Texas Tower: 47-Story Office Tower At 845 Texas Ave.

[lockmat]

51 minutes ago, KinkaidAlum said:

The McDonald's was taken down for a proposed apartment/condo tower called The Shamrock. 

 

Is the a picture pre and post Shamrock available?

[IronTiger]

12 hours ago, lockmat said:

 

Is the a picture pre and post Shamrock available?

I've seen a rendering of the Shamrock here a long time ago. If it's available, it's nestled on old pages of HAIF from circa 2004-2005. I can't imagine the pictures still work. As for the McDonald's on the site, I'd like to see a picture of that too!

[H-Town Man]

On ‎5‎/‎14‎/‎2016 at 9:54 AM, IronTiger said:

I've seen a rendering of the Shamrock here a long time ago. If it's available, it's nestled on old pages of HAIF from circa 2004-2005. I can't imagine the pictures still work. As for the McDonald's on the site, I'd like to see a picture of that too!

 

Picture the most average circa 1980 suburban McDonald's you can, only with tall buildings all around it and more parking instead of a playground.

 

[Houston19514]

On 5/13/2016 at 1:21 PM, bobruss said:

I believe that Hines has bought property in the past in downtown and demolished buildings and held the property for a few years before proceeding with development. Please verify or correct me but it seems someone has quoted that before. I also spoke with one of the very high up officials in the company who happens to be the next door neighbor to family and he said it will be a while before anything is done with the property. There is no incentive to start another project right now due to our economic state, and to do differently would be unsound judgement in my mind. I don't know how many of you were around in 1985, at the height of the oil bath but the  investors in the Heritage Plaza were the last ones in the building boom to start construction and before the slab was dry they were filing for bankruptcy. With millions of square feet of sub lease available downtown and 22,000 new inside the loop apartments almost  10,000 of them downtown why build even if your talking 3 years for completion. The oil companies won't be absorbing that space for a while and its going to take several years to fill whats being built right now. 

Perfect example is BG Place soon to be 00Place. It will happen but I think its going to be a parking lot for a while.

I hope not but history says they will wait.

 

We have found one example of Hines buying a property and holding it for a few years before developing it (or selling it).  But even in that case (the site of 1000 Main), it was likely never their intention to hold it for any significant period of time before developing; events intervened.  Holding property for later development does not seem to be Hines' MO.

[lockmat]

Courtesy of fellow HAIFer and their website http://arch-ive.org/archive/houston-chronicle/

 

 

and...

 

 

http://www.cah.utexas.edu/db/dmr/image_lg.php?variable=e_bb_1156

Edited May 26, 2016 by lockmat

[H-Town Man]

On ‎5‎/‎16‎/‎2016 at 11:37 AM, Houston19514 said:

 

We have found one example of Hines buying a property and holding it for a few years before developing it (or selling it).  But even in that case (the site of 1000 Main), it was likely never their intention to hold it for any significant period of time before developing; events intervened.  Holding property for later development does not seem to be Hines' MO.

 

I believe they had control of the current site of 609 Main back around the time they were developing BG Group Place, circa 2008. There was a fuzzy rendering on here of a building for that site and rumor that development was imminent but then the recession hit. So it seems like they held onto that site for around 5-6 years before 609 Main was announced.

 

[lockmat]

7 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I believe they had control of the current site of 609 Main back around the time they were developing BG Group Place, circa 2008. There was a fuzzy rendering on here of a building for that site and rumor that development was imminent but then the recession hit. So it seems like they held onto that site for around 5-6 years before 609 Main was announced.

 

 

Per HCAD:

 

Owner	Effective Date
HCG BLOCK 69 LLC	3/12/2008

[Houston19514]

16 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I believe they had control of the current site of 609 Main back around the time they were developing BG Group Place, circa 2008. There was a fuzzy rendering on here of a building for that site and rumor that development was imminent but then the recession hit. So it seems like they held onto that site for around 5-6 years before 609 Main was announced.

 

 

True.  But 5-6 years is not a long holding period in the commercial real estate world; it's almost inconsequential.

 

Edited May 26, 2016 by Houston19514

[bobruss]

Actually that was a different developer who was planning to build a fairly tall maybe 40 stories high rise residential condos. I think it was called the Shamrock 

and even had a green tiled roof. That was probable ten or twelve years ago. They are the ones who tore down the McDonalds.

[H-Town Man]

8 minutes ago, bobruss said:

Actually that was a different developer who was planning to build a fairly tall maybe 40 stories high rise residential condos. I think it was called the Shamrock 

and even had a green tiled roof. That was probable ten or twelve years ago. They are the ones who tore down the McDonalds.

 

I wasn't thinking of the Shamrock. This was circa 2008 and it was Hines.

 

[Montrose1100]

36 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I wasn't thinking of the Shamrock. This was circa 2008 and it was Hines.

 

It was a smaller, bluer version of the residential/hotel component of the BBVA complex in Uptown. Can't remember for sure if it was for this site or an early proposal for BG Group when he was probably sizing it for Hess.

[bobruss]

I don't know about that one but I can't remember who the developer was for the Shamrock on the site where 609 Main is going up now. I remember seeing the big sign on the

corner with a picture of the high rise. Does anyone remember anything else about that doomed project? They even had a sales trailer on site and I stopped by and got a brochure for it. Kincaidalum can you remember any details. My old brain just can't keep up with al this info.

[nativehoustonion]

Hines owned 609 Main for many years.  It was a parking lot, but look now!  I have read a lot of his books. Very smart man, he will do another highrise.  He took a chance on Pennzoil Place and received awards.  He eats brocolli everyday and he is 90!  Fabu person!

[lockmat]

1 hour ago, nativehoustonion said:

Hines owned 609 Main for many years.  It was a parking lot, but look now!  I have read a lot of his books. Very smart man, he will do another highrise.  He took a chance on Pennzoil Place and received awards.  He eats brocolli everyday and he is 90!  Fabu person!

I didn't know Gerald was an author!

[Montrose1100]

15 hours ago, bobruss said:

I don't know about that one but I can't remember who the developer was for the Shamrock on the site where 609 Main is going up now. I remember seeing the big sign on the

corner with a picture of the high rise. Does anyone remember anything else about that doomed project? They even had a sales trailer on site and I stopped by and got a brochure for it. Kincaidalum can you remember any details. My old brain just can't keep up with al this info.

Architect was EDI (Mercer). There was a lot of balconies and green turrets on the top. The trailer and partial fence remained there for years. 

[H-Town Man]

20 hours ago, bobruss said:

I don't know about that one but I can't remember who the developer was for the Shamrock on the site where 609 Main is going up now. I remember seeing the big sign on the

corner with a picture of the high rise. Does anyone remember anything else about that doomed project? They even had a sales trailer on site and I stopped by and got a brochure for it. Kincaidalum can you remember any details. My old brain just can't keep up with al this info.

 

Tracy Suttles

[mollusk]

On 5/27/2016 at 7:18 AM, Montrose1100 said:

Architect was EDI (Mercer). There was a lot of balconies and green turrets on the top. The trailer and partial fence remained there for years. 

 

I didn't know that it was the same architect as Mercer, though it makes sense... Here's a link

[nate4l1f3]

On May 14, 2016 at 9:46 PM, lockmat said:

 

Is the a picture pre and post Shamrock available?

I believe this is it. 

[Urbannizer]

http://swamplot.com/form

er-chronicle-building-tunnel-back-open-during-demo-limbo/2016-06-07/

The management at 717 Louisiana St. has sent out word to tenants that the tunnel segment beneath the vacated downtown Houston Chronicle building is now open again, even though the newspaper’s former headquarters at 801 Texas Ave. are still standing on top of it. Documents filed with the Harris County district clerk’s office show that Hines agreed to hold off on the demo for a while, after Linbeck’s Theater Square group filed a lawsuit to stop them.

***

That filing was on the Wednesday after the Tax Day flood (though the city still gave its OK on the knockdown in mid-May). A hearing on the case appears to have been rescheduled a few times — most recently for late June. Theater Square wants to connect the tunnel segment to an adjacent property across Prairie St. by Market Square, using some structures in the Chronicle building’s basement; the group claims in the suit that Hines has been trying to stop it from doing so, allegedly in violation of a contract Hines inherited when it bought 801 Texas last year from news conglomerate and previous owner Hearst Corporation.

[bobruss]

I think they are just unhappy with Hines for getting the jump on 609 Main before they were able to get their project on this site started.

Perhaps sour grapes. They could have stuck it out there like Hines did and built theirs as a spec building if they were really serious.

Thats what Hines did.

[Urbannizer]

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/Downtown-developers-spar-over-tunnel-access-8319708.php#photo-10105695

 

One of the city's biggest developers is in court this week as a judge works to determine whether it is trying to hinder a competitor's access to downtown's vital tunnel system.

 

Hines wants to demolish the current structure and eventually redo the existing tunnel connector in a way that makes sense for the foundations. Hines and a group of investors purchased the Hearst property at 801 Texas last year for $54 million, testimony showed. Attorneys said the property was purchased for a "high-grade, Class A skyscraper."

 

A representative for Hines said during the hearing that its construction there could begin as early as fall 2017 and architects are being interviewed for the project.

The judge is set to decide on the temporary injunction in the next few weeks. A trial over the tunnel connecting the two properties is scheduled for January.

[HoustonIsHome]

On 4/6/2016 at 4:56 PM, Sunstar said:

Not to mention the fact that there's already a giant parking lot right next to this location by Market Square. 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong but other than the Chronicle, Chase and Exxon, isn't every last building on the east frontage of Milam between market square and the Days Inn a parking garage? 

 

I know there are some on the Travis side,  but Milam is pretty much all parking garage other than Chase, Chronicle and Exxon.

 

With the chronicle building and Houston club gone chase and Exxon with be the only non parking building on the left side of Milam from Market Square ask the way down to The Days Inn.

 

There is the International surface lot, then the Chronicle  surface parking, then Chase, then Skanska garage, then Esperson Garage, then garage,  then garage then garage .... all the way down to Bell where the is surface parking on one side and Exxon on the other.

 

Kind of sad that there are basically only two non parking buildings fronting that side of Milam. 

 

 

[houstontexasjack]

Looks as though Hines retained Baker Botts to draft the briefing and Rusty Hardin to do the oral arguments.  "Sour grapes" might be accurate--the briefing suggests Theater Square tried to buy the Chronicle property and failed.

[wxman]

"High-grade, Class A skyscraper." Hmm, do they classify all their projects like this or could this block really house a skyscraper unknown to any city outside New York?

[MarathonMan]

31 minutes ago, wxman said:

"High-grade, Class A skyscraper." Hmm, do they classify all their projects like this or could this block really house a skyscraper unknown to any city outside New York?

The former.

[hindesky]

[Urbannizer]

 

[Timoric]

-

Edited July 10, 2019 by Timoric

[Montrose1100]

3 hours ago, Timoric said:

 

I hope that Gerald Hines wants to leave his mark on Houston with the biggest and best skyscraper this city has ever seen. It isn't out of the realm of possible. I read on here he lives in London but maybe he wants to do something like that for Houston.

I've always wondered what a random super tall at the edge of the skyline would look like. Would be extremely dramatic from the North & East.

[Avossos]

13 hours ago, Timoric said:

 

I hope that Gerald Hines wants to leave his mark on Houston with the biggest and best skyscraper this city has ever seen. It isn't out of the realm of possible. I read on here he lives in London but maybe he wants to do something like that for Houston.

He lives in Houston, too