jermh

6 minutes ago, CREguy13 said:

I actually walked by here today and some of the tape read 'rebar'.  Hines and Cerberus may be in the early stages of their redevelopment of the plaza and ground level.  These holes are being drilled on Travis/Texas side.  They might be extending the first floor out on both these sides to add restaurant space for lease.  These sidewalks are pretty wide especially on Travis. 

Thanks! I suspected it to be the start of some capital improvements. It'll be interesting to see which architect was chosen and what they proposed.

Any idea what they are doing here? There's also scaffolding on 2 sides of the building.

It looks like Gables is branding this property as Crimson.

Don't tell anyone, but Phoenicia downtown was well stocked and even had toilet paper on sunday. It could have changed over the last two days, so buyer beware.

Not my typical grocery haunt because I think the word Phoenicia is Mediterranean for expensive, but it was very nice to grab and go without having to fight people.

Oh yeah, I've been to this since it re-opened. It's almost the same as it was during it's life as the conservatory, but with a new wood ceiling and bad caricature murals above the entry stairs. It's probably more of a my own internalized "oh no, change!" reaction to the changes rather than them really being out of place. 

Everything that used to be dark gray or black colored paint wise is now white. The arcade games are gone, but the back bar had a bigger, and welcome in my opinion, selection of local beers on tap. I tried an IPA by Brash there for the first time, and it was pretty good. Obviously most of the food vendors are new, but I think it's the same taco place that replaced El Burro & The Bull shortly before conservatory closed and it's for sure the same Tres Leches place. I'm happy this is open again. 

It looks like they added some more official signage that will stay after these cardboard poles go away.

These popped up over the weekend on Travis next to The Rice, Market Square Park, and Bayou Lofts. From what I can find, they are newly designated drop-offs for rideshares (Uber, Lyft, etc.), which will be interesting to see how this affects foot traffic near them on the weekends and a line of cars trying to drop/pickup at these locations.

There was a truck on the Louisiana side of the plaza that looks to be pulling core samples as I walked by at lunch.

4 hours ago, urbanize713 said:

Seriously, that is the first thing that came to my mind. 

Maybe impromptu detention pond is one of it's mixed-uses.

26 minutes ago, X.R. said:

Downtown slowly getting all of the amenities people have been clamoring for. So now you'll have Lifetime, the Met, and YMCA all in downtown, and if LifeTime Fitness has those lounge areas and fast-healthy food like the other locations then the downtown businesses and offices without a gym/lounge area of their own can now provide that service to their employees as a benefit of being at the DT location. And DT residents can go there too, I guess 😆

 

Thanks @wilcal!

I wish this location was getting a lap pool. The YMCA is nice, but it can get crowded, and another pool downtown would help relieve that. Regardless lacking a pool having new amenities downtown will be exciting for a lot of people.

21 hours ago, Luminare said:

In my opinion, I like the small scale of Highland Village. Really it just needs a light touch and a few fixes. I would create an underground parking garage and make the surface parking lot one giant pedestrian plaza with pavilions scattered around. We don't have a lot of big pedestrian spaces that are all hardscape. Not everything has to be at the sidewalk on the street if it can do something in a unique way that creates a unique space.

I've never paid attention to the size of it or how many cars it can park, but there is a garage behind P.F. Chang's in the back Highland Village. If that can accommodate the current lot capacity and parking minimum, is it possible they might not even need to build an underground garage?

The icing on the cake would be if they ever built the multi-use path proposed under power lines that run next to the train tracks to Memorial Park. After that, if we ever get a future connection from the Memorial to Buffalo Bayou's , you would have this shopping center connected to all of the Allen Parkway developments, Downtown, and beyond. I like to bicycle dream that all those moving parts could come together sometimes. 

On 1/2/2020 at 2:51 PM, Urbannizer said:

HKS is the architect; DPR is the GC

 

https://www.dpr.com/media/review/fall-2019/projects

 There's an RFQ/RFQ out again for the Architecture side of this project.

https://www4.mdanderson.org/procurement/bids/index.cfm?pagename=viewBid&id=6858&name=Request for Qualification

39 minutes ago, Montrose1100 said:

Well, I don't think Shanghai River is super cheap? It's more so the only place left that has white table cloths from the 80s with decent food. They also have a dish called Happy Family Marvin Zindler which is super cool. A relic of the past for sure. The drink menu is ginormous, so many cocktails. Everyone at your table could order the same drink and they might come out different, but they're still good, part of the charm. The food is consistent and reminds of me of Chef Chan's. Higher quality than most.

They also have a photo of Marin Zindler and his dog on the wall. 

Good news! Now I'm curious if it will somehow incorporate the former prohibition space. I walked by last weekend, and workers were re-configuring the patio fencing at ground level to join the two areas. Previously the railing was separating the outdoor seating between the two establishments.

Renovations are coming along, but I guess they're not going to hit that November 2019 opening date. ;)