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http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/m...politan/2915259

Nov. 23, 2004, 1:23AM

Uprooted tree severs MetroRail power line

By MIKE GLENN

Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle

Heavy rainstorms uprooted a tree at Hermann Park tonight, severing a MetroRail power line when the tree fell across the southbound tracks.

The tree snapped the cable about 8:45 p.m. near the Hermann Park/Rice University station along Fannin near Sunset. No one was injured.

Metro Police Sgt. Herbert Darby said the tree would have to be removed from the tracks before the line can be repaired and power restored to the system.

"It's a pretty good-sized tree," Darby said.

Kerry Vick of Victoria and about 10 other MetroRail passengers were stranded for about 90 minutes when their southbound train suddenly lost power.

Vick, who is scheduled to fly to South Carolina Tuesday to begin Army basic training, wasn't upset about about the delay.

"Stuff happens. You can never be too safe when you're messing with electricity," he said. "I'd much rather be stalled than for them to let somebody come off and be hurt."

A Metro bus was later called to ferry Vick and the other passengers to their final destinations.

The line is expected to be repaired early this morning, officials said.

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Ha! I wondered what happened.

I was downtown, and they kept making these garbled announcements about "an incident" and how shuttle buses would ferry people from the Wheeler Street station. Thought for sure we'd succeeded in winning the Nat'l title for most light rail accidents this year.

Incidentally, wish they'd refine those announcements a bit - there were a bunch of people jabbering away in the background, and it really was difficult to make out what the announcer was saying.

Too bad about the tree; they add so much to that area of town.

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  • 2 months later...

Hey everyone---

Please excuse me if I am way off here:

I have heard that certain areas of towns can be 'redlined' by mortgage lenders, meaning that the property can be considered too high risk to loan money for. Is this true? If so, does this apply to any areas of the East End of Houston? Many of these neighborhoods have such obvious potential. Though, I wonder if I would have better luck getting a loan for a property in the Heights?

Anyone have a thought on this?

Thanks,

Danny

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Hey everyone---

Please excuse me if I am way off here:

I have heard that certain areas of towns can be 'redlined' by mortgage lenders, meaning that the property can be considered too high risk to loan money for.  Is this true?  If so, does this apply to any areas of the East End of Houston?  Many of these neighborhoods have such obvious potential.  Though, I wonder if I would have better luck getting a loan for a property in the Heights?

Anyone have a thought on this?

Thanks,

Danny

No, that is not true. The practice of "redlining" was outlawed years ago, I believe in 1968.

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In fact, in many parts of the east end, you can get BETTER mortgages because they are considered areas in need of investment. Even in my neighborhood of Idylwood, where some homes run into the upper 200's, Bank of America offers some sort of 0-down loan (they must get credit from the Fed gov't for this).

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In fact, in many parts of the east end, you can get BETTER mortgages because they are considered areas in need of investment.  Even in my neighborhood of Idylwood, where some homes run into the upper 200's, Bank of America offers some sort of 0-down loan (they must get credit from the Fed gov't for this).

There are tons of 0-down loans out there right now, for credit scores down to 570, which is not a real good score. The only issue you might have would be if you bought an old house and it needed some work to obvious things like roof, flooring, structural, that the appraiser would make note of, or if the house only had space heaters. In that case, the seller would probably have to install some kind of wall mounted whole-house heating system, at the least.

I work in the mortgage business and have had that happen a couple of times. I also live on the East End. If you have any questions, I'll be glad to help, just P.M. me.

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Thanks to everyone for your replies!

It is nice to see there is opportunity for a 1st time home buyer to live near downtown. I had started to lose hope after looking at prices for the Heights and Montrose areas... I am going to do a little exploring out in the car this Sunday. Any Eastside neighborhoods that are must-sees? I am definately checking out Idylwood, Forest Hill, and Pineview. Riverside Terrace had some amazing homes, but I haven't seen many for sale.

Danny

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Thanks to everyone for your replies!

It is nice to see there is opportunity for a 1st time home buyer to live near downtown.  I had started to lose hope after looking at prices for the Heights and Montrose areas...  I am going to do a little exploring out in the car this Sunday.  Any Eastside neighborhoods that are must-sees?  I am definately checking out Idylwood, Forest Hill, and Pineview.  Riverside Terrace had some amazing homes, but I haven't seen many for sale.

Danny

Riverside has some incredible homes, but the prices can get up there. Idylwood and Houston Country Club Estates are two must see, along with Glenbrook Valley & Eastwood.

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Thanks to everyone for your replies!

It is nice to see there is opportunity for a 1st time home buyer to live near downtown.  I had started to lose hope after looking at prices for the Heights and Montrose areas...  I am going to do a little exploring out in the car this Sunday.  Any Eastside neighborhoods that are must-sees?  I am definately checking out Idylwood, Forest Hill, and Pineview.  Riverside Terrace had some amazing homes, but I haven't seen many for sale.

Danny

Mason Park Terrace has some cute houses in it, but is kinda ghetto. Eastwood Supplement also has some cute houses, but again, is kinda ghetto, although less ghetto than MPT.

Anyways, welcome to the same boat I'm in. I want to live close in, but can't afford the west end unless I buy a condo, and that ain't gonna happen.

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Thanks to everyone for your replies!

It is nice to see there is opportunity for a 1st time home buyer to live near downtown.  I had started to lose hope after looking at prices for the Heights and Montrose areas...  I am going to do a little exploring out in the car this Sunday.  Any Eastside neighborhoods that are must-sees?  I am definately checking out Idylwood, Forest Hill, and Pineview.  Riverside Terrace had some amazing homes, but I haven't seen many for sale.

Danny

You also might want to check out the Broadmoor area, which is near Lawndale and Telephone. They're mostly brick bungalows from the 20s & 30s from the $80s to 130s, I believe. The man that sort of started the Eastwood rehabbing in the 80s, Bill England, supposedly has bought some houses over there. It still looks a little ragged though right now.

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You also might want to check out the Broadmoor area, which is near Lawndale and Telephone. They're mostly brick bungalows from the 20s & 30s from the $80s to 130s, I believe. The man that sort of started the Eastwood rehabbing in the 80s, Bill England, supposedly has bought some houses over there. It still looks a little ragged though right now.

I got an e-mail from him about the Glenbrook Valley web site. I saw one of the houses he redid in Eastwood received a good brick award from GHPA.

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I got an e-mail from him about the Glenbrook Valley web site.  I saw one of the houses he redid in Eastwood received a good brick award from GHPA.

Cool. There's potentially a great organization if all of the old house people could get together. I still haven't made it to the Eastwood Home tour yet but I've heard some first hand accounts of the beautiful work that he and his partner have done and inspired many others to do.

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There are some great bargains still in the East end. I know there are one or two in Idylwood that can be bought right now for under $150,000. There are two on North Dover( a good block) in Glenbrook that are 2500 sf range that can also be bought for under $150k.

Idylwood:

6621 Fairfield $149,900

6602 Meadowlawn $149,000

Houston Country Club Estates

1019 Villa De Matel $139,900

6503 Pinehurst $149,000

6402 Jefferson $155,000

Glenbrook Valley

8110 Dover $149,900

8224 Dover $149,900

7742 Morley $137,500

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  • 1 year later...

For anyone who says that there has been NO development on the Main St/Fannin line, then they obviously NEVER went in that vicinity before the rail. Here's a list of things, off of the top of my head, that have been built or are planned for the Redline area...

1) New UH Downtown classroom for Criminal Justice

2) Hotel Icon

3) Main St Square

4) Commerce Towers

5) Humble Tower Apartments

6) Kirby bldg condo conversion

7) Marriott Courtyard

8) Residence Inn by Marriott

9) McKinney Garage with ground floor retail

10) Catholic Diocese Hdqts

11) Metro Hdqts with transit center

12) Citiplace Apartments by farb

13) T'afia

14) Byrd's Lofts

15) Hotel ZaZa

15) 1000 Main/Reliant Energy Plaza

16) Laidback Manor

17) Memorial Hermann Medical Plaza

18) Texas Woman's University Health Science Center

19) TMC Transit Center development by Transwestern

20) Heart and Vascular Institute

21) Texas Children's Nureoscience Center

22) Texas Children's Maternity Care Tower

23) Museum Tower Apartments

24) American Apparel

25) Inman Gallery at Isabella Courts

26) Calais at Courtlandt Square Apartments

27) Ventanna Apartments by Farb

28) Toyota Center

29) Hilton Americas Hotel

Stop lying.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I tried looking for a thread to resurrect that was relavent, but couldn't find one.

On KTRK, I heard a report something about light rail construction is slated to start next year.

Is this a done deal? I was in the next room during the report so I didn't hear the whole thing and I can't find anything online about it.

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I've seen statements from Metro recently that indicated that the Southeast, North, and Uptown lines would begin construction in July, 2007. So it would be reasonable to assume that the short extension of the light rail to the planned intermodal transit facility north of downtown would begin around the same time.

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  • 11 months later...

I'm glad someone started this thread this morning, because I had a few questions concerning the current.

What is "stray current"? Does it affect buildings/foundations? Does it affect people (shocks, cause cancer, etc..)? Will all this "stray current" affect the progess of the future light-rail routes?

LAYMAN'S ANSWERS ONLY PLEASE! (That goes for you too Niche!)

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I'm glad someone started this thread this morning, because I had a few questions concerning the current.

What is "stray current"? Does it affect buildings/foundations? Does it affect people (shocks, cause cancer, etc..)? Will all this "stray current" affect the progess of the future light-rail routes?

LAYMAN'S ANSWERS ONLY PLEASE! (That goes for you too Niche!)

basically when you have a circuit, there is an intended path that the current should follow. it should go out he hot lead and come back the neutral one....basically it is going out the hot lead but it is not all returning and is seeping into other conductors. it can induce shocks in buildings

an explanation by METRO would help in this instance, but if it goes unexplained and gets bad publicity you never know how it could affect future routes.

disconnect the neutral at your house then suddenly your ground becomes hot. it will affect anything attached to the ground and can result in a shock.

In the hospital setting with sensitive equipment, the consequences could be major which is probably why TMC spent 100k on this study.

Edited by musicman
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I'm glad someone started this thread this morning, because I had a few questions concerning the current.

What is "stray current"? Does it affect buildings/foundations? Does it affect people (shocks, cause cancer, etc..)? Will all this "stray current" affect the progess of the future light-rail routes?

LAYMAN'S ANSWERS ONLY PLEASE! (That goes for you too Niche!)

Well, stray electricity is common for most electric powered rail systems. While New York has some of the worst of it in the nation (it's been documented that DOGS have been fried stepping on manhole covers), Houston's relatively minor, HOWEVER, depending on where the current is straying to, it CAN corrode metal (Rebar, plumbing) and cause some damage for extended periods of time. "extended periods of time" can mean several YEARS. Houston's (and the residents) aren't quite used to it, so they're not understanding completely what it's about and probably exaggerating the danger (which is what media has a tendency to do). But as long as they're on top of it, very little damage should occur.

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Guest Marty

Great thread, I heard about this the other day and it got me to thinking about the mistake of grounding things to your water pipe.

Edited by Marty
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Well, stray electricity is common for most electric powered rail systems. While New York has some of the worst of it in the nation (it's been documented that DOGS have been fried stepping on manhole covers), Houston's relatively minor, HOWEVER, depending on where the current is straying to, it CAN corrode metal (Rebar, plumbing) and cause some damage for extended periods of time. "extended periods of time" can mean several YEARS. Houston's (and the residents) aren't quite used to it, so they're not understanding completely what it's about and probably exaggerating the danger (which is what media has a tendency to do). But as long as they're on top of it, very little damage should occur.

It doesn't have to be rail systems leaking, either. There were some reports on TV a few months ago about dogs being zapped on wet manhole covers in Chicago's Grant Park by stray current from nearby light poles. I believe one dog died and several others were hurt. The city's response was something along the lines of shrugging its shoulders and telling people not to let their pets wee on the manhole covers.

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It doesn't have to be rail systems leaking, either. There were some reports on TV a few months ago about dogs being zapped on wet manhole covers in Chicago's Grant Park by stray current from nearby light poles. I believe one dog died and several others were hurt. The city's response was something along the lines of shrugging its shoulders and telling people not to let their pets wee on the manhole covers.

I heard about that several years ago,but forgot all about that.

The article in the chronicle mentions where it's not leaking and their conclusions as to why it's not. Seems that the ballast in the south station keeps water from pooling in those areas and they plan on using ballast on the U-Line.

My problem with this is that you can expect kids/vandals/morons to get the rocks and use them for other purposes, or have them wind up on the street proper. I'm just wondering why they can't do a slight design change that would get the water away? Personally, I think think the whole "blame it on the rain" thing is overblown. While we do get a fair amount of rain, it doesn't rain every bleedin' day. Just keep the current from straying into pipes and manhole covers to keep our structures and fido safe.

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It doesn't have to be rail systems leaking, either. There were some reports on TV a few months ago about dogs being zapped on wet manhole covers in Chicago's Grant Park by stray current from nearby light poles. I believe one dog died and several others were hurt. The city's response was something along the lines of shrugging its shoulders and telling people not to let their pets wee on the manhole covers.

This is the reason why junction box covers that you see in the sidewalk for traffic signals and street lighting are made from a non-metallic material. Of course, there are some older metal ones out there and while they are most likely safe, I wouldn't step on them! :o

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  • 1 year later...

Metro's been sending out alerts all night. Things are back to normal now, but here's what happened:

METRO CONTINUES METRORAIL REPAIRS

METRO is continuing to make repairs to METRORail overhead power lines knocked down by a trash hauler earlier today.

For the remainder of Friday

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I got bumped off at Rice U stop on Friday and immediately experienced a replay of the Metro's inadequate 700 bus substitute after Hurricane Ike.

Think a large mob, few buses that do come by are full (or the driver will not open the doors despite adequate standing room), and general frustration.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I ran across a couple of interesting articles this weekend, both talking about a private infusion of money into public transit.

Bar and club owners along L.A. Metro's downtown rail line (like Houston, also called the Red Line) are trying to boost business. The way they're doing it is paying L.A. Metro to run Red Line service longer into the night so that it's more useful for late-night clubbers and bar hoppers.

The downtown businesses pay the cost of whatever it takes to keep the trains running beyond their usual closing time until 3am on Friday and Saturday nights. Amazingly, the plan went through in just two months. Now the city DOT has taken notice and is extending the runs of its downtown circulator shuttle trollies to match the extended rail hours -- again paid for with private money.

What do the HAIFers think about this plan? Do you think downtown Houston bars would pony up to keep the Red Line running later, or maybe making the current schedule more frequent (it's every 20 minutes now, compared with every 2-10 minutes in LA).

What about a circulator bus between the downtown bars and the city's other club districts?

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I think the idea has some merit.

a circulating bus route might do well as a trial to see how that works out, but seeing how long the distances are between rice, washingbton, midtown, downtown, and galleria; it would be interesting to see the routing and how the drivers would handle some of the more rowdy riders.

then again, the argument could be squashed with security onboard and ridership could be encouraged if an "amnesty" against a Public Intoxication for those those riding mass transit.

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  • 10 months later...
  • 7 months later...

The Red Line is to close this weekend due to TMC bridge construction. Why do they have to close the whole damn thing? Can't they bridge stations with buses, like when it floods?

I was going to ride it to two destinations this weekend.

http://blogs.chron.c...rail_shutd.html

Edited by rsb320
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The Red Line is to close this weekend due to TMC bridge construction. Why do they have to close the whole damn thing? Can't they bridge stations with buses, like when it floods?

I was going to ride it to two destinations this weekend.

If the wires have to be deenergized and the work goes on all night then trains can't make it back to the maintenance and cleaning facility. That's my guess.

You can still ride the shuttle buses. They will be running more often than the trains would so total travel time should be similar.

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  • 3 months later...

constructionwas well under way, the first couple of photos are just north where it's supposed to end, but it could just be related utility work....or not. Because of the construction, taking pics was quite a challenge, but as you can see, these are heading south from Northline mall. 011.jpg

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For grins, I took a quick shot of the Transit center as it currently stands.

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This is looking back at crosstimbers. I sat here for a couple of minutes and noticed most south bound traffic turned east or west. Kinda' wonder if that's normal or if it's simply because of the traffic.

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The site of where the first of the overpasses that will be built.

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One of the more challenging turns I'd like to see how they're going to handle. The DEIS doesn't give much detail.

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Looking back at Hays and the split. Another challenging intersection.

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This is where the rail is supposed to split off.

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As you can see, little work so far on boundary.

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And this is the turn from Boundery onto Main.

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This is continuing on Fulton just south of boundary heading towards Hogan.

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Hogan.....

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With the area it is suppose to turn to Main.

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I have no idea where there bridge is supposed to go over and "land" so I just took a guess it would land about here. Pick a spot.

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  • 8 months later...

Cool! They really are working on the light rail!

And thanks for the pics: it shows me another part of Houston I haven't seen before...looks like it has Fiesta, Payless Shoes, and...Dairy Land?

Actually, I've been meaning to go back since I saw how much the construction has progressed. My only problem is being a bit more selective on what I shoot and post.

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Actually, I've been meaning to go back since I saw how much the construction has progressed. My only problem is being a bit more selective on what I shoot and post.

May I speak for most of us?

I'm unsure as to what immediate effect this work is having on the neighborhood, or how efficiently it's contributing to the construction of the Red Line. These photographs are a valuable record.

Post the pictures first - we'll sort it out later.

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May I speak for most of us?

I'm unsure as to what immediate effect this work is having on the neighborhood, or how efficiently it's contributing to the construction of the Red Line. These photographs are a valuable record.

Post the pictures first - we'll sort it out later.

I was thinking that as well.

Perhaps taking all the pics and then posting them on my photobucket and letting picking them from there?

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It cleared up nicely and was in the area so I thought I'd snap a few photos after the rain and clouds flew past.

As you can see, nothing really done at the TC, but the road next to it is coming along nicely, though.

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This is crosstimbers as it stands.

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This look looking north towards Crosstimbers.

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No sign of constructing starting for the elevated section. Anyone to pool bets on when it starts?

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From here, there is little sign of construction from Stokes to 610, but looks like they are just starting, but there wasn't a good place to take a decent photo.

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This is the Patton intersection looking south.

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This is from the entrance of Moody Park looking south. Note the construction of new apartments across the street.

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Note the new pavement at the intersection. Its hard to see, but it is there.

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There is little or no sign of construction from Boundary and Hogan and nothing on those particular streets, so I started at Main @ Boundary.

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No sign of construction the elevated portion here....

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...and then I noticed the cranes. Didn't think much of them, figured it had something to do with some UHD expansion...

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Looking BACK, revealed something unexpected. I thought the elevated portion was taking a different route?

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Other than that, there wasn't much more construction towards the south, but as you can see, there is some off the roadway where I thought the elevated portion would go.

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And the bonus of a DT view I've never really seen before. NOW I wish I had a better camera.

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  • The title was changed to METRORail Red Line
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