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Bank Of America Tower: Office Building For Downtown


barracuda

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This tower is 100% getting built.  There is no way Skanska would have moved forward with the mat pour on such a prime piece of real estate if they weren't certain the rest of the tower would be built.  Their development team is smart. They don't want chump change from parking contracts, they want big bucks from leases.  It's not a question of if, but when.  

 

I can also confirm that parking on half of the block will go to 8 and the rest to street level.  

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This tower is 100% getting built.  There is no way Skanska would have moved forward with the mat pour on such a prime piece of real estate if they weren't certain the rest of the tower would be built.  Their development team is smart. They don't want chump change from parking contracts, they want big bucks from leases.  It's not a question of if, but when.  

 

I can also confirm that parking on half of the block will go to 8 and the rest to street level.  

That's not true, they could absolutely pour the mat and still not be ready to move forward with the tower.  They have not started construction on the office segment yet, but pouring the foundation will show any interested tenants that Skanska is ready to move forward and help "push" tenants over the finish line.  It is hard for a tenant to committ to such a large expense without a little more skin from the landlord, I know of one that is very close and will likely make the decision to relocate to Capitol Tower.  I guess we will see.

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I guess I have a hard time seeing how the can split the garage from the tower. From the floor plans that cspwal show, they are so Intigrated that building up half looks impossible. Tunnel/steet level atrium straddles the footprint of both halves. And the elevator shafts for the garage are between the elevator shafts of the tower. Could they really build them as seperate cores? I don't think that this is like houston first building where the garage and the office/hotel building are built completely ape rarely.

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My guess about why building just part of the parking garage makes sense:  There is a lot of demand for parking in that part of downtown, but I imagine that they'd also like to have some dedicated in building parking for tenants without having to terminate a bunch of contracts in place.

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This tower is 100% getting built.  There is no way Skanska would have moved forward with the mat pour on such a prime piece of real estate if they weren't certain the rest of the tower would be built.  Their development team is smart. They don't want chump change from parking contracts, they want big bucks from leases.  It's not a question of if, but when.  

 

I can also confirm that parking on half of the block will go to 8 and the rest to street level.  

 

Definitely agree with this. Plus its going to take several months just to get to the point where they will be even close to the mid-rise portion. At that point they will have probably locked in a tenant.

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https://www.bisnow.com/houston/news/deal-sheet/this-weeks-houston-deal-sheet-49718

 

Skanska and subcontractor Baker Concrete Construction completed the mat foundation pour for the future Capitol Tower development Downtown. The two-day operation laid a 35k SF footprint and used 9,300 cubic yards of concrete and 2.4M pounds of rebar. Capitol Tower is one of only three buildings in the US to receive LEED Platinum v4 pre-certification. That sustainability was at play during the mat pour—60% of the cement needed was replaced with fly ash, a recycled product that will prevent 1 million pounds of CO2 emissions. Skanska will also complete the seven-story garage on the southern portion of the property and continue construction on the north side up to street level, but will not go vertical on its 35-story, 750k SF office tower until it locks in an anchor tenant.

Read more at: https://www.bisnow.com/houston/news/deal-sheet/this-weeks-houston-deal-sheet-49718?utm_source=CopyShare&utm_medium=Browser

Edited by DrLan34
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Found this note on a Houston development map:

 

 

Capitol Tower Parking Garage

"Originally planned as a 35-story LEED v4 Platinum office building has now been reduced to a 7-story, 300-space parking garage. Estimated completion 4Q 2015"

 

That can't be right. 

 

http://devmap.io/developments/capitol-tower-parking-garage

 

We noted that a few pages back and it is consistent with Skanska's public statements. They say that they will be able to build the tower whenever they get a tenant, so they have to get the common foundation/base ready to go, which is what we see now.  I doubt we'll be able to tell what is the status of that actually is until they max out the garage portion and keep building or stop right there and pack up the cranes. Hopefully they'll announce something before that.

 

They're putting up forms for ramps right now.

Edited by Nate99
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Found this note on a Houston development map:

 

 

Capitol Tower Parking Garage

"Originally planned as a 35-story LEED v4 Platinum office building has now been reduced to a 7-story, 300-space parking garage. Estimated completion 4Q 2015"

 

That can't be right. 

 

http://devmap.io/developments/capitol-tower-parking-garage

 

Yeah whoever made an edit to this makes it seem as if the tower has been canned. I've edit the link so the correct info should be up soon.

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We noted that a few pages back and it is consistent with Skanska's public statements. They say that they will be able to build the tower whenever they get a tenant, so they have to get the common foundation/base ready to go, which is what we see now.  I doubt we'll be able to tell what is the status of that actually is until they max out the garage portion and keep building or stop right there and pack up the cranes. Hopefully they'll announce something before that.

 

They're putting up forms for ramps right now.

 

Thanks Nate, the way it was written sounded as if they gave up on the tower and were going to build the garage and call it a day. 

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Found this note on a Houston development map:

 

 

Capitol Tower Parking Garage

"Originally planned as a 35-story LEED v4 Platinum office building has now been reduced to a 7-story, 300-space parking garage. Estimated completion 4Q 2015"

 

That can't be right. 

 

http://devmap.io/developments/capitol-tower-parking-garage

That's updated by us... wouldn't really take it as news worthy.

 

 

Missed all these other posts.

Edited by Triton
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  • 2 weeks later...

They have to build the garage out so they can get the tunnel back in operation. I don't believe they are going to start a spec

building in these economic conditions. Especially with mergers going on like Williams. They are just completing what they were

obligated to do and that was finish the garage and reopen the tunnel. That way they'll have some revenue coming in while they

wait out this downturn. These people are not into risk taking. They're northern Europeans and they make conservative plays.

It will get built but unless there is a major player ready to take a huge chunk of space it's going on the back burner

no matter how loud everyone screams.

I'm disappointed also but it's not the end of the world. I was really liking the unobstructed view of the Pennzoil. That will be gone very soon.

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I don't believe they are going to start a spec building in these economic conditions.

 

Although the Houston economy is certainly declining (over 3,000 construction jobs in Houston lost I read in a report this week), there are still certainly large corporations outside of oil that are looking for space. I know for instance that CBRE is expanding its office space to the Memorial Herman Tower in Memorial City. There are financial corporations that can certainly take advantage of this newer space and leave an older tower. I'm sure someone like Houston19514 has the info on when the leases are up for some of these big businesses.

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That is the damn lobby of the tower from the renderings... how has there not been an announcement yet?

 

Keep in mind - the original plan to not disturb Those Whose Parking Shall Not Be Disturbedtm got disturbed when the implosion of the southern half of the block didn't go as planned.  As a result, the original plan of building up the garage on the south half and then continuing with the garage and tower on the north half got chucked into the dumper.  

 

IIRC, the plan now is to build about 1/2 - 2/3 of the garage across the entire block, with the remainder of the garage and the tower going up later once the tenant situation justifies.  Regardless of how long that ends up taking, it does result in the original lobby getting at least roughed in, if not built out (which might result in The Parking Ramp With The Most Spectacular Lobby In The Worldtm).

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Why doesn't Houston try to land other companies outside of oil and gas?

See the Ellington Spaceport and TMCs new innovation/research collaborative developments if you don't think Houston is working on expanding beyond O&G.. The city/it's people are trying to boost the presence of other fields, but I somewhat agree that Houston doesn't seem to do enough to attract businesses outside of O&G.. Why didn't Houston make a big push for Genteral Electric?

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  • The title was changed to Bank Of America Tower: Office Building For Downtown

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