TheNiche

If I recall correctly, the 380 Agreement allowed a provision whereby the city and the developer could agree to add or remove items from the original list. They ended up using that provision, although clearly some of the work that ended up being done was of questionable value. But that's pretty much just the City being the City. (What would the developer care about baluster repair?) The City does lots of things of questionable value, such as building and operating public libraries. If you're pissy about this--and clearly you are because I can't recall you posting anything in any other thread, ever--then why aren't you also getting pissy about other things that the City does?

I do not disagree with anything that you've said except that I do not know what a "keystone of opportunity" is. Does it have anything to do with the wholesale distribution of Keystone beer? I am in favor of the distribution of beer downtown. That would aid our efforts to attract tourists. Why Keystone, though? There is better beer to choose from. In all seriousness, since a bunch of the money is coming from the hotel tax, I am not at all opposed to efforts that would enhance tourism. I just happen to think that these funds could be better spent on other projects, even on projects within the downtown area if that is what concerns you the most.

Well, we agree on that much at least. Some actually are worse than others. Red already dissected this issue. And even if you have a point or a partial point, it only comprises a relatively small portion of the total project cost.

Wouldn't a welfare project for traffic engineers entail lots of critical feedback so as to require revision after revision? If so, then that would cause the traffic engineering firms to bid out new projects at a higher fee and to have to hire more traffic engineers. And besides, it isn't as though the development is located on an island with only one shoddy bridge across to it. There are lots of alternative routes. When I shop there, I'm going to drive across the bridge of despair in my deceptively-heavy passenger car. And I shall not care. When the bridge is tore up, I'll drive on down to Heights and turn right at the new intersection at Kohler. If a one-block detour ruins your day, then perhaps yours is such a charmed life that I should envy you; I shall not allow such a trifling nuisance to ruin my day however. Yeah, it's wasn't well written. Okay, so go and read the one for the Gulfgate HEB. At least the scope of work in the case of Ainbinder was such that it would improve infrastructure that Ainbinder was not otherwise required to improve on their own. With Gulfgate...jeez, I'm not going to make a direct accusation, but I sense that it could've bordered on the criminal. The public got nothing.

I am not disputing that this was poorly written, only that many of the other 380 Agreements are worse. If all that a government ever did was to make paper agreements, then those agreements would be worthless. The threat or promise that those agreements shall be kept and enforced are what makes them valuable and worthwhile.

There used to be a small collection of perhaps a half-dozen houses mixed in with mostly commercial properties. The developer of the Target dealt with the discontented neighborhood by literally blockbusting it into oblivion. There was even one holdout that absolutely refused to sell out, and so the developer surrounded and beseiged that house by the pavement for the Target store's parking lot. (You can see it in the April 2006 imagery on Google Earth. It's almost comical.) Eventually even the holdout gave up and sold out. So there is no neighborhood to be adversely impacted. I vaguely recall that Woodland Heights was concerned about traffic going up Watson, but obviously that concern was unwarranted. By comparison, Ainbinder and Wal-Mart have been good corporate citizens. They worked alongside City officials to transform overgrown brownfield sites into a viable shopping center alongside dense new housing with improved civic infrastructure whereas no other proposal could have been brought to fruition within any forseeable time horizon. And now, in only a few weeks time, I will be showing my appreciation for their presence in my urban community by shopping there regularly. Unless of course, I am "no one" persuant to your statement. Am I "no one" to you? Am I less than human, perhaps even verging on the non-sentient on account of my desire to purchase and consume pre-cooked sliced chorizo in deli meat form from the 'Not-Quite-Heights Wal-Mart'?

Presuming that the developer abides by the improvements specified in the 380 Agreement, they will be reimbursed by the City. The City knew what was being proposed by the developer and agreed to it, and even if the City was unaware of the condition of its own bridge at the time, that is their problem...not the developer's. Both parties to the deal should have done due diligence. You seem to have a beef with the City. That's fantastic. I'm not pleased with the way that they've administered 380 Agreements either, and this instance was one of the better-written ones if you can believe it. Send them a message by voting Republican in 2012.

Fine, then the land could be bought and then given away to developers in return for them building something that people want more of. Whatever. I'm just giving a bunch of alternatives, of which all of the alternatives are better than a fuddy duddy cultural center.

Is that sarcasm? I can't tell.

With $32 million, someone could buy up just about as much acreage as is comprised in Discovery Green, all over the south, southeast, and east part of downtown where there are so many surface lots, and donate them to the Parks Board. I'd rather they do that.

Uh yeah, actually I would need a contract in order to take on that kind of a project myself. Someone willing to pay compensate me on a 5% match on total donations would be very much encouraged to step forward.

Is that a contract? For 5% of the take, I'd quit my job today. Hey, but you know this was only the first alternative idea for $32 million that come to mind. It took me maybe three minutes, and it's way better than this cultural center idea. I'm sure that there are even more and even better ideas. We need ideas. Ideas are the cure to dull fuddy-duddy expenditures such as are proposed.

We could, though. All it takes is an organized effort, coupled with the sale of naming rights to the pocket parks. Give them a little plaque and some bricks with donors' engraved names in them. Publicize it well. The program would easily make national news if done properly. Then turn around and solicit old people and their estates for donations of land; give naming rights there as well, where appropriate. Pick up some of the lots from out of tax auctions and constables' sales to stretch the budget. The name of the game is organization. It would take the right person. Someone like myself, properly compensated.

This seems really cheesy. For $32 million to expound upon culture, we could've purchased...more culture. Imagine if the funds were used to purchase a single lot in each inner city neighborhood for a pocket park built around a sculpture comprised of defunct oil & gas scrap metal, welded together (or some such other unifying theme). There you have it. Culture. Something worth exploring Houston's nooks and crannies to see. It'd be the sort of thing that can be sold in miniature at an airport gift shop. "Collect them all!"

Would a moderator please move the tangential comments starting with 'totheskies' post over to the University Line thread, since that was the subject of an old post that he was responding to? Thanks.

Okay. A UH student lives in Cypress and schedules his classes to coincide with the availability of Park & Ride service. This means putting up with 8:30AM or 10:00AM classes. But never mind that those are unpopular. The trip from Cypress P&R to the Northwest Transit Center takes 25 minutes. Continuing into downtown takes another 10 minutes, and then the student can transfer (averaging, say, 4 minutes) to the Southeast Line and continue 3.4 miles to Scott Street or 4.0 miles to Wheeler Street (the student's choice, no transfer necessary). Light rail averages 19mph, so that'll be about another 12 minutes. The student's trip from the Northwest TC to the campus border took 26 minutes. If they had attempted to use the Uptown and University lines from the Northwest TC, that would make for a 12-mile trip on light rail. So that's 4 minutes for the transfer plus 38 minutes for the light rail ride: 42 minutes. Upon approach to the UH campus you can anticipate some combination of transfers and/or walking the remaining one, two, or three quarters of a mile to your classroom. That can vary a great deal, but let's just call it 8 minutes. A commute can be done in either 59 minutes on the Southeast Line or 75 minutes on the University Line at the same cost to the individual. Choose one.

METRO is bound to abide by the City's codified standards for sidewalk widths. That means that METRO should have paid for them. The City of Houston waived that requirement.

Trees spaced out ever so often can provide a psychological barrier between pedestrians and vehicles as well as provide shade, with their roots being accommodated by the extra width of an appropriately-large sidewalk zone as they mature. These are functional enhancements that promote walking and transit use.

I'm not advocating for buried power lines. That gets to be really expensive, and only affects the aesthetic environment. If its that big of a deal to some people, then I'd sooner have the power lines moved to sacrificial side streets (like Uptown did) than pay for burying them. But let's take a step back from that debate because we can both agree that wherever the power lines go, there will be vertical obstructions in a sidewalk that abuts the curb of a street. Between trees (which will mature), signage, light poles, power/telephone poles, garbage cans, and other pedestrians, a narrow sidewalk abutting a major thoroughfare with light rail is a busy place. Abutting means that it starts at the edge of the pavement, where the cars go past at high speed. The extra width in a configuration like this is a mechanism toward safety and the comfort of use. It is not perfectly fine for a normal pedestrian.

I noted a comment on the Swamplot post about the botched sidewalks along the Green Line (fmrly. Brown and/or East) from user Local Planner. It follows: That the city would pay for the sage advice of constituents as mediated through professional planners, and then deliberately ignored it by cutting METRO a break, has managed to piss me off immensely. What is the point of transit without adequate pedestrian infrastructure? How can we fund an underpass and ignore sidewalks? How is it that now that there's a revenue source, we're hearing about streetcars, the most expensive fix to the 'last mile' problem that could possibly be conceived? This is just pitiful. Where is the accountability?

Up until today, I hadn't posted on this thread in many weeks, probably months. And I think that the last time that I had posted, I mostly just wanted to know when the opening date was. If there is a "worst bridges" ranking, I missed it. That's how involved I am in this subject. Would you mind re-posting it?

Look in the mirror. You wouldn't know about the bridge or be vocal about the bridge unless Wal-Mart had prompted you to give a damn. There are lots of bridges in poor condition, but you don't care about those. You care about this one. Why? Wal-Mart. That's why. Wal-Mart trucks have several approaches to their store available to them. They don't need the Yale Street bridge except for the traffic count of passenger vehicles.

I know that I wouldn't want highrises all rising right along the boundaries of Discovery Green. A few gaps above lowrise buildings will let through some light and prevent a sense of claustrophobia. It also opens up view corridors to existing or future development, just so as though one can still see the forest from the trees. In response to your question, though, I doubt that they've given this any thought. They're surely more interested in the experience of people inside the building than outside it. I like this rendering. I hope that it gets built as such.

Does the idea of 'daytime population' as it is applied to urban areas and business districts apply with validity to a university campus? Many students and professors are only there some of the day for twice a week. Many of the staff are part-time, too.