2/10/20 Meeting For Public Input Re: Bridge Over Brazos St. At Spur 527

[trymahjong]

Meeting hosted by Westmoreland Civic at The Montrose Center 401 Branard, 7:30 pm. The meeting will focus on public input concerning bridge only; specifically if it is possible to convert to green space.COH public works has also been invited.

[trymahjong]

I ( and 50 others) attended an almost  kum-bah-ya gathering to turn Bagbystreet that accesses Spur 527, and Brazos bridge to a green space.

 

A few  things stood out to me:

COH owns the land in this proposal , not TxDot, plus willing to go forward without TxDot approval.

The money saved ( minus “spanking” fee from TxDot could see this project started and mostly finished.) might find other money.

Since TxDot doesn’t own it COH would have more leeway in dealing with potential homeless problem.

YES there probably is potential homeless problem but these residents who literally live next door to 527 Spur, would rather deal with homeless and have less traffic noise from spur.

Big statistics thrown out that Bagby doesn’t have that much traffic ( COH/PWE speak for “ not that many Courtlandt Place access users nor Hawthorne street access users)  leaving Smith street and Louisiana ( with a few PWE safety tweaks)  more suited anyway.

COH/PWE are prepared to accommodate the Lower Westheimer reconstruction— when ever that happens

 

you get to vote Yes or No and provide comments............it might or might not be useful....apparently Midtown businesses haven’t weighed in yet.

Buildforward@houstontx.go

 

Midtown Superneighborhood  will have meeting on this subject soon.

 

 

 

Edited February 11, 2020 by trymahjong

[Naviguessor]

Gotta say, this would open up a nice conduit from Montrose to The Innovation District and Mid Main.  

[wilcal]

The rendering is 😍

 

 

I used to live in Westmoreland, and it is so dangerous crossing at Holman. 

 

This would be a real benefit for the area. 

[bulldog]

4 hours ago, wilcal said:

The rendering is 😍

 

 

I used to live in Westmoreland, and it is so dangerous crossing at Holman. 

 

This would be a real benefit for the area. 

"Bagby doesn’t have that much traffic." LOL. This creates a private Spur on-ramp for Westmoreland? No wonder they're in favor. If I could get the government to close the streets by my house to the public and only let me use them, I'd probably be in favor of that too. Doesn't mean it makes any real sense.

[Texasota]

Fantastic. This would be a huge improvement, and I really like the idea of the City pushing against TXDOT's biases here.

[wilcal]

1 hour ago, bulldog said:

"Bagby doesn’t have that much traffic." LOL. This creates a private Spur on-ramp for Westmoreland? No wonder they're in favor. If I could get the government to close the streets by my house to the public and only let me use them, I'd probably be in favor of that too. Doesn't mean it makes any real sense.

 

That is the existing road. It wouldn't go onto the spur.

 

Edit: Also, I lived in Westmoreland for almost 5 years, I would be shocked if anybody that lived there would prefer to have a private spur onto the highway (and have traffic funnel through the neighborhood to get there) versus losing access into the neighborhood from Bagby. 

Edited February 11, 2020 by wilcal

[Moore713]

3 hours ago, Texasota said:

Fantastic. This would be a huge improvement, and I really like the idea of the City pushing against TXDOT's biases here.

Cities need to take more control anyway..Txdox doesn't give a damn about who has to live in these areas 

[H-Town Man]

Hopefully this is the first of several phases in eliminating the spur. The Main Street Master Plan in 2001 called for the spur to be replaced with a tree-lined boulevard.

 

[ToryGattis]

9 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

Hopefully this is the first of several phases in eliminating the spur. The Main Street Master Plan in 2001 called for the spur to be replaced with a tree-lined boulevard.

 

 

That would be a disaster, not just in traffic flow to/from downtown, but it would suffocate many of the businesses in Midtown that count on that flow (Specs, Whole Foods, Randalls, and others).  I don't want Midtown to go back to being a food/grocery desert.  I also think a big part of the densification in Midtown is the easy access to/from 59, including big job centers at Greenway and Uptown (and even Westpark to Westchase).

 

My own views on the spur closing/park on my blog here:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2020/02/could-houston-get-google-converting-59.html

[H-Town Man]

2 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

That would be a disaster, not just in traffic flow to/from downtown, but it would suffocate many of the businesses in Midtown that count on that flow (Specs, Whole Foods, Randalls, and others).  I don't want Midtown to go back to being a food/grocery desert.  I also think a big part of the densification in Midtown is the easy access to/from 59, including big job centers at Greenway and Uptown (and even Westpark to Westchase).

 

My own views on the spur closing/park on my blog here:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2020/02/could-houston-get-google-converting-59.html

 

Yes, I've seen your blog post. Not surprising at all that you are opposed to this, since you always favor more concrete and non-stop traffic lanes over anything else and even have a co-blogger who goes by "MaxConcrete." As to your arguments that this will hurt Midtown, I think they are thin and specious, but we will see what the local residents themselves think. Now that there is a strong and growing local population, we no longer need to worry about freeway access and high traffic exposure to benefit the neighborhood. Can you agree that this is a decision that should be driven by local residents first and foremost?

 

[ToryGattis]

Just now, H-Town Man said:

 

Yes, I've seen your blog post. Not surprising at all that you are opposed to this, since you always favor more concrete and non-stop traffic lanes over anything else and even have a co-blogger who goes by "MaxConcrete." As to your arguments that this will hurt Midtown, I think they are thin and specious, but we will see what the local residents themselves think. Now that there is a strong and growing local population, we no longer need to worry about freeway access and high traffic exposure to benefit the neighborhood. Can you agree that this is a decision that should be driven by local residents first and foremost?

 

 

Nope. I think it needs to be a balance of local residents with the needs of the greater community and metro area.  Local residents almost always try to get all the benefits while pushing as many of the costs as possible on others.

 

I think the robust freeway network is what has built Houston into the powerhouse metro that it is - #5 in the country.  Without it, we would be a tiny fraction of what we are now.

 

Yeah, I'm not a fan of that screen name either, lol.  But he's a good, thoughtful guy that does great analysis.

[H-Town Man]

Just now, ToryGattis said:

 

Nope. I think it needs to be a balance of local residents with the needs of the greater community and metro area.  Local residents almost always try to get all the benefits while pushing as many of the costs as possible on others.

 

I think the robust freeway network is what has built Houston into the powerhouse metro that it is - #5 in the country.  Without it, we would be a tiny fraction of what we are now.

 

Yeah, I'm not a fan of that screen name either, lol.  But he's a good, thoughtful guy that does great analysis.

 

The robust freeway network has been important and continues to be important. But for about 70 years now, nearly every decision has gone in favor of freeways over local neighborhoods. Now that we have some truly successful urban neighborhoods starting to develop, it is time to reverse some of those historic bad decisions and shift the balance more in favor of neighborhoods. That means getting rid of freeway spurs that stick into developing high density areas and essentially function as takeoff ramps for people flying out to Sugarland.

 

Also time to notice that it's not 1980 anymore and the world favors parks over concrete. It also favors streets over tunnels, another issue that you have taken the wrong side of. You told us for years that walkable neighborhoods would never work in Houston because people can't carry portable air conditioners, but the last 10 years has shown that they work very well when they are allowed to develop and aren't covered in concrete ramps with jerks in BMWs going 60 MPH. But I haven't seen an acknowledgment of this from you, just more pushing the 1980 paradigm.

 

[ToryGattis]

20 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

The robust freeway network has been important and continues to be important. But for about 70 years now, nearly every decision has gone in favor of freeways over local neighborhoods. Now that we have some truly successful urban neighborhoods starting to develop, it is time to reverse some of those historic bad decisions and shift the balance more in favor of neighborhoods. That means getting rid of freeway spurs that stick into developing high density areas and essentially function as takeoff ramps for people flying out to Sugarland.

 

Also time to notice that it's not 1980 anymore and the world favors parks over concrete. It also favors streets over tunnels, another issue that you have taken the wrong side of. You told us for years that walkable neighborhoods would never work in Houston because people can't carry portable air conditioners, but the last 10 years has shown that they work very well when they are allowed to develop and aren't covered in concrete ramps with jerks in BMWs going 60 MPH. But I haven't seen an acknowledgment of this from you, just more pushing the 1980 paradigm.

 

 

I've never been opposed to walkable neighborhoods. In fact, quite the opposite. But they need to be stitched together with a robust arterial and freeway network.  From a post of mine 14 years ago (!):

 

"I think New Urbanism needs to realize it is a great paradigm at the neighborhood level, but that those neighborhoods need to be linked together with a freeway and arterial network across a larger region if you want an integrated and cohesive metro economy. The pedestrian and the car operate at totally different scales (3mph vs. 30-60mph), and therefore the right form factors for each are different. You don't build a city around just the pedestrian or just the car, but for both. Getting militant about one over the other makes about as much sense as asking "should our country be built around the car or the airplane?" Well, the answer is both: the car for shorter distances, and the airplane for longer ones - and that means interstates and airports. The same logic applies at the scale of a city/metro-region: you need freeways for longer distances, arterials for medium distances, and narrow streets with sidewalks for very short distances (i.e. the pedestrian district/neighborhood). New Urbanism makes the very valid point that we've sort of forgotten about that last category over the last few decades - and we're now rediscovering it - but that doesn't invalidate the other two scales any more than they invalidated the pedestrian scale."

...

"The bottom line is that citizen mobility = urban vibrancy. New Urbanists need to focus on building great neighborhoods and let traffic engineers decide the right way to knit those neighborhoods together into a great city."

 

There's more in that post as well:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2006/02/new-urbanism-and-value-of-mobility.html

and another relevant one is my application of Jane Jacob's principles to a car-based city like Houston:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2006/05/applying-jane-jacobs-4-tenets-of.html

 

Edited February 15, 2020 by ToryGattis

[mollusk]

Milam and Smith provide the lion's share of the traffic going to the Southwest Freeway; Louisiana and Travis have always taken practically all of the northbound traffic.  The reality is that Brazos and Bagby don't connect well to downtown.  Brazos dies at the south end of Allen Center, and Bagby is a rambling indirect cluster between Pierce and Dallas.  Taking it out of the theoretical, the bridge to Brazos has now been closed for months without any noticeable negative effect.

[dbigtex56]

Speaking as a pedestrian who lived in Westmoreland for more than 23 years (1985-2008), I see many advantages to this plan. 
After a couple of unsatisfactory approaches to the Hawthorn/Holman/Bagby kerfuffle, we finally have one that makes sense. The extension of Stuart St to accommodate Courtlandt Place is an innovative approach to mollifying what's always been the Problem Child of the neighborhood. (BTW, has it never occurred to anyone to bock off the eastern entrance to Courtlandt Place, and move the gates to the western end, accessible via Taft St.? They might lose an insignificant tree, or have it moved to the eastern end of the block, but accessibility would vastly improve.)
Also, it will neatly knit together a couple of currently neglected open spaces (the encampment under the 527 bridge on W Alabama and the Hawthorn/Holman/Burlington triangle pocket park), and alleviate the claustrophobic feeling that the ramp adjacent to Burlington St gives to the eastern edge of the neighborhood, while providing a cut-through that will shorten the distance for those walking to the HCC/Ensemble Station. 

6 hours ago, ToryGattis said:

New Urbanists need to focus on building great neighborhoods and let traffic engineers decide the right way to knit those neighborhoods together into a great city.

And this? What a steaming load of crap. Robert Moses is dead, may he rot in peace.

[trymahjong]

Maybe.....just Maybe...those that actually live next to Bagby and Brazos of this discussion should have their opinions heard and

“ weighed” against  the idea that large businesses like Spec’s ( and their many satellite stores) Whole Foods ( and their Satellite stores) and Randall’s ( and their satellite stores) would be adversely impacted by moving off ramps and access ramps TWO streets over....yes literally a stone’s throw— th streets that were constructed for just that purpose.

 

Avondale ( their neighborhood boundary is on the north side of Bagby and Brazos at Elgin) spoke long and hard against the Bagby access (as did Westmoreland, Audubon, and First Montrose Commons)when it was first proposed so many years back——-those opinions were ignored because someone who had “researched and was knowledgeable “ knew what was better for those residents!

 

hmmmmmm and so the residents lived what turned out to be a character building experience.

 

The noise issue is indeed horrible and impacts the quality of life— the idea of a green space there is incredible and will Impact the quality of life.   
 

Closing Bagby access and taking away the Brazos bridge to make room for a pocket green space is a good thing, that deserves support.

 

 

 

[iah77]

This is ridiculous and the flow in those illustrations looks like a disaster. This area is so selfish, they should be obligated to take down their gates if this happens to open up "their" greenspace as well.

[H-Town Man]

On 2/15/2020 at 2:23 PM, ToryGattis said:

 

I've never been opposed to walkable neighborhoods. In fact, quite the opposite. But they need to be stitched together with a robust arterial and freeway network.  From a post of mine 14 years ago (!):

 

"I think New Urbanism needs to realize it is a great paradigm at the neighborhood level, but that those neighborhoods need to be linked together with a freeway and arterial network across a larger region if you want an integrated and cohesive metro economy. The pedestrian and the car operate at totally different scales (3mph vs. 30-60mph), and therefore the right form factors for each are different. You don't build a city around just the pedestrian or just the car, but for both. Getting militant about one over the other makes about as much sense as asking "should our country be built around the car or the airplane?" Well, the answer is both: the car for shorter distances, and the airplane for longer ones - and that means interstates and airports. The same logic applies at the scale of a city/metro-region: you need freeways for longer distances, arterials for medium distances, and narrow streets with sidewalks for very short distances (i.e. the pedestrian district/neighborhood). New Urbanism makes the very valid point that we've sort of forgotten about that last category over the last few decades - and we're now rediscovering it - but that doesn't invalidate the other two scales any more than they invalidated the pedestrian scale."

...

"The bottom line is that citizen mobility = urban vibrancy. New Urbanists need to focus on building great neighborhoods and let traffic engineers decide the right way to knit those neighborhoods together into a great city."

 

There's more in that post as well:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2006/02/new-urbanism-and-value-of-mobility.html

and another relevant one is my application of Jane Jacob's principles to a car-based city like Houston:

http://houstonstrategies.blogspot.com/2006/05/applying-jane-jacobs-4-tenets-of.html

 

 

I didn't say you were ever opposed to walkable neighborhoods. I said you predicted for years they wouldn't work in Houston, because we don't have portable air conditioners to walk around with. I agree that we need freeways to get around the metro area. Midtown residents heading southwest have a very large freeway right close by, the Southwest Freeway. But your post above focused on the need for the spur so that lots of traffic will continue to channel through Midtown and help support big box stores. This does not say to me that you really care about urban neighborhoods, or even understand what an urban neighborhood is. You want Midtown to be a place that people can easily go through, not a place that people particularly want to go to. Your linked posts basically make the point that Houston is great with people getting around by car and doesn't need walkable neighborhoods. Increasingly, more and more people in Houston think otherwise, and you are stuck trying to sell us on Houston 1980.

 

[Ross]

On 2/15/2020 at 1:44 PM, H-Town Man said:

 

Yes, I've seen your blog post. Not surprising at all that you are opposed to this, since you always favor more concrete and non-stop traffic lanes over anything else and even have a co-blogger who goes by "MaxConcrete." As to your arguments that this will hurt Midtown, I think they are thin and specious, but we will see what the local residents themselves think. Now that there is a strong and growing local population, we no longer need to worry about freeway access and high traffic exposure to benefit the neighborhood. Can you agree that this is a decision that should be driven by local residents first and foremost?

 

The residents in Midtown aren't the only stakeholders here. Plus, lots of people in Midtown use the Spur to get to work. When we lived in Midtown, I worked in Bellaire. I got on teh Spur every morning, and got off of it every afternoon. If the Spur disappears, which seems to be your goal, then how do people in Midtown get to 59? Or off of 59? Taking the Pierce/Gray or McGowen/Tuam exists adds as much as 20 minutes, depending on the time of day. Should people in Midtown who need to use 59 suffer?

On 2/15/2020 at 2:04 PM, H-Town Man said:

 

The robust freeway network has been important and continues to be important. But for about 70 years now, nearly every decision has gone in favor of freeways over local neighborhoods. Now that we have some truly successful urban neighborhoods starting to develop, it is time to reverse some of those historic bad decisions and shift the balance more in favor of neighborhoods. That means getting rid of freeway spurs that stick into developing high density areas and essentially function as takeoff ramps for people flying out to Sugarland.

 

Also time to notice that it's not 1980 anymore and the world favors parks over concrete. It also favors streets over tunnels, another issue that you have taken the wrong side of. You told us for years that walkable neighborhoods would never work in Houston because people can't carry portable air conditioners, but the last 10 years has shown that they work very well when they are allowed to develop and aren't covered in concrete ramps with jerks in BMWs going 60 MPH. But I haven't seen an acknowledgment of this from you, just more pushing the 1980 paradigm.

 

The neighborhoods will develop just fine with the freeways in place.

2 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I didn't say you were ever opposed to walkable neighborhoods. I said you predicted for years they wouldn't work in Houston, because we don't have portable air conditioners to walk around with. I agree that we need freeways to get around the metro area. Midtown residents heading southwest have a very large freeway right close by, the Southwest Freeway. But your post above focused on the need for the spur so that lots of traffic will continue to channel through Midtown and help support big box stores. This does not say to me that you really care about urban neighborhoods, or even understand what an urban neighborhood is. You want Midtown to be a place that people can easily go through, not a place that people particularly want to go to. Your linked posts basically make the point that Houston is great with people getting around by car and doesn't need walkable neighborhoods. Increasingly, more and more people in Houston think otherwise, and you are stuck trying to sell us on Houston 1980.

 

Midtown has always been a place to go through. The Spur carries 65,000 cars a day. Where do those cars go if is closes? If it is harder to get to Downtown, then businesses will locate elsewhere.

[H-Town Man]

1 minute ago, Ross said:

Midtown has always been a place to go through. 

 

And yet it's the fastest growing neighborhood in the whole city for new multi-family development, so I guess a lot of people don't agree with you. Just like Tory, the old-timers can't realize that it's not 1980 anymore.

 

[Ross]

2 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

And yet it's the fastest growing neighborhood in the whole city for new multi-family development, so I guess a lot of people don't agree with you. Just like Tory, the old-timers can't realize that it's not 1980 anymore.

 

Do you really think that Midtown will end up being an area that people only go to, not through? That's stupidly ridiculous. It's fast growing because for decades no one lived there. In the 1990 census, there were less than 1000 people in Midtown. It started growing in the late 90's.

 

You haven't said what the 65,000 cars per day that use the Spur should do if it is closed. They still need to get to Downtown.

 

Personally, I don't give a crap what the residents of Midtown think. They live in Houston, and have to understand it ain't just about them.

[ToryGattis]

4 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I didn't say you were ever opposed to walkable neighborhoods. I said you predicted for years they wouldn't work in Houston, because we don't have portable air conditioners to walk around with. I agree that we need freeways to get around the metro area. Midtown residents heading southwest have a very large freeway right close by, the Southwest Freeway. But your post above focused on the need for the spur so that lots of traffic will continue to channel through Midtown and help support big box stores. This does not say to me that you really care about urban neighborhoods, or even understand what an urban neighborhood is. You want Midtown to be a place that people can easily go through, not a place that people particularly want to go to. Your linked posts basically make the point that Houston is great with people getting around by car and doesn't need walkable neighborhoods. Increasingly, more and more people in Houston think otherwise, and you are stuck trying to sell us on Houston 1980.

 

 

I didn't say they wouldn't work - just that Houston was built around the car because it is the only way to bring an A/C with you everywhere - and most people like that at least 5 months a year.  But I think we've developed some very fine, vibrant walkable neighborhoods.

 

I think Midtown works great as it is, which is part of why it's growing so fast. It accommodates a ton of cars during the day, but turns into Houston's biggest nightlife neighborhood at night (downtown is able to do this as well).  It also has fantastic access to the rest of the city (partly through the spur), which is very attractive.  And the most walkable part is developing exactly where it should - along rail+one-lane Main St.

[KinkaidAlum]

and Midtown wasn't always a place to just go through. 

 

I think providing upgrades to make Midtown a better neighborhood for those that live there are far more important than providing upgrades for commuters just buzzing through. Hell, who knows, maybe if that becomes decent park space, someone will decide the commute from Sugar Land isn't worth it and move to Midtown taking a car off the highway. 

[ToryGattis]

3 minutes ago, KinkaidAlum said:

and Midtown wasn't always a place to just go through. 

 

I think providing upgrades to make Midtown a better neighborhood for those that live there are far more important than providing upgrades for commuters just buzzing through. Hell, who knows, maybe if that becomes decent park space, someone will decide the commute from Sugar Land isn't worth it and move to Midtown taking a car off the highway. 

 

This is the fantasy of urbanists, when the reality is that is far more likely for an employer to give up on the core and move out to the suburbs where their family-centric employees want to live - with good schools and affordable nice new homes (like Exxon did) - than those employees moving into the core of the city. Houston can do both: upgrade and improve mobility from the suburbs to jobs in the core, while also supporting plenty of nice walkable core neighborhoods.

[Ross]

31 minutes ago, KinkaidAlum said:

and Midtown wasn't always a place to just go through. 

 

I think providing upgrades to make Midtown a better neighborhood for those that live there are far more important than providing upgrades for commuters just buzzing through. Hell, who knows, maybe if that becomes decent park space, someone will decide the commute from Sugar Land isn't worth it and move to Midtown taking a car off the highway. 

Almost no one with children is going to make that decision. People with children tend to want to live where the schools are better than in Midtown, and where they can buy a house with a yard and a garage and room for all the stuff that middle class life generally entails. They might move to the Heights, GOOF, etc, but they aren't moving to Midtown.

[wilcal]

On 2/15/2020 at 8:34 PM, dbigtex56 said:

The extension of Stuart St to accommodate Courtlandt Place is an innovative approach to mollifying what's always been the Problem Child of the neighborhood. (BTW, has it never occurred to anyone to bock off the eastern entrance to Courtlandt Place, and move the gates to the western end, accessible via Taft St.? They might lose an insignificant tree, or have it moved to the eastern end of the block, but accessibility would vastly improve.)

 

10 hours ago, iah77 said:

This is ridiculous and the flow in those illustrations looks like a disaster. This area is so selfish, they should be obligated to take down their gates if this happens to open up "their" greenspace as well.

 

It was open on both sides originally 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, Ross said:

The residents in Midtown aren't the only stakeholders here. Plus, lots of people in Midtown use the Spur to get to work. When we lived in Midtown, I worked in Bellaire. I got on teh Spur every morning, and got off of it every afternoon. If the Spur disappears, which seems to be your goal, then how do people in Midtown get to 59? Or off of 59? Taking the Pierce/Gray or McGowen/Tuam exists adds as much as 20 minutes, depending on the time of day. Should people in Midtown who need to use 59 suffer?

The neighborhoods will develop just fine with the freeways in place.

Midtown has always been a place to go through. The Spur carries 65,000 cars a day. Where do those cars go if is closes? If it is harder to get to Downtown, then businesses will locate elsewhere.

 

We are not talking about removing the spur.  We are talking about removing one of the entrances and the exits to the spur. 

 

2 hours ago, Ross said:

Personally, I don't give a crap what the residents of Midtown think. They live in Houston, and have to understand it ain't just about them.

 

It appears your compassion is as keen as your reading ability. 

 

21 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

This is the fantasy of urbanists, when the reality is that is far more likely for an employer to give up on the core and move out to the suburbs where their family-centric employees want to live - with good schools and affordable nice new homes (like Exxon did) - than those employees moving into the core of the city. Houston can do both: upgrade and improve mobility from the suburbs to jobs in the core, while also supporting plenty of nice walkable core neighborhoods.

 

Of course it's a balance, but sending tens of thousands of commuters through surface streets (and having them drive 40+ MPH) through a rapidly growing neighborhood doesn't make sense. Giving people options on places they want to live near desirable jobs that don't require them to drive 50+ miles/day is the only way sustainable way forward. 

 

[ToryGattis]

1 minute ago, wilcal said:

 

 

It was open on both sides originally 

 

 

 

 

We are not talking about removing the spur.  We are talking about removing one of the entrances and the exits to the spur. 

 

 

It appears your compassion is as keen as your reading ability. 

 

 

Of course it's a balance, but sending tens of thousands of commuters through surface streets (and having them drive 40+ MPH) through a rapidly growing neighborhood doesn't make sense. Giving people options on places they want to live near desirable jobs that don't require them to drive 50+ miles/day is the only way sustainable way forward. 

 

 

There was a scenario/wish made earlier in this thread about removing the spur entirely, which sparked these responses.

 

There are plenty of options for people who want to live closer to core jobs, and more are built every day. We're not lacking for options.

[wilcal]

1 minute ago, ToryGattis said:

 

There was a scenario/wish made earlier in this thread about removing the spur entirely, which sparked these responses.

 

There are plenty of options for people who want to live closer to core jobs, and more are built every day. We're not lacking for options.

 

Midtown represents more than half of the market-based parking area and will likely be a heavy "participant" in the walkable places ordinance. It's uniquely primed with the red line connecting it to the two of the major job centers. 

 

We don't have plenty of options who want to live closer to core jobs and have extremely convenient public transit access. 

 

It will be interesting to see what the 2020 census info looks like for Midtown and inside 610. 

[Ross]

9 hours ago, wilcal said:

 

Midtown represents more than half of the market-based parking area and will likely be a heavy "participant" in the walkable places ordinance. It's uniquely primed with the red line connecting it to the two of the major job centers. 

 

We don't have plenty of options who want to live closer to core jobs and have extremely convenient public transit access. 

 

It will be interesting to see what the 2020 census info looks like for Midtown and inside 610. 

Regardless of those results, there will still be hundreds of thousands of people living in Sugar Land, Katy, et al that will need to get to Downtown. Any proposed changes need to take that into account, because those folks are not moving from the suburbs any time soon.

 

I don't have any real issues with closing the Bagby and Brazos ramps to the Spur, but the Spur is still a necessary part of Houston's transit infrastructure.

[trymahjong]

TxDot has plans for Spur 527-

 

According to TxDoT spokesperson- 527 is targeted to be placed below ground from Alabama to I59.

That will allow commuters and residents the opportunity to experience NO ACCESS from 527........resulting in better informed opinions I’m sure.

 

BTW

COH/PWE reported that when Bagby was entirely closed while Brazos bridge was dismantled NO. Repeat No complaints were received at all, from anyone concerning changes in access.

Edited February 17, 2020 by trymahjong

[ToryGattis]

46 minutes ago, trymahjong said:

TxDot has plans for Spur 527-

 

According to TxDoT spokesperson- 527 is targeted to be placed below ground from Alabama to I59.

That will allow commuters and residents the opportunity to experience NO ACCESS from 527........resulting in better informed opinions I’m sure.

 

BTW

COH/PWE reported that when Bagby was entirely closed while Brazos bridge was dismantled NO. Repeat No complaints were received at all, from anyone concerning changes in access.

 

I didn't know about the underground plan. Interesting.  I think they should consider a tunnel connecting it all the way up to 45 so that traffic doesn't have to cut through the neighborhood anymore.

 

People don't complain when they assume something is temporary for construction. Permanent is a different issue.  Put up a fair-sized sign at the Bagby entrance to the Spur saying it may be closed permanently along with a number to call with feedback, and then see what people say...

[H-Town Man]

14 hours ago, Ross said:

Do you really think that Midtown will end up being an area that people only go to, not through? That's stupidly ridiculous. It's fast growing because for decades no one lived there. In the 1990 census, there were less than 1000 people in Midtown. It started growing in the late 90's.

 

You haven't said what the 65,000 cars per day that use the Spur should do if it is closed. They still need to get to Downtown.

 

Personally, I don't give a crap what the residents of Midtown think. They live in Houston, and have to understand it ain't just about them.

 

Do you really think I said that people will "only" go to Midtown, not through it? Can you quote where I said that? Before tossing childish insults like "stupidly ridiculous," why don't you read what I'm actually writing?

 

I am not talking about percentage growth, I'm talking about which neighborhood has the most apartments being built. Midtown leads the entire metro area, with over 5,000 units added in the last 5 years. In terms of interest and land value, it is a more important neighborhood than wherever you live, unless you live either downtown or on Post Oak Blvd.

 

What will the 65,000 cars per day do when the Spur is turned into a surface street? The same thing they do when the Spur ends where it currently ends. Deal with a few traffic lights. I wish all arguments on HAIF were this easy.

 

Edited February 17, 2020 by H-Town Man

[cspwal]

20 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

I think they should consider a tunnel connecting it all the way up to 45 so that traffic doesn't have to cut through the neighborhood anymore.

We should dig more tunnels in general.  Highway tunnels, subway tunnels, mysterious secret tunnels,  underwater drainage tunnels

[H-Town Man]

12 hours ago, ToryGattis said:

I think Midtown works great as it is, which is part of why it's growing so fast. It accommodates a ton of cars during the day, but turns into Houston's biggest nightlife neighborhood at night (downtown is able to do this as well).  It also has fantastic access to the rest of the city (partly through the spur), which is very attractive.  And the most walkable part is developing exactly where it should - along rail+one-lane Main St.

 

Midtown is dominated by 5-lane roads with narrow sidewalks and few stops where cars whiz along at 40 mph. It is a hostile environment for pedestrians in most places. The amount of recent mixed-use development and land speculation shows that it is trying to hatch out of its egg as a truly walkable urban neighborhood but it is being held back by decisions made in the past to make it a speedzone for commuters.

 

It was one thing to laugh off the urbanists when land in Midtown was worth $20/SF, but now that it is worth $200/SF, we need to realize that the world has shifted. Houston's future and competitiveness does not rely on helping people in the suburbs commute to downtown easily the way they once did. I say this as a person who lives in the suburbs with a large family. Property values in the core are skyrocketing while values in the suburbs are growing modestly with inflation because preferences are shifting to the urban core. Which means that the balance of interests in these decisions needs to likewise shift. Yes, the commuters are still important, but not as important, while the inner city is exponentially more important.

 

Whatever detriment to the city's interests is caused by southwest commuters having to wait through a few more traffic lights on the way to work downtown is more than made up for by the creation of value resulting from removing a freeway spur in an area where land values are high and interest in urban living is high. This is, at bottom, an economic decision.

 

Edited February 17, 2020 by H-Town Man

[ToryGattis]

3 minutes ago, cspwal said:

We should dig more tunnels in general.  Highway tunnels, subway tunnels, mysterious secret tunnels,  underwater drainage tunnels

Yes! Especially more mysterious secret tunnels! 😅 (one of my favorite exploring experiences at Rice) And sure, let them drain water too during a hard rain.

[ToryGattis]

5 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

Midtown is dominated by 5-lane roads with narrow sidewalks and few stops where cars whiz along at 40 mph. It is a hostile environment for pedestrians in most places. The amount of recent mixed-use development and land speculation shows that it is trying to hatch out of its egg as a truly walkable urban neighborhood but it is being held back by decisions made in the past to make it a speedzone for commuters.

 

It was one thing to laugh off the urbanists when land in Midtown was worth $20/SF, but now that it is worth $200/SF, we need to realize that the world has shifted. Houston's future and competitiveness does not rely on helping people in the suburbs commute to downtown easily the way they once did. I say this as a person who lives in the suburbs with a large family. Property values in the core are skyrocketing while values in the suburbs are growing modestly with inflation because preferences are shifting to the urban core. Which means that the balance of interests in these decisions needs to likewise shift.

 

Whatever detriment to the city's interests is caused by southwest commuters having to wait through a few more traffic lights on the way to work downtown is more than made up for by the creation of value resulting from removing a freeway spur in an area where land values are high and interest in urban living is high. This is, at bottom, an economic decision.

 

 

The urban values are increasing as traffic worsens and there are an increasing number of childless households.  Suburbs stay flat because there is plenty of competition (i.e. there is a whole lot of land out there to choose from - not near as much in the core).  But this argument frustrates me the same as people who move next to an airport and then complain about the planes.  The major streets and freeways are well established. If you don't like living next to them, don't move in next to them. But don't move into them and then complain. You made your decision and knew what you were buying into.  Next thing you know, West U, Bellaire, and the westside villages will shrink or cut all their major thru-streets because they don't want people driving through them - they just want to be an endpoint.  It's selfish and self-centered and detrimental to the community as a whole.

[clutchcity94]

1 hour ago, trymahjong said:

TxDot has plans for Spur 527-

 

According to TxDoT spokesperson- 527 is targeted to be placed below ground from Alabama to I59.

That will allow commuters and residents the opportunity to experience NO ACCESS from 527........resulting in better informed opinions I’m sure.

 

BTW

COH/PWE reported that when Bagby was entirely closed while Brazos bridge was dismantled NO. Repeat No complaints were received at all, from anyone concerning changes in access.

This would be incredible! Where did you see this?

 

Just imagine what the area around The Ion will look like then. You can walk from there towards Montrose Blvd on Wheeler/Richmond without worrying about getting shanked underneath the spur encampments.

 

Sounds like a dream!

[H-Town Man]

12 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

The urban values are increasing as traffic worsens and there are an increasing number of childless households.  Suburbs stay flat because there is plenty of competition (i.e. there is a whole lot of land out there to choose from - not near as much in the core).  But this argument frustrates me the same as people who move next to an airport and then complain about the planes.  The major streets and freeways are well established. If you don't like living next to them, don't move in next to them. But don't move into them and then complain. You made your decision and knew what you were buying into.  Next thing you know, West U, Bellaire, and the westside villages will shrink or cut all their major thru-streets because they don't want people driving through them - they just want to be an endpoint.  It's selfish and self-centered and detrimental to the community as a whole.

 

Nothing is ever well established. When the freeways were built, it was well established that there were residential neighborhoods there, but the world was changing and those residential neighborhoods had to accept freeways being cut through them and the consequent decline in quality of life. Now the world is changing again. There's absolutely nothing wrong with inner city residents demanding that infrastructure be altered to benefit them. That's just how democracy works in city planning.

 

I think for you this is kind of a culture war thing - you see the prospering inner city as a threat to how life "should be," with everyone living in a tract house growing a family. I actually do sympathize with you on the shift in societal values away from family, but I don't see this as quite the threat that you do, partly because I've lived in cities where families live in urban environments. 

 

An increasingly greater proportion of downtown's workforce is coming and will continue to come from people who live closer to downtown. This means that it is less important to preserve speedways for commuters. I also get the feeling that you think that most of the change has already happened and you don't quite see that Midtown as it is now is only a shadow of what it will be in another 20 years, with tens of thousands of people living there and sidewalks thronged with pedestrians. We are still only in the first chapter of the changes that will occur.

 

Edited February 17, 2020 by H-Town Man

[Ross]

1 minute ago, H-Town Man said:

 

Nothing is ever well established. When the freeways were built, it was well established that there were residential neighborhoods there, but the world was changing and those residential neighborhoods had to accept freeways being cut through them and the consequent decline in quality of life. Now the world is changing again. I think for you this is kind of a culture war thing - you see the prospering inner city as a threat to how life "should be," with everyone living in a tract house growing a family. I actually do sympathize with you on the shift in societal values away from family, but I don't see this as quite the threat that you do, partly because I've lived in cities where families live in urban environments. 

 

An increasingly greater proportion of downtown's workforce is coming and will continue to come from people who live closer to downtown. This means that it is less important to preserve speedways for commuters. I also get the feeling that you think that most of the change has already happened and you don't quite see that Midtown as it is now is only a shadow of what it will be in another 20 years, with tens of thousands of people living there and sidewalks thronged with pedestrians. We are still only in the first chapter of the changes that will occur.

 

Until they have kids and want to live somewhere that isn't full of douchebag bars, has yards, garages, good schools, etc. We moved from Midtown to the Greater Heights after our son was born, and didn't want him playing outside with prostitutes, drug dealers, and drunks walking by. We could deal with those aspects when it was just my wife and I, but Midtown is a pretty child hostile area once they get past toddler stage.

 

The businesses downtown aren't made up of just people under 30, and there has to be a way for the workers to get from the suburbs to Downtown.

[wilcal]

2 hours ago, Ross said:

Regardless of those results, there will still be hundreds of thousands of people living in Sugar Land, Katy, et al that will need to get to Downtown. Any proposed changes need to take that into account, because those folks are not moving from the suburbs any time soon.

 

I don't have any real issues with closing the Bagby and Brazos ramps to the Spur, but the Spur is still a necessary part of Houston's transit infrastructure.

 

Sorry if my comments came across as being a little too far last night, they were a bit too 'extra'.

 

With that being said, I don't think that there are hundreds of thousands of people that are trying to get downtown because there's only just over 100,000 jobs in Downtown and I don't think that many people are going to court or getting a new passport.

 

It will never be sustainable to have people drive their own vehicles by themselves from outside Beltway 8. Park and Ride ridership is up between 6 and 10% YOY and it needs to increase more. Metro really needs to make a better effort with more options from P&R locations direct to the Med Center or Uptown, etc. 

 

1 hour ago, trymahjong said:

TxDot has plans for Spur 527-

 

According to TxDoT spokesperson- 527 is targeted to be placed below ground from Alabama to I59.

That will allow commuters and residents the opportunity to experience NO ACCESS from 527........resulting in better informed opinions I’m sure.

 

BTW

COH/PWE reported that when Bagby was entirely closed while Brazos bridge was dismantled NO. Repeat No complaints were received at all, from anyone concerning changes in access.

 

"No access" just means driving up to the ramp in Downtown. Not great, but it would be a mega improvement. Would gladly trade having to drive up to an entrance ramp instead of having all of those cars in Midtown.

 

42 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

I didn't know about the underground plan. Interesting.  I think they should consider a tunnel connecting it all the way up to 45 so that traffic doesn't have to cut through the neighborhood anymore.

 

People don't complain when they assume something is temporary for construction. Permanent is a different issue.  Put up a fair-sized sign at the Bagby entrance to the Spur saying it may be closed permanently along with a number to call with feedback, and then see what people say...

 

Would be interesting to see traffic reduction results from non-commuters having their Waze/Google Map "shortcut" blocked with no-through traffic signs.

 

5 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

The urban values are increasing as traffic worsens and there are an increasing number of childless households.  Suburbs stay flat because there is plenty of competition (i.e. there is a whole lot of land out there to choose from - not near as much in the core).  But this argument frustrates me the same as people who move next to an airport and then complain about the planes.  The major streets and freeways are well established. If you don't like living next to them, don't move in next to them. But don't move into them and then complain. You made your decision and knew what you were buying into.  Next thing you know, West U, Bellaire, and the westside villages will shrink or cut all their major thru-streets because they don't want people driving through them - they just want to be an endpoint.  It's selfish and self-centered and detrimental to the community as a whole.

 

So we should never widen or improve highways then because the people living out there should know what they were signing up for? The streets in Midtown are grossly overbuilt except for the 1 hour in each direction that they receive rush hour traffic, and it creates a safety hazard from reckless drivers who treat them like a highway the other 23 hours of the day. There is wanton disrespect for HOV lanes/speed limits/pedestrian right of way. It's more akin to Shepherd/Durham than to West U/ Bellaire. 

1 minute ago, Ross said:

Until they have kids and want to live somewhere that isn't full of douchebag bars, has yards, garages, good schools, etc. We moved from Midtown to the Greater Heights after our son was born, and didn't want him playing outside with prostitutes, drug dealers, and drunks walking by. We could deal with those aspects when it was just my wife and I, but Midtown is a pretty child hostile area once they get past toddler stage.

 

The businesses downtown aren't made up of just people under 30, and there has to be a way for the workers to get from the suburbs to Downtown.

 

 

Or we could keep spending $20 billion/year on highway expansion in Texas for a problem that can't be solved and only creates more upkeep costs into perpetuity!

[ToryGattis]

3 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

Nothing is ever well established. When the freeways were built, it was well established that there were residential neighborhoods there, but the world was changing and those residential neighborhoods had to accept freeways being cut through them and the consequent decline in quality of life. Now the world is changing again. There's absolutely nothing wrong with inner city residents demanding that infrastructure be altered to benefit them. That's just how democracy works in city planning.

 

I think for you this is kind of a culture war thing - you see the prospering inner city as a threat to how life "should be," with everyone living in a tract house growing a family. I actually do sympathize with you on the shift in societal values away from family, but I don't see this as quite the threat that you do, partly because I've lived in cities where families live in urban environments. 

 

An increasingly greater proportion of downtown's workforce is coming and will continue to come from people who live closer to downtown. This means that it is less important to preserve speedways for commuters. I also get the feeling that you think that most of the change has already happened and you don't quite see that Midtown as it is now is only a shadow of what it will be in another 20 years, with tens of thousands of people living there and sidewalks thronged with pedestrians. We are still only in the first chapter of the changes that will occur.

 

 

You misunderstand where I'm coming from.  I'm a live-and-let-live guy, families (usually in the suburbs) and non-families (typically urban).  Offer both and let people choose.  The big picture story in cities is that people have pushed the average age of marriage and children back almost a decade, and people want to live in cities and urban neighborhoods during that decade, which is totally fine and great (I live in a Midtown midrise myself). Even some empty nesters are coming back, although that is very small (the vast majority age in place in the suburbs).  What I'm trying to prevent is a scenario where the anti-suburb forces make commuting intolerable, so many major employers move out to the suburbs (like Exxon) and weaken both the core city and the overall metro (imho).  I like that Houston has a strong central core, which can't be said in all cities (and I don't just mean Detroit - I think our core is much stronger than Dallas, Atlanta, Phoenix, and even LA in some ways).  For the typical major employer, 75+% of their employees are family oriented (30-65 age range).  If they are forced to make a choice, they will pick the suburbs.  Let's not force them to make that choice.

 

As far as the future of Midtown, for better or worse I think it will blend into downtown after the Pierce is removed and become more and more like downtown - probably something like a small Manhattan.  And I'll point out Manhattan has giant one-way streets as well and does better than any other city in America for pedestrian life. They are not incompatible.  In fact, midtown will probably become more like Manhattan in another way: big one-way streets moving lots of cars north-south, with smaller more intimate neighborhoods on the cross-streets.  It's a fine model. 

[H-Town Man]

22 minutes ago, Ross said:

Until they have kids and want to live somewhere that isn't full of douchebag bars, has yards, garages, good schools, etc. We moved from Midtown to the Greater Heights after our son was born, and didn't want him playing outside with prostitutes, drug dealers, and drunks walking by. We could deal with those aspects when it was just my wife and I, but Midtown is a pretty child hostile area once they get past toddler stage.

 

The businesses downtown aren't made up of just people under 30, and there has to be a way for the workers to get from the suburbs to Downtown.

 

Becoming clearer and clearer that your opposition to this is based on cultural dislike.

 

[H-Town Man]

19 minutes ago, ToryGattis said:

 

You misunderstand where I'm coming from.  I'm a live-and-let-live guy, families (usually in the suburbs) and non-families (typically urban).  Offer both and let people choose.  The big picture story in cities is that people have pushed the average age of marriage and children back almost a decade, and people want to live in cities and urban neighborhoods during that decade, which is totally fine and great (I live in a Midtown midrise myself). Even some empty nesters are coming back, although that is very small (the vast majority age in place in the suburbs).  What I'm trying to prevent is a scenario where the anti-suburb forces make commuting intolerable, so many major employers move out to the suburbs (like Exxon) and weaken both the core city and the overall metro (imho).  I like that Houston has a strong central core, which can't be said in all cities (and I don't just mean Detroit - I think our core is much stronger than Dallas, Atlanta, Phoenix, and even LA in some ways).  For the typical major employer, 75+% of their employees are family oriented (30-65 age range).  If they are forced to make a choice, they will pick the suburbs.  Let's not force them to make that choice.

 

As far as the future of Midtown, for better or worse I think it will blend into downtown after the Pierce is removed and become more and more like downtown - probably something like a small Manhattan.  And I'll point out Manhattan has giant one-way streets as well and does better than any other city in America for pedestrian life. They are not incompatible.  In fact, midtown will probably become more like Manhattan in another way: big one-way streets moving lots of cars north-south, with smaller more intimate neighborhoods on the cross-streets.  It's a fine model. 

 

This is a more thoughtful post than your previous one. I think though that if we are being honest about letting people choose, then we also need to slowly shift the balance of priority in planning decisions as inner city neighborhoods become more and more important. Perform some cost-benefit analysis. There is obviously a cost to closing the part of the Spur that they want to close for this park plan (although as mollusk made the case above, not very much), and a larger cost to closing the rest of the Spur. Commuters from the southwest will see an increase of 5-10 minutes in their downtown commute, which will have a marginal effect on leasing downtown.

 

What is the opportunity? A major stigma is removed from an up-and-coming urban neighborhood, land along the Spur doubles or triples in value, attracting a wave of development (mostly mid-rise and some high-rise multi-family) similar to what other new parks in the inner city have attracted (Buffalo Bayou, Discovery Green, Super Block), increasing the city's tax base and adding to the image of Houston as a green city with high quality of life. Real estate brokers in urban environments often say that "wherever Whole Foods locates becomes the center of the universe." We already have the new Whole Foods at Elgin and Brazos; remove a stigma and put a park in front of it and you have a catalyst for accelerated redevelopment and value increases over a 5-block radius. The number of commuters lost who live outside the city will be more than compensated by the number of people living in new midrise and highrises on the city tax rolls. Not a hard decision for COH.

 

[ToryGattis]

21 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

This is a more thoughtful post than your previous one. I think though that if we are being honest about letting people choose, then we also need to slowly shift the balance of priority in planning decisions as inner city neighborhoods become more and more important. Perform some cost-benefit analysis. There is obviously a cost to closing the part of the Spur that they want to close for this park plan (although as mollusk made the case above, not very much), and a larger cost to closing the rest of the Spur. Commuters from the southwest will see an increase of 5-10 minutes in their downtown commute, which will have a marginal effect on leasing downtown.

 

What is the opportunity? A major stigma is removed from an up-and-coming urban neighborhood, land along the Spur doubles or triples in value, attracting a wave of development (mostly mid-rise and some high-rise multi-family) similar to what other new parks in the inner city have attracted (Buffalo Bayou, Discovery Green, Super Block), increasing the city's tax base and adding to the image of Houston as a green city with high quality of life. Real estate brokers in urban environments often say that "wherever Whole Foods locates becomes the center of the universe." We already have the new Whole Foods at Elgin and Brazos; remove a stigma and put a park in front of it and you have a catalyst for accelerated redevelopment and value increases over a 5-block radius. The number of commuters lost who live outside the city will be more than compensated by the number of people living in new midrise and highrises on the city tax rolls. Not a hard decision for COH.

 

 

Well, ironically, Whole Foods located there counting on the traffic coming off the spur and up Brazos.  They would very much like it reopened.  I've been to that Whole Foods several times and they are definitely lacking customers right now. The cashiers told me it's dead all the time.  I think Whole Foods took a risk locating in a food desert, and it hasn't paid off so far. We need to support it before they close it, and that may mean seriously considering reopening the Brazos bridge.  

 

I could see closing just Brazos and Bagby as being tolerable, as I said in my post, but closing the entire spur would be a disaster.

 

I think Midtown has developed just fine - gangbusters even - even with the fast one-way streets. No need to remove them. If Manhattan has them, I don't see why we shouldn't either.  Clearly a vibrant walkable community can spring up just fine around them.

[mollusk]

2 hours ago, cspwal said:

We should dig more tunnels in general.  Highway tunnels, subway tunnels, mysterious secret tunnels,  underwater drainage tunnels

 

Are you sure that more secret tunnels aren't being built as we speak?  How would anyone other than us Mole People know about them?

[Ross]

2 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

Becoming clearer and clearer that your opposition to this is based on cultural dislike.

 

What cultural dislike? I actually liked living in Midtown until after we had a kid, and realized there was not going to be anywhere for him to ride a bike, play outside without close supervision, etc. We still know people who live there, and there are still drunks, homeless, and male prostitutes running around, which makes having a kid there problematic. Everyone we knew who had kids moved, except for one couple. We were fortunate to find a great place in the Greater Heights, others moved to the burbs. And, at the time we moved, the zoned elementary was changed from J Will Jones, which became HAIS, to Blackshear, one of the worst elementaries in HISD. Midtown is now zoned to Gregory-Lincoln, which is a mediocre school with no real hope of improvement, for K-8, and to Lamar for HS, which is better, but still not high on my list, even though it's rated highly.

[H-Town Man]

2 hours ago, ToryGattis said:

 

Well, ironically, Whole Foods located there counting on the traffic coming off the spur and up Brazos.  They would very much like it reopened.  I've been to that Whole Foods several times and they are definitely lacking customers right now. The cashiers told me it's dead all the time.  I think Whole Foods took a risk locating in a food desert, and it hasn't paid off so far. We need to support it before they close it, and that may mean seriously considering reopening the Brazos bridge.  

 

I could see closing just Brazos and Bagby as being tolerable, as I said in my post, but closing the entire spur would be a disaster.

 

I think Midtown has developed just fine - gangbusters even - even with the fast one-way streets. No need to remove them. If Manhattan has them, I don't see why we shouldn't either.  Clearly a vibrant walkable community can spring up just fine around them.

 

It's not really clear if you can only provide one example of a walkable neighborhood with fast one-way streets and that example is the one city in the U.S. where people would still walk no matter what the streets were like. Manhattan also benefits from the long blocks between the big avenues so there is some respite from the heavy traffic. You could invite a dozen urban experts to give input on Midtown and probably all twelve would tell you that the wide fast streets are hindering pedestrian life, but why listen to them when you have your one example?

 

Regarding Whole Foods, I can't imagine they would be full of customers since the development I'm talking about hasn't happened yet.

 

[BeerNut]

2 hours ago, ToryGattis said:

 

Well, ironically, Whole Foods located there counting on the traffic coming off the spur and up Brazos.  They would very much like it reopened.  I've been to that Whole Foods several times and they are definitely lacking customers right now. The cashiers told me it's dead all the time.  I think Whole Foods took a risk locating in a food desert, and it hasn't paid off so far. We need to support it before they close it, and that may mean seriously considering reopening the Brazos bridge.  

 

I wonder how much affect curbside pickup and delivery has had on this.  

[bulldog]

5 hours ago, trymahjong said:

COH/PWE reported that when Bagby was entirely closed while Brazos bridge was dismantled NO. Repeat No complaints were received at all, from anyone concerning changes in access.

I haven't complained because I'm happy the city is finally fixing a bridge that has been literally falling apart for years.