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Kinglyam

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Everything posted by Kinglyam

  1. Kinglyam
    The bottom of the light rail is elevated at least 20 feet above existing grade. I don't know how thick the beams and rail surface are, but say about 5 feet or so to the top of the rail surface. Then, the top of the electric lines that power the train are another 15 feet above that. You'll need at least 10 feet of clearance (probably more) to install anything over those electrical lines, so now we've got the bottom of the new freeway at around 50 feet just to get over the light rail. The beams and slab to the top of pavement will be more than 5 feet thick, I'm sure, and may be 10 feet given that the entire thing is elevated. If you look at the Appendix G I referenced, it shows a section cut at the other end of Hardy Yards. The I-10 lanes drop to the ground, but the I-45 lanes stay elevated past Hardy Street. So 60 feet is more than a reasonable expectation, and we should be hopeful that it's no more than that. I know I am, particularly, since I've been planning to build a house on Burnett that would have what I thought would be uninterrupted skyline views.
  2. Kinglyam
    Or, you could check out their website. If you look at the 4th public meeting documents, in Appendix G, page 22 has a section showing the 405-foot wide I-10. It's all raised, but with no vertical scale shown. I tried making a jpg of it, but the file didn't work, and the PDF is too big to attach.
  3. Kinglyam
    Well, this is a surprise (to me). TxDOT is planning to get the downtown I-45 cluster**** started by 2020/21, which will run the freeway right between UHD and Hardy Yards. I never expected that to happen at all, tbh. That's going to bite for the value of any skyline-view residential units that will now have a massive freeway right outside their windows. Do you think this will force a change in the layout we've seen?
  4. Kinglyam
    Are you new to Houston, LTAWACS? Nothing gets built here without the parking garage first. The rest of the building will come around it.
  5. Kinglyam
    Does this mean they finally figured out how to keep them from getting stolen, and are going to put in the upgrades? Or did they just give up because a few UHD students wanted some H's for their dorm room?
  6. Kinglyam
    I was up there last night to check out the new work, and stepped it off. Definitely 6' wide, like all the stuff they built along Burnett. Easy for two people walking side-by-side, but that's it.
  7. Kinglyam
    Are you talking about the San Jacinto St. extension? I've seen in other forums that it seems to be up in the air.
  8. Kinglyam
    How big would this station be? As long as it can be melded in with the planned mixed use development, great. But if it's going to replace all of it, no thanks. That would kill development in Near Northside if they end up with just a rail station. Looking at the March "Last Mile" report, going into Hardy Yards was rated next-to-last of the options, so I question the likelihood that it is now a top-three. Plus, DH-2 goes down the median of I-10 and over I-45? I don't see that getting approved unless they officially kill the Uber-Alignment they've been talking about. This major piece of infrastructure would have to be torn down and rebuilt within a few years if that went through.
  9. Kinglyam
    As long as they don't do This Way and That Way, but since it's not being developed by Dow engineers, we're probably good. I thought it was a promising, ahem, sign, that the developers see this as a destination development, and will put a lot of effort into making it worthwhile.
  10. Kinglyam
    Interesting that it stops at Chestnut. They've done the sidewalks from Chestnut to Freeman, and conduit is in place, but no landscaping whatsoever. It's still a muddy, weed-infested mess along that area.
  11. Kinglyam
    I'm pretty sure it's not. It's always been described as a "kiss and drop" location, and this far in town, land is too valuable to spend on parking. It's not like it's easily accessible from the freeways, anyway. Clearly this is intended as a true urban location, which means you ride transit, a bike, or walk there. What the Hardy Yards developers do is a different story, of course.
  12. Kinglyam
    I didn't realize it was two different contractors doing the work. That might explain why they are working on the south lanes to the east, and on the north lanes to the west. The portion of the road done by Metro appears to be about finished. They had poured what appears to be the last strip of concrete in their section earlier this week. The lines are already painted on the north lanes from Freeman east. The tunnel work does appear to be about finished. The concrete work looks like it's pretty much finished, anyway. I only drive by, so don't linger long enough to get the details.
  13. Kinglyam
    Take it for what it's worth, but I spoke to a future neighbor of mine on Everett, who said he had talked to one of the architects that was working on the Hardy Yards design. According to this AOAA (acquaintance of an acquaintance) news, Phase I of the Hardy Yards project is supposed to start in about 18 months. The guy showed me some images he supposedly was directed to by the architect, but they were those old "Hardy Yards Plaza" renderings that were posted here in 2013, including the miniature Eiffel tower. Since I can't find anything current, I take the construction start with a big grain of salt.
  14. Kinglyam
    I wouldn't count on KBR before Hardy. Hardy Yards is already remediated and approved for construction, with nothing (known) near it. I'm not sure KBR is. Plus, KBR is right next door to the MDI site. While it's down to ground water monitoring only, I'm thinking that's going to put a damper on expansion. And don't forget, light rail. Not anywhere near KBR.
  15. Kinglyam
    It's mixed use, so unless they build it all office on that side (which is possible, of course), there would be some residential. I've not seen any detailed layouts discussing where things are supposed to go in the development, only sketches.
  16. Kinglyam
    I didn't realize until today that they were planning to reroute the spaghetti bowl to north of UHD. Right now, the plans show it going along the south side of the UPRR track, through UHD's surface lot off Daly, with an entirely elevated structure.It will probably cut the value of any residential planned for the south side of the yards, since they'll have that massive freeway right outside the 3rd floor, but overall I doubt would have a huge impact on the whole project.
  17. Kinglyam
    They've torn up the road and are working on the subgrade on the north side of Burnett, now. The project manager says about 3-4 weeks (weather permitting, of course) for that side of the road to be finished. Looks like they're not dropping the grade like the foreman told me a while back. That roller-coaster ride they put at the new Main-Burnett intersection gives them all the grade change they need. I don't want to think what that intersection is going to be like during a toad-strangler.
  18. Kinglyam
    A temporary road with all that asphalt seems pretty wasteful, but I suppose that makes sense with what the foreman told me ages ago, that they were going to start the work by redoing the north side of Burnett first. The rain must have really put a crimp in their schedule.
  19. Kinglyam
    I suspect here's not a lot more in that article than in this one from Wednesday: http://www.bxtx.com/construction-preview/22439-hardy-yards-springs-back-to-life.html
  20. Kinglyam
    I haven't seen anything, but I just noticed a thread a little bit down the forum about a residential construction ("The Lofts", so creative) planned for that triangle of land across the tracks from the warehouse.
  21. Kinglyam
    Not just that, but all our drainage bayous are undersized for the increased flow we're getting from all the development out west, Katy and beyond. Add to that a ground surface that's sinking due to subsidence. Plus, there's a drive now to reintroduce habitat and naturalize bayou flow paths. There's always going to be concrete in the lowest portion of the floodway (like Buffalo and White Oak Bayous near Heights), but they may bench above that with just dirt. Widening is going to depend a lot on the surrounding development, though, and they may have to concrete-line more of the bayou in areas where they can't widen it as much.
  22. Kinglyam
    To listen to some of the "drivers" downtown, that's exactly what the light rail was doing the first couple of year's operation! Triton, I'm a poor judge of speed, admittedly, but I'm pretty sure the trains don't do 45 through there. They appear to be doing 20 or so at best. But, yes, I realize it's only a stop sign. They have to signalize it with drop arms, at least. But one little podunk intersection, surely that's not so hard? For that matter, once the Main-Burnett intersection is complete, would it be reasonable to just abandon that road? It's already gone to heck in a handbasket with the rerouted traffic, and gods know it's not likely to get fixed anytime soon. I imagine the street connectors to downtown that are included with the Hardy developments will include signalized crossings that are paid for by the developer, so they can get that whole line silenced from Maury. On a side note, that old warehouse would make an awesome shell for a commercial redevelopment, perfect for the UHD crowd. Throw in a coffee shop, bar, maybe small food court...
  23. Kinglyam
    As well as amazing sounds, at least until they silence the rail crossing at Daly/Trentham, plus whatever new crossings this development creates. There must be 20 trains a day through there, at least. I can't believe they still have to sound the horn for that one little crossing, but go silent when they cross I-45.
  24. Kinglyam
    I forgot about the Fiesta, thanks for the correction. But I don't think it's going to be enough for the proposed development. With the number of people the rail yards would bring in, it looks too small. And, let's be blunt, Fiesta doesn't appeal to the primary market demographic for the mixed-use development. Fiestas are a mostly blue-collar demographic, while most of the new people coming to the yards are likely to be white-collar. I expect most of the residents of the new development (and surrounding redevelopment) to want a higher-end HEB or something similar. As for restaraunts, other than Tex-Mex and fast food, what's in the area? I've never seen anything.
  25. Kinglyam
    Yep. I talked to the construction foreman a couple of weeks ago (before the rain started). They were scheduled to start ripping up the north side of Burnett last week, but it looks like the rain delayed them. It's supposed to go on for 3 months once they start tearing up the road itself. The elevation of Burnett will be dropping pretty significantly starting about where that picture is taken (Everett St.) That intersection will get dropped at least a foot, he said. The side streets are going to curb-and-gutter back to about 150 feet from Burnett, as well.
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