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Office Tower At 1111 Travis St.


burgower4

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With proper maintenance and the occasional rehabilitation, you're looking at centuries for large scale high rises. Recall, that the root cause and reason for demolishing a highrise is (most of the time) not because of engineering design deficiencies, but because of economic constraints such as square footage and altered needs for the land. One could argue that controlling factor for life expectancy of a highrise is not engineering, but rather economics.

Now, my profession deals with the rehabilitation of structures--- including highrises. If I remember correctly, The empire state building and sears tower or both steel frame high rises; the (likely) primary deterioration mechanism that supporting members will undergo is corrosion, thus reducing the structural capacity. Lets say zombie apocalypse happens and the building is totally abandoned. Without maintenance; I'd give your average highrise about 50 years+ before large scale structural collapses could occur- Will the building look like shit before that? hell yes. Will it collapse--- maybe. Will it stand--- maybe?

Quick example: Sterick building in downtown Memphis, TN-- built in the 1930's... Has been abandoned since 1980s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sterick_Building

 http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/may/03/memphis-officials-pushing-plan-redevelop-long-vaca/?print=1

There's plenty of pictures of people sneaking inside and snapping photos all over the net: looks like shit. I guarantee it could be fixed (albeit probably expensive).

A concrete highrise is going to be a different. Carbonatation is a likely (long term) deterioration mechanism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonatation (assuming everything else is perfect. Even then... I'd give it more than 50 years before major major issues started to occur. 

Even in the industrial world, I've worked on process unit structures that are over 100 years old and thats saying a lot since MechE's and ChemE's tend to not give a shit about Civil infrastructure Maintenance 

 

Structurally unsafe caused by deterioration/age on a skyscaper is only going to occur if the owners are negligent that their structural members are deteriorating or the building is abandoned. To give another example, The old Days Inn and Central Square here in Houston have been both abandoned now for several years. I'll put money on the fact that the central square renovation had some structural repairs. 

 

To answer your question in TL:DR form: With proper maintenance and continuous use: A long long time.

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With proper maintenance and the occasional rehabilitation, you're looking at centuries for large scale high rises. Recall, that the root cause and reason for demolishing a highrise is (most of the time) not because of engineering design deficiencies, but because of economic constraints such as square footage and altered needs for the land. One could argue that controlling factor for life expectancy of a highrise is not engineering, but rather economics.

Now, my profession deals with the rehabilitation of structures--- including highrises. If I remember correctly, The empire state building and sears tower or both steel frame high rises; the (likely) primary deterioration mechanism that supporting members will undergo is corrosion, thus reducing the structural capacity. Lets say zombie apocalypse happens and the building is totally abandoned. Without maintenance; I'd give your average highrise about 50 years+ before large scale structural collapses could occur- Will the building look like shit before that? hell yes. Will it collapse--- maybe. Will it stand--- maybe?

Quick example: Sterick building in downtown Memphis, TN-- built in the 1930's... Has been abandoned since 1980s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sterick_Building

 http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/may/03/memphis-officials-pushing-plan-redevelop-long-vaca/?print=1

There's plenty of pictures of people sneaking inside and snapping photos all over the net: looks like shit. I guarantee it could be fixed (albeit probably expensive).

A concrete highrise is going to be a different. Carbonatation is a likely (long term) deterioration mechanism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonatation (assuming everything else is perfect. Even then... I'd give it more than 50 years before major major issues started to occur. 

Even in the industrial world, I've worked on process unit structures that are over 100 years old and thats saying a lot since MechE's and ChemE's tend to not give a shit about Civil infrastructure Maintenance 

 

Structurally unsafe caused by deterioration/age on a skyscaper is only going to occur if the owners are negligent that their structural members are deteriorating or the building is abandoned. To give another example, The old Days Inn and Central Square here in Houston have been both abandoned now for several years. I'll put money on the fact that the central square renovation had some structural repairs. 

 

To answer your question in TL:DR form: With proper maintenance and continuous use: A long long time.

Typically the primary cause for damage in at least houses is rain. A properly roofed house and its floors will last decade, if the roof falls in and the water starts getting into the floors, it's toast and will be a nasty wreck when the bulldozers finally take it out.

Freeways tend to last about 40 years before substantial replacement is needed, that can attributed to less erosion but heavy stress (trucks, mostly). Towers are not subject to that stress. If the old Days Inn/Holiday Inn is to be reopened, any structural damages would likely be caused from vandalism or erosion (again, exterior parts only), unless there were other problems (being a hotel, it was probably built relatively cheaply). That's just a thought, I'm not an engineer. :)

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  • 2 weeks later...

I am overjoyed that they didn't drag their feet on this one and shot a building out of that massive bathtub, but I don't like that wide of a setback on the Travis side.

I guess I might change my mind when its all done, but I doubt it. I am not a big fan of plazas.

The building itself looks like its shaping up to be an interesting one, I just appreciated the mass of the previous occupant of that block, and the shade that it offered.

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Hilcorp is an independent oil and gas company. The property is being developed by Hines. I think the entire building will be occupied by Hilcorp.

 

I think that slightly misstates the situation.  I believe Hines is managing the 1111 Travis construction project.  I don't think it's quite accurate to say the property is being developed by Hines.  Might seem like semantics, but it's a substantive difference.  609 Main is being developed by Hines.  They bought the real property; They made the plans for the building; They own the project.   1111 Travis is owned and is being developed by Hilcorp.  Hines is managing the development for a contractual fee paid by Hilcorp.

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Does anyone know what Hilcorp's plans are for the block they own across Travis St, where everyone has vacated (except for Subway)?

Also IIRC, didn't 1111 Travis recieve tax incentives from the city for including retail?

Edited by tigereye
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With proper maintenance and the occasional rehabilitation, you're looking at centuries for large scale high rises. Recall, that the root cause and reason for demolishing a highrise is (most of the time) not because of engineering design deficiencies, but because of economic constraints such as square footage and altered needs for the land. One could argue that controlling factor for life expectancy of a highrise is not engineering, but rather economics.

Now, my profession deals with the rehabilitation of structures--- including highrises. If I remember correctly, The empire state building and sears tower or both steel frame high rises; the (likely) primary deterioration mechanism that supporting members will undergo is corrosion, thus reducing the structural capacity. Lets say zombie apocalypse happens and the building is totally abandoned. Without maintenance; I'd give your average highrise about 50 years+ before large scale structural collapses could occur- Will the building look like shit before that? hell yes. Will it collapse--- maybe. Will it stand--- maybe?

Quick example: Sterick building in downtown Memphis, TN-- built in the 1930's... Has been abandoned since 1980s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sterick_Building

http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/may/03/memphis-officials-pushing-plan-redevelop-long-vaca/?print=1

There's plenty of pictures of people sneaking inside and snapping photos all over the net: looks like shit. I guarantee it could be fixed (albeit probably expensive).

A concrete highrise is going to be a different. Carbonatation is a likely (long term) deterioration mechanism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonatation (assuming everything else is perfect. Even then... I'd give it more than 50 years before major major issues started to occur.

Even in the industrial world, I've worked on process unit structures that are over 100 years old and thats saying a lot since MechE's and ChemE's tend to not give a shit about Civil infrastructure Maintenance

Structurally unsafe caused by deterioration/age on a skyscaper is only going to occur if the owners are negligent that their structural members are deteriorating or the building is abandoned. To give another example, The old Days Inn and Central Square here in Houston have been both abandoned now for several years. I'll put money on the fact that the central square renovation had some structural repairs.

To answer your question in TL:DR form: With proper maintenance and continuous use: A long long time.

Doesn't steel become brittle after being bent or stressed a certain number of times (like in the millions)? Stressed by wind, for example.

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