tangledwoods

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Ouch and that demo will not be cheap. Somebody on that job isn't going home with a paycheck. More than likely this will all be shouldered on the contractor. Then again I'm not on this job, and have no access to the specifications, but I would assume that most stock specs already have what is required, so this is bad sub work which would then fall on the GC.

 

Just an FYI, mistakes happen ALL THE TIME in construction.  TAS (the concrete sub here) screwed it up and will replace it without complaint or cost to anyone else. That whole whoopsie is probably going to cost them less than 10k, nothing to really write home about, they will work the weekend and make up the time so schedule shouldn't be an issue either.  Oh and I would bet you a chicken dinner that the goofball that screwed up here did not go home and is in fact the one on the boom lift chipping out the bad concrete.  We call those "teaching moments"!

Of course the crane guy in the last photo isn't wearing a hard hat or vest.  These people are a joke.  Side note: Awesome photos cityliving!!

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The green dry wall looked more interesting, but at least the housing authority is keeping up with trends around the city to blend in. 

not to be that annoying person but as an FYI the green board stuff on the outside of the building is called sheathing.  In this case is it Zip sheathing with an integrated air barrier.

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So is it safe to assume that this thing will be delayed a considerable amount? How do you even repair this type of damage?

 

Looking at the photos, there isn't really all that much damage.  They will spend more time arguing about who's insurance should pay what than the actual time it takes to address the damage.  I would bet this sets the project back 3-4 weeks max.

Having said that, if I owned that tower crane, I would claim it as a 100% loss and sue the shit out of Consolidated.....

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This really feels like a prime area to put something big in.

i see what you did there. 

I have only ever done dewatering systems when doing permanent below grade structures.  In houston we have a number of foundation options that allow for installing foundations in VERY wet soils without the need for dewatering.  The fact that they have a system installed makes me think they are either going to have a basement / underground parking / or other below grade support structures for the fountains and site stuff.

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Teal, which provides a cloud-based system for delivering hot water to buildings without water heaters

My interpretation of that really stupid sentence:  They use drones to scoop up hot Buffalo Bayou water and drop it on your house....

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Does anyone know what is happening with the Pavilion?  It seems like there's been little to no construction progress there for some time.

there are 3 items that are wreaking havoc on construction schedules right now: mineral wool insulation, metal decking, and roof insulation.  Looks like they need all 3 on the little building....  My guess is that they got pinched on schedule and will get to it when they get their materials.

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There are about 8-10 of these along the fence line, seems like they are pumping water into them. I wonder if they are doing remediation work to the soil? I know there was a warehouse here for a long time, I wonder if the previous owner polluted the ground? Anyone know what kind of work was done at the old warehouse?

I am about 75% positive that these are part of either a permanent or temporary dewatering system.

Here is a company that specializes in that kind of work here in Houston:

Griffin Dewatering

well get prepared for a bunch of angry rich people in tanglewood to take up their metaphorical pitchforks!

This place gives me all kinds of Palace of the Golden Orbs vibe:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/palace-of-the-golden-orbs

Although Aga Khan appears to be a much more real organization with much better funding, I cant quite shake off my doubts related to their past tax issues with the site, and their non-existent time frame for actually bringing the project forward.

The project has been in planning for 15+ years and they have chosen now to break ground, which blows me away.  There has never been a more expensive time to break ground on a new construction project in Houston, TX.... We are facing across the board price increases and delays for common building products.

If you would like to read some industry gossip, here is the latest inflation report from the AGC:

https://www.agc.org/learn/construction-data/agc-construction-inflation-alert

I'll retreat to my safe place and continue to pray to the optimism / positivity gods.

this is one of the most refreshingly new glass box tower designs I have seen in the last few years.  WOW, nice to see some good architecture in the commercial office space!!!

I also heard that the "Grand Poobah Architect" is Rem Koolhaas and the "Master Ideation Architect" Renzo Piano.

All joking aside KPF are a legit firm, excited to see their name attached. 

something something OSHA?  okay stupid question, how do you embed an imgur so it shows up????

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flipping to residential seems logical.

the FF heights dont work, you would have to blow out portions of every other floor (which would make for some dope loft style units) but not sure what the market would be for that.  Also the core depth of this building makes it inefficient for residential or hotel conversion.

FWIW the comments above are largely from a bar conversation with a developer that doesnt like Shorenstein  so take all of that for what it is......

here is the problem with 800 bell:  no one wants an old 1.3 million SF building with low FF heights and extremely old infrastructure.

The "sell" from Shorenstein is that you could deliver a "reno" of this building to market faster than a new tower but there are not a whole lot of anchor tenants looking for the kind of SF they would need to kick this into gear.  Even with top tier renovations this will never be able to compete with new construction Hines or Skanska buildings.... 

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Under the agreement, which has yet to be approved, the city of Houston will pay up to $40 million for the facility to be built. The city will recover its investment through a 20-year lease agreement, officials said.

Why in hell is the city spending $40mil when this company could easily go out and bank finance the job themselves (or get a developer involved)?  I wasn't aware that our tax dollars are being used to fund commercial development....

Cherry might need a bigger "hoe" to bring this one down.

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I think the real miracle is that it was barely standing 25 years ago, and yet somehow it stood another 25 years. And even after that 25 years, it didn't fall on its own but needed heavy equipment to tear it down.

FWIW, the equipment used to "tear it down" are just excavators, no heavy demo equipment was used to demo this thing as none was needed.  When we demo modern ish buildings you have to use hammers or shears on the equipment to "chew" through the structure.  Looking back through these photos is looks like they largely used buckets to process the building down.

Also salvage of brick is almost never done even in restoration projects.  The old brick is often weaker than the mortar holding it together making it almost impossible to re-use.

A few years ago Harris County did a great restoration of 5900 Canal.  This was a concrete framed building with decent bones. From what I understand it was an old canning factory.

https://www.kirksey.com/portfolio/projects/harris-county-5900-canal-renovation

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I, for one, would love to see a Houston F1 GP combining parts of downtown with Memorial/Allen. 

send it through montrose, we would have 20 DNF's.....

Back to the topic, major props to the Skanska folks for thinking about the cycling folks.

this is such a salty post and project title.  What did HCC do to you???  this building looks to be the very definition of vanilla ice cream.  Not bad, not good....  I for one am happy to see HCC being restrained and responsible steward of our TAX DOLLARS.