cloud713

yeah, that area is where i think they mean the southern downtown park will go. my "fantasy 2 block park" was more to spur development in the south/southeast/"parking lot district" portion of downtown but i agree the southwest portion could use a park. i just wish it was bigger than half a block. at least there are 2 empty blocks next to the park that could be developed into new highrises.

with an average maximum acceleration and deceleration time of 3mph per second, it would take the trains over 20 seconds to pick up speed and another 20+ to slow down, for each station. averaging 30mph (around half the speed between full speed and stop, assuming the train accelerates at a constant rate), it would take the train 880 feet to pick up speed, and 880 feet to slow down. over the course of 12 start/stop cycles (in between the 13 stations from Hilcroft to Wheeler) it would take the train 21,120 feet just to speed up and slow down. thats exactly 4 miles that you are spending speeding up and slowing down, and its less than 7 miles between Hilcroft and Wheeler, so you are spending the majority of your time accelerating or decelerating when you have 13 stations on that portion of the line. that leaves you with around 2.8 miles of track that you can comfortably do 60mph on (theoretically.. obviously they wouldnt allow trains to do 60 down the middle of a city street [most likely they would limit the speed of the train if it were on Richmond.. something they wouldnt have to worry about on the Westpark ROW with a few simple gates for street crossing, or a couple elevated/trenched sections. i believe right now the fastest they go is around 40mph, on the stretch between Hermann Park and the Museum District] but assuming they did, and all the red lights were timed perfectly). you end up spending 2 minutes and 48 seconds at top speed, 8 minutes accelerating/decelerating, and 6 minutes waiting at each station (assuming stops are 30 seconds in length). thats almost 17 minutes. sounds pretty fast, but like i pointed out right before this.. trains would never hit 60mph on Richmond. they would be lucky to hit 40mph (there are way more cross streets/red lights on Richmond than there are on that stretch along Hermann Park where the red line approaches 40mph). now if the same train ran down Westpark it would spend 5 minutes and 8 seconds traveling at 60mph, 3 minutes and 20 seconds accelerating/decelerating, and 2 minutes 30 seconds waiting at the stations (assuming there were 6 total stations on the Westpark line [you would only have to wait 5 times as you get off at the last stop/dont have to wait]) so since the Richmond figures were flawed.. well assume the train tops out at 30mph for Richmond. 440 feet x's 2 (one for accel, one for decel) x's 12 cycles (13 stations) is exactly 2 miles. that would take you 8 minutes averaging 15mph. that would leave the other 4.8 miles to be traveled at a top speed of 30mph, which would take 9 minutes and 48 seconds, and then 6 minutes of waiting at stations. thats almost 25 minutes just to get from Hilcroft to Wheeler, assuming you catch every single green light and dont have to stop anywhere besides the stations (we all know thats not going to happen), vs around 11 minutes to get from Hilcroft to Wheeler on Westpark. so the Westpark line would be over twice as fast. (my math is somewhat flawed as the Westpark line would still have a short journey along Richmond for the last half mile or so, and the Richmond line travels down Westpark for about 3 miles, so the Westpark line would be slightly slower than 11 minutes, and the Richmond line would be a little faster than 25 minutes, though the Richmond line has many more intersections to traverse than the Westpark line, so its going to have to stop many more times than the Westpark line possibly has to stop. in the end youre probably looking at close to a 30 minute trip from Hilcroft to Wheeler (the original main street line was around 8 miles with 16 stations and took exactly 30 minutes. this line is 7 miles and 13 stations), compared to less than 15 minutes for the Westpark line. notes.. i dont think 15 minutes is particularly fast for an express route between Uptown and the center of the city. but i also think 30 minutes just to get part way to your destination (lets be honest.. i doubt most peoples final destination is Wheeler. they are probably going to transfer north or south) is a deterrent that could lower ridership numbers. in the end i would like to see an express route down Memorial Dr, cutting through the south side of Memorial Park, and hitting the northern portion of Uptown/somewhere in the middle of the Post Oak LRT/BRT line. i think that one could easily do 60 along most of the route and wouldnt need but one or two stations (if any) in between downtown and uptown. and best of all.. NO TRANSFERS! if that happens id be more than happy to add more stations to the University Line. but right now our traffic isnt nearly bad enough to warrant sitting for 30 minutes to get from ~uptown to ~downtown (5 miles distance). if we want this to be successful it has to be faster.

how long does the average train stop take at stations? a minute?

ive read somewhere that the Energy Corridor is supposed to overtake downtown in a few decades, in terms of office sq footage.. not sure if thats true/will happen or not, but who knows. i suppose Midtown/4th Ward is a possibility/spilling over across Pierce (or maybe Pierce will be gone by then, heh) from downtown. or they will just pull a Houston and start tearing down the last remaining old/"insignificant" buildings in downtown to build more towers. by the time downtown fills up some of these buildings will be well over 100 years old..

lol, they seriously modeled it after a cruise ship? i thought everyone just made fun of it/called it a giant cruise ship in the middle of downtown because it vaguely resembled one. if the former is the case then im glad they are cladding over some of the structure, but unfortunately i doubt the back will get remodeled. and im still waiting for a TopGolf on the roof of GRB, dammit! how come no one else thinks that would be a good use of space/makes it happen? heh

Got bored and made another sketch up of what it would look like with an additional bridge over 59 between Montrose and Graustark along with a train. Couldn't squeeze in the last bridge at Hazzard though. Ah well.. You get the idea. I don't think the bridges are too cluttered/gaps too close together with a bridge at Yoakum. Aside from the gap between Mandell and Graustark, the gap between Graustark and Montrose is/was the biggest.

i dont think it would be significantly less. there would still be direct access to Uptown (the major destination along the route), Greenway Plaza (the second biggest destination on the route), Kirby (possibly the third biggest destination on the route), and Montrose/St Thomas/The Menil (another popular destination along the route, and this stop would be in the same location as it was planned on the original line, on Richmond). like i said, i dont think dumping a few stops like Dunlavy, Shepherd (again, south of 59. north of 59, yes, a Shepherd stop would be warranted), Eastside, one of the two stops at greenway (Edloe would be more centrally located than either of the 2 planned on Richmond/Cummins anyways), Weslayan, New Castle, or S Rice Rd. if anything, having the route be more of an express/commuter route would make it more appealing to people trying to get from the west side of the city to the center of the city, so that could even out the ridership numbers that were lost by taking out the less popular stops. and again, in the future if we get an express East-West route then we can add more stations to the westpark/university line route. not to mention it would be a ton cheaper building the line on the pre-existing ROW METRO already owns down Westpark/the power lines, and as was pointed out before, stations are pretty expensive, so the less stations, the cheaper the total cost as well. id imagine they could build a minimal stop Westpark line like i previously described, for less than half of what the 13 station Richmond/University line would of cost.

this.. do we want a slow University Line with ELEVEN stations between Hilcroft and Wheeler, that runs on surface streets, or a University Line with 4 stations between Hilcroft and Wheeler that runs in its own designated ROW with fewer street crossings (and the possibility of building overpasses or underpasses on the few busy cross streets along Westpark, like Kirby, Buffalo Speedway, and Edloe).. if were not going to have an east-west commuter/express route anytime soon then this needs to be our express route, with minimal stops for quicker travel time. when we build another east/west express route then we can come back and add stations to the university line. for now though if we want that "world class system", the Richmond route with 13 stops is not the way to do it.

not the style of rail we are building now at least..

I think given the current circumstances with Culberson blocking anything on Richmond west of Shepherd, jumping the line over to Westpark by means of Yoakum is the best bet. the street (Yoakum) is plenty wide enough with a median perfect to run light rail down the middle of, and it would cross over the trenched part of 59 so you wouldnt have to worry about elevating the rail really high above the freeway/looking unsightly like you likely would further west at Shepherd. and none of the other streets really have room for LRT to cross over to Westpark on, especially any of the streets with the existing arch bridges.. just build a new matching arch bridge at Yoakum for the rail and it would blend in perfectly.. i would only have an elevated station at Kirby, and preferably a trenched station at Edloe/Greenway, connecting under 59 into the Greenway tunnel system (finally found some sketches of the tunnel system online), or elevated, if they decide tunneling under 59 is too complicated, with an enclosed skybridge across 59 to Greenway, and then a new stop at either Post Oak, or the planned Gulfton stop, before hitting Hilcroft TC and potentially going on to the suburbs, with stations even further spread apart (probably at new P&Rs on the major roads like Beltway, Highway 6, and G.P.). between Hilcroft and Wheeler there would be 4 stops. compared to the planned ELEVEN stops in between Hilcroft TC and Wheeler Station. not only will the trains be able to travel at a higher speed in their own ROW along Westpark (especially if there are a couple overpasses and/or an underpass), and not have to stop nearly as much, while still serving 4 of the major destinations along the route. the travel time would probably be cut in half, maybe more? do we really want to sit through 12 stops getting from uptown to downtown, or do you want to only have to sit through 6? i get that more stations mean potentially higher ridership, but are that many riders going to be utilizing stops at NewCastle, Weslayan, Cummins (or "Greenway".. only one Greenway stop is necessary), Eastside, Shepherd (south of 59.. if it was north of 59 on Richmond i might could see the need for the stop, but it wont be) or Dunlavy..? i dont think we need to burden our east west connector with over a dozen stations.. especially if we arent going to be building an east-west express/commuter route any time in the foreseeable future. if and when we get a commuter/express route (probably the Hempstead line from the Uptown LRT extension to Northwest Mall, east, over to thePost Office/UH-D or the Hardy yards to connect into the main st line in/near downtown), then we can add more stations along the University Line where they seem fit. but i (along with others) seem to think the University Line will be the most crucial link in our system, once the other lines are built out, as ridership on the uptown line is sure to be very high, and many people will want to travel between uptown/theGalleria/the west side and downtown/the museum district/TMC/Reliant Stadium/ect. like Iron Tiger was getting at.. if we want to have a world class transit system, its not going to happen by building rail down the middle of insanely busy surface streets..

the half a block, on the north side of the Savoy property? i had hoped the new southern downtown park would be at least a full block, possibly 2 blocks wide if it went south of the Toyota Center garage (so abandoning a street in between the two blocks to connect one large park wouldnt be such an issue, since the street dead ends just north at the garage anyways). to spur development around that desolate part of downtown. with all the residential around SkyHouse (the block to the north, the rumored block to the south, and Houston House), that location makes sense i guess. especially if they build another residential tower or two on the properties to the north and to the west of the Savoy/potential southern Park site. though i honestly always envisioned the park going on one of the blocks east or north east of the ExxonMobil building, with that underground open air plaza/court yard lined with retail that i once talked about that ties into the tunnel system, and then some residential towers around that on the available blocks surrounding it, tying into the park, and thus, the tunnel system. man im on a roll rambling tonight.. either way im ecstatic that they are building a new park on the southern portion of downtown, and whatever location they choose, there will be multiple plots that become prime for development nearby.

i think you mean like Margaret T. Hance Park in Phoenix. believe me.. weve already gone there.. heh. (though not in this discussion.. Levy Park isnt next to the sunken portions of 59/i69.. its further down and the road is actually elevated at that spot. not to mention there is an existing structure between Levy Park and the freeway. but i thought the sunken portion of 59/i69 would be a cool location for a deck park too but the overwhelming consensus was that capping 59/i69 wouldnt be a good idea as it would block the decorative arch bridges from view. the freeway is fronted by the backs of houses on one side and a railroad track on the other anyways, so it wouldnt be that great of a location for a deck park. the best location (though we would have to sink 59/i69) IMO would be just north of the convention center, between downtown and EaDo/the East End. the east side is arguably even more cut off from downtown than midtown or the 4th ward (partly due to the convention center, not necessarily the width or layout of the freeway), so a central location bridging the gap between the two areas would be ideal. not to mention it would be smack in between Minute Maid and BBVA Compass Stadium, and could host events for game days at either venue, along with plenty of other organized events to connect the two communities together. or if we wanted to go all out/fantasy.. trench 610W between Westheimer and San Felipe, since the area between those roads is booming so much on the east, while uptown continues to boom to the west, and build a deck park linking both areas together. it would be an enormous task, but maybe next time they widen/reconstruct 610 we could do it (assuming both sides of 610 continue to grow like they have been, necessitating a connection/link between the two sides). (sorry for sidetracking so much.. heh)

i agree.. and yeah, a north side 635 E/W line would be prime for DART.. it would be like if Houston had a commuter rail layout with lines running NW down Hempstead, West down Westpark, and Southwest down 90A, in order to transfer from Sugar Land to the northwest or the Galleria/uptown, you would have to ride the train all the way into the city (an additional 5 miles or so each way, plus transfers/wait time, and possible trips up/down the Red line [sugar Land would have to take the Red Line up to Wheeler in order to catch a train west, or to UH-D/Post Office or the Hardy Yards to catch a train to the northwest.. whereas if there was a commuter rail route up/down the north/south rail line just east of 610, you could catch a train that could turn onto that west side connector (or transfer at a station at the West Side N/S line intersection), and take you into the two other west side commuter rail lines, saving you over 10 miles of track on commuter rail, and an additional amount of time you would spend transfering over to the other commuter rail routes from the light rail network. its the same idea as the 635 line (even down to it connecting 3 separate rail lines), just turning the northern oriented DFW/DART system on its left side for a western oriented version for the Houston metro. IMO the West Side Connector idea is genius if we ever build out a commuter or LRT-hybrid system that reaches out to the burbs. its where the people are, and would save a hell of a lot of time for people trying to get from the southern/central/northern portion of the west side to another area on the west side. i suppose an alternative to the West Side Connector (if NIMBYs like Afton Oaks [go figure this plan would go through AO just like the original U Line.. ugh] put up a fight against more rail [i say more because rail already runs right along the corridor i proposed, so that argument should seem baseless] coming through their neighborhoods) would be extending the Uptown line down 610 to S Post Oak to 90A, though it would be much slower having to traverse all the stops on the uptown line, vs just 3 stops on the West Side Connector, 90 A, Westpark, and Hempstead.

right? Discovery Green has been an enormous success.. how many people live in downtown? (around 4,000.. including the prison population who i doubt frequents the park) and how many people visit DiscoGreen each year? (over a million, around the same amount as visit Klyde Warren in Dallas, which serves as the boundary between uptown [over 13,000 people] and downtown [over 8,000 people], the two largest urban districts in the city) i say replicate on, Houston! every park cant be a one off facility like Bethel Church Park.. if the Midtown Superblock park is DiscoGreen II is Levy Park @ Kirby Grove going to be DiscoGreen III ? will the Park at San Felipe be DiscoGreen IV ? when will the madness end.. a park is a park. there is a set standard of amenities that most successful parks follow, and these parks are following that. if the layout was similar to DiscoGreen i could see your point.. but was every park founded after Central Park considered a copy of Central Park if it had lakes, grassy areas, and/or paths through the trees?

So how will they work an entrance into the Milam side (assuming that's the right side of the building) where the driveway for the ramps into and out of the garage are, and the side of the garage? Will the entrance be on the side of the garage going underneath the ramp that's on the side of the tower? That seems kind of strange..

Wait.. so this building will have its front entrance on MILAM?? how is that so if the garage and the vehicle ramp drive in/out is on the Milam side? or did they completely reorient the garage, and have the tower facing Market Square, instead of facing south like we all assumed? because that archway on the ground floor in the middle of the building sure looks like the front entrance to me, and i always figured that was facing Preston?

i dont think any of the Cotton Belt Line is under construction..? pretty sure that one is in a political mess too. yeah. i would either have the stations at existing Park and Rides, enclosing the old vehicle ramp from the P&R onto the HOV lane, and adding moving sidewalks down it to move the people from the station at the elevated portion over the highway, down to the pick up & drop off/P&R/rental car/B-Cycle areas off on one side of the roadway. or like you mentioned earlier, cut a hole in the overpass (which i dont think would be too tricky, minus maybe relocating one of the reinforcement beams or something), and have an escalator and elevator to bring people down to the street/ground level under the highway.

didnt realize the buildings had much visual appeal. i was just looking at them from satellite view. just checked them out on street view and they are kind of neat. its only on less than a quarter of the block.. Midway could keep that building (and the tenants) while continuing the alley way/corridor through the middle of that block too. that Front Row Tickets building can go though.. ha that building could stay, and the tenants hang around. or they could rebuild the building/shuffle those tenants into other spaces in GreenStreet while its u/c. it would just be cool to see a residential component to this project one day, and continuing the complex to the east seems most logical (unless they redeveloped their garage and built a residential tower on top of that). good point.. that makes sense.

wow.. you will also be able to see 6HC, 1800 Texas(? the 28 story next to 500 Crawford), the 38 story residential next to the Hess Garage, Marriott Marquis, and possibly the new convention center garage if MM doesnt go up first/block it. what an angle!

You don't think Hines market square tower would peek out from the right side of I.T.? And I don't think it looks bad in the skyline..

true, something along 635 from 75/the red line, west to PGBT, turning south down PGBT to the LRT line running towards DFW, ending at the Belt Line Station (Orange Line?) would be great. it would also connect into the line going up i35 towards Denton (Green line?). most of DFWs population is to the north, so an east/west connector on the north side would be ideal to prevent people from having to take unnecessary trips into downtown when they are trying to get somewhere to the east or west.here is a comparison of the map METRO is trying to build, and some future map that i dont think they are trying to fully accomplish anymore(?).. i dont understand the line paralleling the Red line to the east, going down into old Pearland. i would of put the line down the middle of 288, but i guess at the time there were more people along the corridor they selected, and 288/new Pearland wasnt exploding with population growth as much. i would scrap that southern spur/branch off the southeast line, and jump the red line over on Belfort, for a southern extension down 288 through Pearland and possibly all the way to the P&R at Highway 6 (though thats outside of Harris County, so another agency would have to take that portion over i guess?)

Damn. I guess it makes sense given that there are multiple separate buildings and parking lots on that block. Maybe midway could make an attempt buying up the majority of the block and building around the holdout(s), a la Hines Southmore.

Demo will continue through the end of the year?!

For what it's worth, I think the DART red line is their most popular/highest ridership, just like our red line. I just don't think moving 100,000 people with 85 miles of track is very efficient given that Houston managed to move around 40,000 people with just 8 miles of track. (I realize our short line hit many of the popular destinations in the city, but still. I would think with our 5 lines built out (I think it's a little over 40 miles) that our system would have ridership near that of DART. Or at least a lot better percentage of boardings per mile than they do. Yeah Galveston is definitely the furthest place out that I would consider rail to, that's why I questioned wether it should be commuter rail service just a few times a day or LRT service more often. True, good point. Whoops.. I corrected my post. I meant i10 when I was referring to replacing money generating toll lanes with rail. Agreed Westpark could fit it, which is why I think that's such a great route.

i think the upper kirby stop is a good idea too. the shepherd stop could be lived without though. i dont see three greenway stops, only two? unless your counting the Weslayan stop as GW? i dont think the Weslayan or Cummins stop are really necessary. i would essentially have a stop at Hillcroft, Post Oak, Greenway, Upper Kirby, Montrose (maybe Yoakum)/Menil/St Thomas, and Wheeler. get rid of all the others. they just slow the trains down and dont serve major destinations.yeah uptown line curved west out to Hillcroft, though this (old) map i just found shows a black like running from uptown along the university line east towards Wheeler? i think a line down Memorial would be better. Washington could get a streetcar? Yeah. I would extend the Uptown line up to Northwest Mall, where the Hempstead rail line crosses through, for a 290 rail station.yeah light rail as commuter train hybrid i guess is a pretty good idea. especially if we can get new ones that go faster than ~65mph (speed demon here.. Heh) i was always put off by it since DART screwed it up/gets such crappy ridership numbers, but i dont think a lot of our routes need full on commuter trains running all the time. maybe a couple like Cypress, The Woodlands, and possibly Galveston (only due to the distance.. depending on if LRT or commuter is cheaper. if its commuter, just run the trains only a couple times a day out to Gal). For the LRT hybrid, just space the stops out at least every few miles, possibly up to 5 miles apart, outside the loop. Westpark could go from hilcroft to china town/a p&r off beltway 8, then to highway 6, and finally 1464 or all the way to the grand parkway. I10 would link up with the Hempstead commuter line to hop over into downtown,and have stops at northwest TC, memorial city, beltway/city center, and then go back to stops every mile or two for to serve the Energy Corridor, before ending out at Mason or GP. Those 2 lines I think would be easiest to implement since the ROW is already there (Westpark) or built to suit it (i10). Of course I would like to see the lines described to Cypress, The Woodlands (possibly with service to Conroe a couple times a day), Galveston, and also lines down 90a, and 288 someday. I find it kind of ironic the 90a line will probably be the first to get built when the ridership predictions were fairly low if I'm not mistaken (like 6,000 people a day?), when they could probably build the Westpark line without much trouble and get higher ridership. I only mention Westpark because I'm sure there would be a big ordeal trying to convert money making toll lanes on i10 into LRT.