woolie
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Everything posted by woolie
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I did delete that post, no?
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is the Matrix your favorite movie?
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Everytime you post that pic -- which, btw, I took because we were thinking about buying one -- I'll remind you that I do indeed like them. They're very cost-effective, space-efficient, and I like interiors even if some of the finishes could be higher quality. I've lived in inner-city Houston for about 6 years now, and most of that time I've used metro/bike/walk at least to get to work, even if I take the car for longer trips. I've traveled to other cities (that fit my 'vision') often. What I've found is that it's not some utopia. Rather it's more like the normal human condition. I think the american car-city is rather the exception to the rule. I don't care if other people have kids. I just don't care for them myself. Every time I say Houston is not my ideal city, people on this forum like to remind me that I'm a mutant and should crawl back into my hole.
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Not a bad place to be. I've often discovered most people are wrong.
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Belief in something that can be demonstrated repeatedly and independently verified is not an act of faith. It's about constructing the proper theory to explain a phenomenon, and devise new experiments to either confirm, amend, or reject the theory based on new observation. And this is the distinguishing trait from acts of faith: a theory is improved to take into account new understanding. Unlike religious faith, there is a rejection of dogma. If someone makes an assertion using the theory of gravity as justification, it can be tested. It doesn't have to be accepted as an article of faith. Anyway, yes, being part of the 5% of Americans who actively reject all superstition and existence of deities has been an interesting experience.
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I'm often angry when I first wake up.... It was poorly written and ranty so I changed it. Although I do feel that way about large parts of the CBD, midtown, and other inner city areas where the quality of the urban space is really lacking, even if you factor in income disparities.
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My own aesthetic tastes run towards traditional-urban, european-style cities. I am willing to make the net-income and convenience sacrifices to live in one. I feel it's more than repaid by the accessibility of things that I consider important to my quality of life. A diverse, organic urban fabric. Mixed-use. Less reliance on big box stores. Multiple transportation modalities. I prefer to live and walk in a world populated by people instead of cars. I think there's a quote, "what fascinates people is people." I care about the quality of the built environment... I feel that a place that's been occupied for hundreds of years isn't old, rather it's a continuously optimized solution, an urban organism fully adapted to its context. ps. I don't ever want kids. So many things don't ever enter into tradeoff compromises.
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Please.
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alot like this:
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I agree about Midtown, though. It's why I moved here. Eagle @ Caroline. I get to ride the choo-choo every day.
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Make a table of the largest 100 cities in the world and the % of trips by car... American cities and in particular Houston/Dallas/Phoenix/etc really are unique. Cars are popular around the world, to be sure, but in most cities the entire fabric that holds the region together won't dissolve if oil supplies are severely diminished, because most trips are either already done by other modes, or discretionary car trips can fall back to other (if less convenient) methods.
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Alright, yes, I wasn't articulating my thoughts very well, but to me the quest for urbanism isn't about fitting some hip ideal, or wanting Houston to be like other cities. It's about sustainable development. The auto oriented suburban city gives me pause because it can be vulnerable to fuel supply disruption, which I really do fear is going to become critically important in the coming decades.. it's about climate change disrupting our economy on a large scale and displacing people all over the world, leading to unstable countries where the rule of law is declining in importance. It really boils down to an issue of Security, much more than environmentalism. The comparison to Detroit (and Pittsburgh, and St. Louis, and Buffalo, etc.) is this, which everyone missed, is the lesson from history, that a structural change in a society or an economy can easily turn a boomtown into a burned out shell. What gives me pause about Houston is the dependence on a single mode of transportation which requires a huge petrochemical infrastructure to support, and the dependence of the local economy on this industry, which although has improved in recent years is still quite heavy. And we can talk about alternative fuels or electric cars playing a role in the future, but we need to be moving there in substantive ways now, with more than just re-branded ag subsidies to corn farmers. Basically I think that global warming and peak oil are going to become important issues in the near future and we should already be moving to restructure our cities and transportation networks to prepare now, while we still have excess resources and are a prosperous society. When I think about building throwaway structures like a WalMart or CostCo, though, it's just pure sadness, that our built environment is reduced from being something people care about and discuss, to simply the cheapest possible air conditioned shelter accessible by freeway.
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I still like the tin shacks. They remind me of British terraced housing.
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*bang* It's always the magic phrase, "I want to leave Houston" that lets the wolves out on this forum. No one would be here if they hadn't intertwined their city pride with their own identity. So to say you want to leave is akin to insulting someone's mother. Why, isn't Houston the greatest city on Earth? How can anyone complain about delayed projects -- they're just icing on top of perfection!
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Haha, alright. Personally, I wouldn't spend too much time there. Unless they had a really good, inexpensive restaurant like Niko Niko's. I'm not exactly their target market. I hadn't considered the train tracks, you're right. But, traffic aside, uptown has fantastic potential for exactly this kind of development. It has the right "kind" of consumers in the area. (I am admittedly not a large consumer of clothes, fashionable stuff, useless crap, etc., kind of stuff that these developments like as tenants.) The thing about CVS is this: it doesn't matter if it's a CVS or Burger King, or CostCo, or whatever. It's simply the construction of suburban-type structures in an area the city has bent-over-backwards to outfit for proper urban infrastructure. It's basically, "oh, hi, thanks for investing so much in this neighborhood. but we can't afford an architect, and our accountants say no risk is acceptable, so we're just going to use a standard acre-footprint design." At least I was able to stay because there was an excellent graduate program here. The TMC is one of the few things about Houston that I think is exceptional, and that I would really miss elsewhere.
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What kind of work experience are you talking about? A Ph.D. is based on the work you accomplish. The coursework is a minor component, at best. Houston has them all, but they're all heavily dependent on the oil still flowing. You're still my favorite here... Alright, I'm guilty of ranting a bit while waiting for my builds to complete, but it's just out of frustration with development in Houston. The illustration was inspired by the Elgin CVS thread. Developers put up renderings showing beautiful mixed-use centers, with wide sidewalks, structured parking, residential, etc. What we actually get is a suburban big box store surrounded by parking. I'm thinking more and more, the renderings are just for the press to get excited about.
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You left out the most fun part by assuming oil is a perfect commodity. The geopolitics of oil complicates any economic model like this. The US will go to war to capture remaining oil resources before the price gets too high. The resource war will be considered a wise investment. It'll be viewed as having a better return on investment than changing our infrastructure to reduce dependence on petroleum. Anyway, color me skeptical about alternative fuels. Corn ethanol has an EROEI of 1.3 and is really just an ag subsidy. Coal-to-liquid is an environmental cluster____. Biodiesel is marginally better. Sugarcane ethanol is realistic and has a positive EROEI but doesn't grow so well in most of the US. Everything else is hypothetical at this point: cellulosic ethanol, algal biodiesel, nuclear-powered DME production, etc. I did want to leave, but my girlfriend still had 2 years left (1 year of BS, 1 year of MS)
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No one else is sick of being promised this: and getting this instead? So excuse me for lack of faith. It's clear no one with the power to build anything worth caring about is interested in building anything worth caring about. Seems that talking about walkable environments in Houston is the equivalent of snake handling and drinking arsenic.
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Not even CERA makes that claim.
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MidtownCoog is internet tough guy. Since you want to know, I'm 24, and leaving Houston as soon as I finish grad school.
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You completely missed my point. Anyway, here's an exercise. Detroit hemorrhaged when the domestic auto industry collapsed. What will happen to Houston when there's no more oil to drill or refine?
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The nightmare traffic in the Village doesn't seem to deter many people. Anyway, what I think is that these mixed-use renderings are just buttering city officials up for the Best Buy or Target that will eventually be built on these plots. Much less risk involved.
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I'll be surprised if even a single one of the "grand projects" approaches anything near the original renderings. HP had its residential component sheared off. The HISD site will be a CostCo. I'm just waiting for the disappointing news on West Ave., Regent Square, BLVD Place, etc. Which will be cancelled or turned into a WalMart first? I'm just wondering if Houston is ever going to join the 21st century, or if it's a lost cause, the first Detroit of the sunbelt.
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Score another one for Houston! edit: lol, gmta trae. we posted at exactly the same moment.
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A ____ing boat load, like, $400k. Mosaic is crazy psf.
