and reopen with minimal impact while the industry slowly recovers," Williamson said. "Providing an unrivaled hotel and dining experience remains our top priority, and we look forward to serving our guests in the near future.”

I would doubt this stays closed for more than a few weeks. No lender would allow for that to happen - need to protect their collateral.