cspwal

This is going to tower over the other two buildings on this block... it's only 1/8 complete right now and it's halfway up the Citizen's bank building

I suspect the original bricks were handmade per the story, but over time bricks were replaced as they were broken, and at a certain point they were probably just replaced through normal municipal channels, which tend to source pavers from established companies.  There are probably some of the handmade bricks still there, but they might not be common

Regent Square

Edit; I'm dumb. Is RS considered part of Midtown?

I wouldn't think so, since it's west of Montrose BLVD.  I also completely forgot about that development and the promised for Movie Tavern.  Would this area be Montrose, or something different?

With Flix Brewhouse coming to Sugar Land too, this is welcome news for moviegoers. But why can't Midtown get its Alamo Drafthouse?

Where could an Alamo drafthouse fit in Midtown?

That sounds like his focus is more on the inner-city, not on commuter solutions.

 

Isn't real-time bus data already available?

 

It is, but it seems unreliable sometimes.  And the metrorail used to have real time data but it seems to have disappeared 

At least the seats have tiny Swedish flags

The only part that you can see from this side of the paywall

Nice historic photo of, and I liked the explanation of how they did it

 

 

Right now, it's a sad-looking skyscraper at the corner of Walker and San Jacinto. Been that way for quite some time actually.

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/bayou-city-history/article/The-Melrose-Building-is-one-of-Houston-s-6668309.php#photo-9040608

Sadly that is probably the case.  However, the current building is still quite tall, and if what we get is just a block that is all that tall (instead of a giant hole) right next to the Metro rail transfer station(s) I'll be happy.  Just glad that the Texaco building survived and wasn't leveled for Skyhouse Rusk or something

Did a quick search on that and I found a picture from back when there were houses in downtown

http://arch-ive.org/archive/irving-r-klein-building/

However, there are major structural issues with the property and it was almost demolished in 2009:

 

"It could cost $4.7 million to resolve the warehouse's structural issues, according to an August 2008 engineering report. "The problem with the [Hogan-Allnoch] building is that the brick is load-bearing brick," Ellwood says. "Unfortunately, with the settling of the earth, the building basically has been compromised. There are pretty substantial cracks going all the way from the bottom to the top." http://www.preservationnation.org/magazine/2009/todays-news/houston-spares-two-buildings.html

 

There were structural issues - it would have required a lot of renovation work to become anything more than a single floor building with very high ceilings

It looks like the interior units will have balconies

We need an eccentric oil tycoon to buy a tunnel boring machine

Davis lit up the "A" on the top of Astoria last night. Diamond is still dark. Wonder when that will fire up?

Still charging the positron emitters

That old greyhound station looks like it's larger capacity, so could hold more people waiting for their buses.  I wonder what it was like before Greyhound moved - maybe it was even worse?

Who wants to tell Culture Map that that's traditional for most all buidlings no matter the time of year?

http://houston.culturemap.com/news/entertainment/12-02-15-new-84-million-sugar-land-performance-arena-tops-out-in-a-holiday-way/

 

 

The topping off ceremony for the Smart Financial Centre at Suglar Land included a Christmas tree

Sad to see another parking lot - and that no one could turn this into semi-useful space

If only Alexan and Catalyst had discovered that sooner and figured out a use for it - because I bet that they fill it in and it's lost

That probably just haven't installed the windows there yet

Answering my own question: it looks like the Midtown greyhound station was built between 1973 and 1981

Looking at historic google earth images, there seems to have been a structure there in February 2004.  

In the historic aerials at http://www.historicaerials.com/it looks like there was a blocky looking building there until 1995.  In the 1966 photo there are diagonal lines that look like buses or trucks lined up.  Someone said a while ago that it was the bus station?  When did Greyhound move to Midtown?

Block 291, 1317 Austin St.

I noticed walking to the Toyota center last night that the building on the corner of Clay and Austin had been demolished.   Earlier I had seen warning signs on it about asbestos, but it was standing as of two weeks ago.

Here's the building in question

Building by Christopher Hisle, on Flickr

HCAD says it's owned by GOLCONDA VENTURE - sounds like a holding company.  Why would they demolish it?  Asbestos infested buildings cost more to demolish right?

http://www.hcad.org/records/details.asp?crypt=%94%9A%B0%94%BFg%84%8D%81zie%8El%87tXtYW%9E%99%A2%D3%89%95%C2e%7CU%8A%81%86%C0%AB%A8%AD%86%5EY%9B%C4%90uf%7B%A9%92%BEq%5E

They tried to build the Astrodome in Memorial park?  Interesting...didn't know that

I wonder how this relates to an elevated busway for the BRT uptown line

On one hand, not everything has to be the most amazing building ever.

On the other hand - it is an architecture blog 

Maybe I've been downtown too long, but that loks like a lot of parking versus how much space the buildings take up.  I mean each parking lot is at least the size of it's associated building if not bigger.