rechlin

Quite a lot more activity today.  There are several guys on the roof by the southwest side of the taller building, where they have set up another structure, a ladder up to a third floor window by the south corner, a few more guys hanging out a fifth floor window that has been removed (hard to see in the photo but just above the ladder), and they've removed a bit of the façade between the third and fourth floors on the southwest side of the shorter building.

Sounds like you know something about construction. Can you describe this process, i.e. what are the different layers?

I don't know much about construction, but I can explain what I have learned from watching various buildings go up.  They're taking a similar approach on the lower floors of SkyHouse.

First, there are two options.  Either they will paint the existing wall (brick or whatever) with the turquoise sealant, or they will attach a metal structure, put green USG Securock gypsum boards on that, and then paint that with the turquoise sealant.

Then, they cut the white façade substrate material to shape (I don't know what it's made of), spread a dark gray adhesive on the back with a trowel, and stick it to the turquoise sealant.  This acts as the fake stone and is shaped to provide all the relief that they want.

Next, they put dark gray texturing on top to smooth everything out.  I don't know if this is the same stuff they use to adhere it on the back.

Finally, they paint it the color they want.

Back to the progress, they have done a lot of work this week.  This morning they finished putting scaffolding on the southeast wall of the penthouse.  Hopefully this means they will refurbish it, because it's definitely showing its 85 years of age.  Also, they have almost finished covering the turquoise with the white façade substrate on the southeast side:

There was a whole lot more activity today, too.  They had a crane there this morning which appeared to lift something onto the roof of the older building (I have a clear view of the roof of the new building, but nothing was put there), but the crane is gone now.  They also had a whole bunch of trucks parked near the RV.  Also they have a new trailer of some sort, but I didn't get close enough to see what it was.

Also, this afternoon they added some kind of lift structure (looked like what they use for window washing) on the roof of the southwest side.  I'll report back later with pictures if things get more interesting.

There are other garages that open up to the streets light rail would go on. I always wondered about what would happen.

Now that they've made more progress on the light rail, I can now see why this was necessary.  It looks like they are building a rail station right where the old garage entrance was, which would have completely blocked the garage entrance, so they were forced to reconfigure the garage in this case.

Work on tearing down the old Texas Tower is now visibly progressing.  They are now starting to build the (de)construction elevator on the northwest side:

Also, they are lifting a large number of barrels of iodine into the building.  Disinfecting?

Back on topic, things are starting to look really good at the top now.  They have apparently nearly finished the work on the 22nd floor, and are now mounting the white backing boards (on top of the sealed USG Securock) in preparation for texturing the 21st floor:

Here's a closeup of the upper façade plus the apparently-completed work on one of the pilasters around the 17th/18th floors:

This is just speculation, but having been in the garage and watching the construction from my building, I think I know what is going on.

The garage entrance was on Rusk.  With the light rail going in right by it, that would no longer be a safe entrance.  So they are reconfiguring the lower floors of the garage to move the entrance to San Jacinto.  No idea if Metro is paying for that or the owners of 1110 Rusk, though.

Just this morning they started adding some of the fake stone façade to the upper floors:

Closeup of the "stone":