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H-Town Man

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Everything posted by H-Town Man

  1. H-Town Man
    Those of you who remember the old Katy Freeway before its expansion, would you say that the new Katy Freeway is not any better than the old Katy Freeway? It's been about 15 years since the expansion was completed, so this process has had time to take place. And even if traffic is now just as bad as it was before the expansion (which I don't think it is), the fact also remains that you have supported massive growth of the west side of Houston, and far more cars are being moved with the same amount of traffic. So you would have to take a very strong anti-growth position to say that there is no long term advantage to expanding a freeway.
  2. H-Town Man
    Not grounded in anything factual? I've watched it play out in politics my entire life. This is how politics is done. Look at the petty squabbles over disaster relief funds, with reminders of when the other party was parsimonious for disaster relief. A year ago when it was proposed that the Covid relief bill include purchasing oil for the strategic petroleum reserve in order to shore up the price of oil and save hundreds of thousands of jobs in the oil industry, the Democrats nixed it in negotiations and Chuck Schumer bragged that he "killed a bailout of the oil industry." And Houston is pretty closely associated with the oil industry, as is Texas, which is all that Houston really is to someone in the Northeast or West Coast - just a part of Texas.
  3. H-Town Man
    Retributive tactics are part of politics. Democrats are going to be a bit more subtle about it and not go blaring it on a tweet, but I don't think that the rules of politics as practiced all over the world are suspended for one party that is noble and virtuous.
  4. H-Town Man
    Has this been tried anywhere in the U.S.? Besides scaring a lot of investors out of Houston because you've suddenly dramatically altered how properties are taxed, it seems like this would have a decentralizing effect on development, as people would choose to build office buildings in suburban locations where land is valued much less and tenants would flee the dramatically high tax reimbursement costs downtown.
  5. H-Town Man
    It was for a long time but then it became a victim of its own success and fell into serious mismanagement. But regardless of what any poll says, the proof is in the pudding. People still pay 3 times more to live in SF than they do to live in Houston. If the cost of real estate there starts going down, then I'll believe that people are really fleeing. Until then, they're not fleeing.
  6. H-Town Man
    Pretty sure the EPA is involved on the national level. And we would be very naive to think that the fact that this is in Texas does not matter. We are the most visible red state the way California is the most visible blue state and people up in D.C. do not think "Well, Houston is actually blue." Trump and the Republicans did a lot of little things to punish California when they had power and there are some scores to settle. To your average White House apparatchik, scaling back a highway and punishing Texas is a win-win that shows who is in charge now and where the power lies. Austin had this idea with building 130 to relieve congestion on I-35. They thought all the trucks and through-traffic would opt for this super fast tollway. But everybody just kept going through on I-35 and traffic didn't get any better. Most people have a very basic, instinctual understanding that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, and it is hard to get them out of that.
  7. H-Town Man
    Do I understand correctly that the city and county's interest in stopping this is because it forces some racial minority people out of their homes, and the federal government's interest in stopping this is because of environmentalist concerns, and the two interests just happen to dovetail? But that on a deeper level, the real motivation is so that local politicians can say "We blew up something that benefits suburbanites more than inner city people" and so that federal politicians can say "We blew up something in Texas"?
  8. H-Town Man
    FIFY
  9. H-Town Man
    The argument usually goes that Houstonians are accustomed to a certain standard of living that is different than other cities. Although the example of New Orleans probably sufficiently beats this argument. I've heard it said, "Well, New Orleans is just uniquely special" in a way that Houston cannot replicate, but this was basically a white flag - obviously if Houston designed public spaces better, it could be "special" too. Tory Gattis was pushing these arguments for awhile, although I think he has backed off since the success of downtown as a walking neighborhood.
  10. H-Town Man
    This has pretty much been proven in areas of our city like Rice Village, downtown. City Centre, and parts of Midtown, the Heights, etc. Also the popularity of Buffalo Bayou park has shown that people like walking in Houston, even in its most humid spot.
  11. H-Town Man
    There already is a tax penalty - they have to pay a bunch of property tax every year on the land as it sits there. And there are positive incentives, as BeerNut mentioned. You can't really do much more without endangering Houston's reputation as a good place for investment. We want more foreign money flowing into Houston because it benefits us, on the whole. We don't want to scare away what foreign money we have. We also aren't anywhere close to a point where we need Golconda's land to continue growing and improving downtown. Skanska has a pretty big chunk of land that will take them most of a decade to develop to its highest potential. There are numerous sites around Market Square, Jones Plaza, Minute Maid Park, and all along Main Street that are ready to be developed. By reducing the supply of available land, you actually get better projects on the remaining land, something that Austin has experienced with its Capitol View Corridors. So don't worry.
  12. H-Town Man
    There would be no legal or constitutional basis for doing this. Part of the right to own property is the right not to sell it. This was a natural right before a lot of other things that people consider natural rights. On the other hand, the city has condemned property in this part of town when it was needed for the Toyota Center.
  13. H-Town Man
    I mentioned a few posts back that I think it's worth thinking about different sections of Midtown, some of which are pretty successful, some of which are much more challenged. Laneways outkicked its coverage a little and ran into a challenging area. So we are having a discussion now about the challenges of certain areas of Midtown. I disagree that this happens all the time in all markets. I don't think a failure like this has happened in Houston since Houston Pavilions, and when that happened, it provoked a good discussion about some of the limits that exist to development downtown. Those limits have receded a bit but they still exist, and we will have to wait and see what happens with Greenstreet to mark our progress. Lastly, I think there is some resistance to the idea that two events make a trend, but real estate trends and perceptions are often based on one or two successes or failures. Two major retail/residential projects go up on Allen Parkway and suddenly the development community is saying that this is Houston's "oceanfront property" and there is a rise in land values everywhere on Allen Parkway. Two big multi-family developments happen on Navigation and suddenly Navigation is "on the map" for new multi-family development. Ed Wulfe's BLVD Place is forced to scale back after the 2008 market crash and that is seen as a bellwether of how the market crash has impacted retail. The Central Square office renovation in north Midtown fails spectacularly and shows that office doesn't work there. And so on.
  14. H-Town Man
    Of course it's largely because of the pandemic. I'm pretty sure I mentioned as much before. But it's still a setback for the area. It's sort of like, if I were to say in 1986, "Things are really rough downtown now, a couple of new office buildings have just foreclosed." And you said, "Well, it's just because of the oil bust." Yeah. It's because of the oil bust. And the oil bust has exposed a couple of long term issues with downtown that were hidden when things were good (shift of development westward and to the suburbs). But regardless of the causes, it's still a rough time for downtown. What does Dallas have to do with anything? The two largest private developments that were brewing were Laneways and The Mix.
  15. H-Town Man
    Was it not already clear that that post was entirely humorous? I suppose you think that when I started off "It is the future I see" that I was really claiming to be able to see the future. And if I were to now admit that I cannot actually see the future, you would post triumphally that you caught me in a lie.
  16. H-Town Man
    Because the two largest private developments that were brewing in Midtown both just failed. A two-block parcel of land that somebody paid $20 million for a few years ago is now in a foreclosure sale. It is fine if you don't think this is significant. But what in your opinion would be significant? Would giant cracks have to appear in the streets and buildings start collapsing?
  17. H-Town Man
    I just threw out a few cities. It was a joke. I guess you searched the internet for all three and found that they hadn't done any in Dallas?
  18. H-Town Man
    But if it's the fastest growing neighborhood in the city, it sounds like it doesn't need a major change, it already is changing. Just needs to continue changing. It might be helpful to talk about different sections of Midtown. Southwest Midtown seems very healthy and thriving, at least from Elgin down to around Richmond, and west of Main. Northwest Midtown was the first area to develop, although it kind of petered out going eastward. North central and northeast Midtown are the areas where large-scale development hasn't worked yet. Yes, you are right about the Camden project.
  19. H-Town Man
    I'm skeptical of some of this. 20-25 years ago, Midtown already had a fast-growing population. I think I saw something a few years ago that said Midtown and Montrose had more housing units constructed in the past decade than any other neighborhood in the city. There's no reason it should have to wait for other neighborhoods to reach their potential, whatever that potential is. (They may have already reached it, they may never reach it...) In Dallas, Deep Ellum was about as dingy as Midtown before it exploded. And Midtown has exploded, it's just hitting a limit right now. One thing that might help along Main Street is if Camden's project would ever open up and start leasing, you'd have more people on the ground which would deter some of the vagrants and vandalism.
  20. H-Town Man
    Probably the reason small things don't get renovated and kept up in Montrose is that people are just waiting to sell it to a midrise/highrise developer. This is also why in most of downtown, small things stopped getting renovated sometime around 1970 or so, although there has been a revival in certain areas.
  21. H-Town Man
    I think they're an entity of the Taiwanese national oil company? Which probably has good motivation to park their money somewhere outside of Taiwan.
  22. H-Town Man
    Are you saying reposition this building or tear it down? It's a pretty nice Mod.
  23. H-Town Man
    I am not sure whether or how quickly developers would do anything with the buildings at Caroline and Preston, given that that two short buildings at Caroline and Prairie are just sitting vacant, and the office renovation at 412 Main was unsuccessful. Historic office space just seems to be a failing proposition downtown unless it is a large building like 712 Main or 1001 McKinney that can be brought to Class A-/B+ status. Our office tenants don't do quirky. On the other hand, the Cotton Exchange building does seem like it would have a bright future without the county, either as residential or hotel. Floor heights will probably determine what that future is, but I'm thinking hotel since there's no balconies.
  24. H-Town Man
    It is the future I see... Camden will buy the land at a rock-bottom foreclosure sale price, then sit on it for ten years. Then they will build a gated, garden-style apartment complex with a high wall. As they do so, they will say that mixed-use development just doesn't work in Houston, although they continue to pursue it with their projects in Atlanta, Charlotte, and Dallas.
  25. H-Town Man
    We've had some successful developments from non-Houston developers like the one on Kirby by Thor Equities as well as developments by Trammell Crow, although they're practically a hometown developer. Probably more I'm not thinking of. This is more of a Midtown problem and a Covid problem. When the Pierce Elevated is demolished and the Southwest Freeway is sunk and the Ion is up and running, then we can give it another go. Right now is not the time. The big test at this point is if something great can be built at Westheimer and Montrose by Skanska. Lease-up and occupancy at Montrose Collective will be the bellwether. That will tell us how bad the damage is.
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