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smurf

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Everything posted by smurf

  1. As much as I respect private development right , but not at the expense of others property rights. Corporations have rights (according to te Supreme Court), but we the people have rights too and a corporation cannot trimuiph over others rights (according to Supreme Court too). Do we not have the right to protest if their development affects our property rights, property value and quality of life such as traffic, utitlities? If you think outside of your one-track mind of economics and think in terms of the big picture. Life is not all about making money. It's as simple as that. Any neighborhood (West End and Lower Heights near Yale especially) would be seriously impacted by traffic. Currently Yale is not big enough to accommodate traffic, and it will affect all the surrounding neighborhoods. On top of that, the Walmart entry is on Koehler side because Yale side is below grade in this section to accommodate the rail line underpass. Does the city not do a (non-rubber stamp) traffic study before issuing permit? It may surprise some of the jaded commenters in this thread, these neighborhoods (townhomes etc), are already a pretty high value residential tax base evolved in this past decade. The city should be enouraging this and not destroying it. This area got the train quiet zone passed. Some of the commentors (who do not live off Washington) complain on clubs and bar, instead of welcoming influx of local money into the area because it is causing many city infrastructural developments to happen in the last few years than have happened in the last 40 years. These townhomes you think are so sub-standard, are built to the same standards as houses in most Houston subdivisions which means they will get re-built on 30-40 years from now and do require regular maintainence as any other house. Nothing in America is built to 100 year standards anymore unless you are willing to 3 or 4 times the price. FYI - Yale is also the route in Phase 3 of Washnington Ave light rail. I am guessing the city will be giving up on that now. I hope the city takes all these issues into the permit. City fo Houston and surrounding neighborhood had no control over TXDOT's feeder expansion, but we the people have control over our city. BTW, I am assuming this site will go thru environmental assessment and cleanup, or just be padded over because there was a heavy industry operating there for most of the last century. Most of the time, it was predates environmental regulations. I have previously stated my specific concerns with Walmart i.e. 30 hour work week, low pay, no health insurance for workers, most workers on mediaid etc programs, ruthless anti- market practices bordering on anti-trust to drive out small businesses, no neighborhood community involvement because it's not in the big picture, quality of products, sourcing of product, enviornmental, sutainability, and community responsibilities that are part of being a public corporation. So I wont dive it them again.
  2. None of you guys talk about poor people having access to good quality foods. Walmart certainly does not provide that. Walmart certainly does not educate the people on how much hormone and anti-bodies are put into USDA beef or chicken (enough to be banned in Canada and Europe). That is a whole another topic. All I want to say on this is that poor people are not blind lemmings that go for cheapest mass produced foods. And yes, if Walmart was so concerned about poor people, it would build a store in a poorer part of town. They are interested in the big picture. They only prefer big suppliers. Majority of their new employees in the last few years mostly work 30 hrs per week to keep them off health care. I expect Rice Military and 6th ward and surrounding neighborhoods to join the Heights and West End to fight Walmart mainly because it will hurt them in the pocket book i.e. lowering all immediate area property values. Walmart has a history of lowering property value within the mile (at least) besides lowering prices. Walmart does not have a reputation of catering to the neighborhood. It would be stupid of all the super 22 neighborhoods to not oppose this. I also expect all the real estate companies in the area to oppose this b/c they will seriously lose money. And Heights is not immune either from this. This will make a case for Yale expansion? Who else in the Heights want Yale to be like Shepherd or Durham? Also, I do hope the city does a traffic survey on adjacent streets. Currently, Yale and Heights Blvd cannot sustain an influx of a few thousand additional cars coming in. For that matter neigher can Washington Ave. Plus the impact on neighborhhod streets which are already too small for the turcks & SUVs the yuppies that. Also, on a related point, who else thinks why TXDOT was pushing to start the feeder road on I-10 all of a suddely and very quickly, and with major objections flooding, enviornmental and traffic concerns from the surrounding neighboorhoods. (Even the city has said this will increase flooding but they have no control over what TXDOT does)
  3. This Target complex and associated properties had so much potential but it is becoming a corporate franchises mecca. Sadly, my prediction is this Target is enroute to becoming the next ghetto Target. I have never eaten at all the strip mall chain restuarants in this Target area because why would you want to when we are blessed with so many local places in this area.
  4. A person from West Side of Houston was trying to convince me that the City Centre is the natural center of Houston. I just said, you are joking, right? I said it's basically re-invented mall with residences. they are popping up every where in the country in suburban neighborhoods and cities. Having said that, it is still better than having old style huge parking lot malls.
  5. great place and was pretty busy with "old school" downtown crowd this past weekend. downtown needs more of these places!!! it definitely caters to locals residents too.
  6. It's not exclusively British, it is worldwide. CBD (central business district) or City centre (CC) are more common terms than Downtown.
  7. That is low!!! It is like a Tex-Mex place charging for chips & salsa or ice tea refills. Also, so does this mean people with celiac disease have to pay extra to get a soy replacement?
  8. Thanks for the Nippon advice! I keep forgetting about that place. Osaka is good too. Kaneyama & Sushi Jin are too far away. Last time I tried Kaneyama, it was actually excellent.
  9. Washinton Avenue needs a bit of restuarant diversity to compliment the Heights proper ... Some suggestions for your entrepreneurs - Late Nite Curry? - Ethiopian? - A good La Fendee or Niko Niko's type of Mediterranean place (Chatters does not cut it). - A Mongolian hot bowl place?
  10. Soma (Washington @ Shepherd) has the best sushi happy hour pricing on Sundays. It's almost half-price including drinks. Ask for Sunday specials. I think it runs from 4 to 9pm. I have been impressed thus far. On another subject, I think Houston need some simple good urban sushi places like they have in JAPAN and west coast cities like Seattle, San Fran etc. None of those $15 dollar fancy rolls. I just fish, udon bowls, yakatori etc. There used to be a nice one in downtown few years ago where a bar now sits across from House of Blues. Oiishi is the closest simple but good Japanese place I have found in the city area but it is far away (Richmond @ Timmons) for a regular outing. I am not sure if the pretenious elements moving to Midtown lately will ever concieve of such concepts.
  11. This is definiely the best project to come to Houston since the Midtown Post development which created (renewed) a whole neighbordood in Houston (It is another story how CVS, Chase & Wachovia strip malls killed off it's expansion). This project will happen but the only question is how much this project will change before construction starts. Initial grand scale was nicer than this current version. Anyways, this project has to happen because my money went to paying for this for 3 years via Allen house! Irfan
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