TheNiche

My crystal ball shows that the infill will begin in earnest in the latter part of 2009. ...but musicman is right--I don't think that the word "soon" is appropriate.

None, except that I'd expect that this project, the Hilton, Baylor, and the rest of the TMC are probably going to generate a fair bit of new employment and put some price pressures on my neighborhood and fuel demand for Liu's projects and other developers' projects that are in the works just south of the Loop. For those households with schools topping the priority list, Pearland will be a the top of the list and will benefit greatly.

I seem to recall that Liu's properties are at the northwest corner of Almeda and Bellfort, and in an odd shape along the west side of Fannin, south of Holmes. They aren't contiguous to one another, the Fannin South station, Astroworld, or Reliant Park. Duany spent more time designing street grids for the area and a traffic circle for the Almeda/Bellfort/Holmes/RR fustercluck than he did looking at what Liu actually owns.

I challenge you to cite where in this thread that I've said that the parking garage looks nice, that Hines didn't lie, or that anything was "good enough for [me]". I further challenge you and anyone else on here to render sound advice that'll get something constructive done to remedy the issue.

Lucifer!

If the bad PR is minor in the grand scheme of things, how would that motivate Hines to make a capital expenditure that will benefit third parties and not their financial stakeholders? Seems to me that by freezing up, they could contain the damage and then not have to do anything. Firms make investment decisions on a project-by-project basis. The various decision-making managers are held accountable for the profitability of their respective projects. If you were that person, would you feel very confident in explaining to your higher-up the value added by making a big expenditure, knowing that your pay or even your job is hanging in the balance?

http://www.oconnordata.com/

Ah, ok. Your explanation of the alcohol tax system changes my reasoning pretty dramatically. My thinking was that if you can lower costs to consumers for using the service, that some amount of those cost savings can be captured by price increases, and also that any additional time aboard ship could be spent with bars open and the party in full swing. If I were on a cruise personally, I'd want to spend hours meandering through the Ship Channel. That's awe-inspiring to me. But Bayport is along Galveston Bay between Shoreacres and Seabrook.

Each of the companies that you listed market products to consumers, and the bad PR you mention is all health/safety related. That's a very different animal than a firm that markets space in office buildings to businesses that builds an ugly parking garage. Your examples get people killed. This case is one where a limited number of people (to whom Hines is not selling a product) have their views marred. See the difference? Create a public controversy over aesthetics, and Hines will freeze up. They will do nothing but make a few comments on how aesthetics can be subjective. Beyond that, they won't fuel the fire by trying to debate, and without further input from their side, the matter will die off pretty quickly as far as the press is concerned. The alternative, as far as Hines would be concerned, would be to very quickly make renovations, but then that'd mean that they would be making an investment without any financial return and signalling to their financial stakeholders that they have no backbone. But they didn't. What's there is there. Now we have to deal with it.

If Hines won't do it themselves and you can't get the Management District, TIRZ, or Central Houston to fund it, the only other folks that could pay for that kind of impact mitigation is your condo association. You might be able to work it out so that all interested parties chip in some amount of money. I realize that it isn't what you want to hear, but if you can work something out, that's how it'll likely be. Someone will have to foot the bill.

Wow, I've never been called the devil before. I've never laughed so hard in an office setting. It is true that in matters of policy, I try to at least put forth a perspective that other contributors to the forum have not considered. I prefer the label "intellectual honesty", personally. There's more to life than being a political partisan. At this point in the game, the garage that is there is grandfathered in regardless of any changes in the law, so this isn't about policy theory. It is only about resolving a problem. My advice to you is threefold: Most people, when called the devil, are not going to take you seriously. You will get nothing from them. Gracious as I am, you will get nothing from me but another attempt at mature discussion. You're hardly one to be advising me to pick and choose battles more wisely when you're the one taking a hard stance that something that you've never seen before is ugly. I am not trying to defend the parking garage and I challenge you to point out where I've said that it is a good thing or that its adverse impacts aren't that bad. I don't see you or anyone else offering advice on how to resolve the matter. The advice is apparently viewed as sound approach or I would suspect that violet and her neighbors wouldn't have already performed many of my recommendations before I was even made aware of the issue.

From Bayport to the Gulf vs. from Galveston to the Gulf is a 20-mile difference. Interestingly, there is also a 20-mile difference between BW8 & Gulf Freeway and Galveston at 25th & Harborside. Which do you think is preferable? Moving 3,000+ people 20 miles in seperate vehicles down a highway, or moving 3,000+ people the same distance in a single vehicle over water, using the time savings from a shorter road trip to start partying aboardship? By the way, I believe there is a speed limit for large vessels plying Galveston Bay.

Technically, the Bayport cruise terminal will be in Pasadena. ...cuz when people think of traveling to our region on leisure, what could possible come to mind more than visiting Pasadena!? Seriously though, I'm not sure that this is so much a matter of competition as it is one of convenience, capacity, and facilities.

When I spoke with Simmons Vedder a while back, the rep started to compare it to Post Midtown and then backed down just a little. I'm not really clear how truely "mixed" it'll be when all is said and done. I haven't heard anything about Oasis, but Archstone doesn't have a track record of doing mixed-use projects and is probably developing the complex to conform to institutional investors' criteria for acquisition, which would explain why they're keeping this one seperate from Esplanade (institutional players don't like complexes that are too large). Those kinds of criteria tend not to be as accepting of mixed-use residential-over-retail projects except in very particular circumstances.

Structured parking on the interior. Physically similar to esplanade, but I'd imagine that the aesthetic will be at least somewhat different if they're trying to brand it as its own complex. Without a rendering, its hard to say exactly, but I wouldn't expect anything more architecturally groundbreaking than a Class A+ complex, at best.

Simmons Vedder is developing two in the TMC area, but that this isn't one of them. One is under construction at OST, east of Almeda. Another is on the cusp of breaking ground at the old Garden Ridge site on OST at Kirby. They're exceptionally bullish on the TMC, but I can't imagine that anyone in their position would build a whole seperate complex just up the road from two other projects under development that haven't at least started leasing yet. Too many eggs in a basket. Turns out that Archstone-Smith did finally decide to build it themselves--they were the ones that did Esplanade. This one will be called "The Oasis" and will be positioned as its own seperate complex to avoid confusion between it and the Esplanade.

The last time I spoke to anybody with Hines, I tried to poke and prod for information on their downtown project. That person was "not allowed to say anything" at that time...but they didn't deny a project, either. No. Not all at once, anyway.

I know. I'm just giving you some advice on impact mitigation and PR matters. I really am not trying to be adversarial--just realistic, helpful, and constructive. I'm not saying that the outcome will be utopian because it won't be, and I'm not just going to get all pissy and negative like other members of this forum contributing to this thread because it doesn't accomplish anything. ...I'd hope that folks would appreciate a truth-and-results-oriented approach. I understand that, but you might be careful not to speak too loudly, and not only because it puts Hines in a tricky PR position in which they're unlikely to waver. A lot of prospective downtown residents don't understand that in a redeveloping area with plenty of building activity, what they know today may change tomorrow. Cherished views may be blocked, creating better views for new residents and worse views for established residents, with commensurate changes in property values. And likewise, freakish situations like this one may arise. The truth is that zoning or building codes typically can't cure ugliness and that you shouldn't expect the City to significantly change anything to accomodate a single neighborhood like downtown. It's not impossible, but it's very unlikely. Barring a regulatory approach, about the last thing that you should want to do is publicize that this kind of thing can happen, which could scare off investors in downtown apartments and prospective owners of downtown condominiums and stunt growth. The best possible outcome is a quiet one between involved parties.

I understand where you're coming from, but problems like these are more easily solved in an environment of mutual respect, even if feigned, than one of bitter conflict. That's the reality of it. And even if you perceive that that environment has already been compromised, it doesn't do much good to sink to their level. Otherwise, when PR becomes an issue, a lot of the public will blow you off as whiny self-interested owners that are no better or worse than those that you oppose. People tend to side with a plain-spoken victim, not a vicious aggressor. And good call trying to pull folks like the Downtown Management District and Central Houston, Inc. into the fray. Although, to be clear, they were not created to prevent this kind of thing, the Management District does have authority to disburse funds for improvements to private property, and if Hines can be shown to have been dishonest in this project, the Management District may be convinced to be more hesitant to help Hines out in any future projects or in renovations to properties they own. Same thing goes with the City, although they tend to be less involved. That approach may give you some leverage beyond just offering a financial incentive. Realistically, if an agreement can be reached to remodel the garage, your condo association is likely to end up paying for it. And it may be frustrating, but if it is a matter that is valued highly enough, that's what'll probably end up happening. When I suggested some sort of a shading system, I meant for the parking garage rather than your building. Perhaps a set of louvres, a screen or wire mesh, or interior baffles near the perimeter of each level of the garage to reduce the amount of line-of-sight exposure to the florescents. If not a complete skin, surely there are ways that wouldn't require significant structural modification that the impacts can be mitigated. If they say that it can't physically be done, try to find an architect or building engineer in your building or that one of your neighbors knows that can refute their claim. If you have to, pay someone for an assessment of what can be done and get some estimates on what it'd cost, and take that to the negotiating table.

Yeah, ok. What's your beef with me that merited post #83, in which you mocked me? You are actually reading my posts before responding to them, right?

Millenica, I appreciate that you made the article available. Thanks! My opinion remains unchanged. The hook that engages the reader is that the issue is framed as a problem. While the data is interesting, it is very intuitive--exactly what I'd expect. And while the article seems to tip-toe around the issue of pie slicing vs. pie size (clearly an important consideration when comparing to more socialistic countries like France, which have had slower economic growth), a lot of the information fits well with my own opinions on the matter.

I don't think my comments were fully understood. My suggestion is to try to work things out in a constructive manner, and at the most fundamental level, I can assure everyone that nothing will happen without at least feigned respect. If it becomes a PR hubub with lots of whiny citizens complaining about bad design, then Hines will get themselves in a position where they can't do anything without signaling defeat. As a business that is B2B-oriented, that's not the face that they'd like to put forward. More likely, that a few whiny self-interested folks worried about the view from their condos start spouting a bunch of rhetorically-loaded crap at them is just going to convince them that it isn't a matter that they should bother with. If let your dog out in the yard to do his business and he poops on the neighbor's yard in plain sight of the neighbor, and the neighbor calls you a [fill in the blank], then are you more likely to make your dog use a litter box inside or are you just going to be more careful to make sure that the neighbor isn't outside when you let the dog out to do his business? What if the neighbor asked you politely, perhaps even with good humor, to please keep your dog in your own yard? I can tell you which approach I'd respond to... And I'm not telling her that she can't vent. I don't know where you got that idea. Hell, I want her to post images to see just how bad it is and I then offered a serious suggestion on how the problem might be remedied. Jeez man, what's yours and Red's beef?

Yep, but I'm not sure how credible it is at this point.

Can you provide photos? Perhaps your condo association could contact them about the matter or a letter-writing campaign could be organized. I don't imagine that it'd be too difficult to modify the garage by adding some form of a shading system or another that would shield you from direct line-of-sight exposure to the glow or to headlights. Ultimately, your association might have to chip in to get modifications done if they're possible, but it it's worth that much to you... Oh, and you might want to tone down the rhetoric. Companies take people that sound serious in a serious way, and "corporate evil" isn't the kind of accusatory phrase that would compel me to give a **** about you if I were them.

The Social Compact study from 2001 or 2002, I think, discussed a systematic tendency for Censuses to undercount Blacks and Hispanics, primarily because lots of Black and Hispanic individuals tend not to trust government workers or forms. It is widely acknowledged that these groups are undercounted. I believe that you are correct, however, that some people throw wild opinions based on nothing out into the political arena.