stjnky

And now most of the fencing has come down. You can actually walk right up and touch the dang thing.

Most likely the reason Houston ranked so low is because the walkable areas (mostly inner loop) are dwarfed by the sprawling outer loop. In most other cities, many of those outer loop areas would be considered separate municipalities and therefore ranked separately (although Houston has this interesting way of being fairly continuous outside the loop which is part of the reason it is all considered Houston I guess).

If they were comparing Houston with other metro areas, I think that would be more fair.

I am always surprised how small the population of the city of Atlanta proper is. I think it's because the municipal boundaries are smaller and the outlying areas are considered separately. That is possibly why Atlanta ranked higher than Houston.

The full article mentions the Sugar Land Town Square specifically. Chop that area off, and I doubt Houston would even be on the list.

What, you mean like a topless haunted house?

On this interactive map of the system...it shows all the access points. It's showing stairs, and stairs alone, where the tunnel crosses under Main between Walker and Mckinney. Most other acceess points are shown in the center of blocks and are more obviously associated with buildings... so I guess this could be it.

Yep, on Travis at McKinney (next to the door for the Jason's Deli), there's a door to a stairway directly to the tunnel system.

Great! Thanks for the pics, but who's the hairy guy in the tighty greenies?

That would be Har Mar Superstar, from my trip to the South By Southwest music fest this past week. :-)

I assure you he is in no way affiliated with the Houston Pavilions.

Tearing up the middle lot now:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/44979020@N00/411660502/

The only "problem" with BMG or Columbia House CDs, as far as resale is concerned, is that they are most likely purchased as 12 for a penny. Soundwaves won't give you 5 bucks for them, but if you're a fan of the artist and you just want to own the recording, there's no significant difference between the BMG version versus the "official" label version, other than you won't be able to sell it to Soundwaves after you're done with it.

Well the closest entrance into the tunnels that I can think of is the Park Shops. It wouldn't seem unreasonable to connect them.

Leetle bit closer if they could hook up with Foley's... er, Macy's.

Not to be rude but is your wife 16? I dont know any Women who shop there for clothes, just teenage girls.

So the bouncers aren't even enforcing that whole 21-thing, huh? That's a shame.

I'm sure someone has pointed this out, but I'm glad that the rail runs just west of it. That's perfect. Does anyone know how close the nearest stop is?

Southbound is just across Dallas Street. Northbound is two blocks further north, just the other side of McKinney.

When was a 4th block added, I have seen only rendering for a 3 block development?!?!?

I think they're maybe referring to a new parking garage somewhere.

Why is the Pavillions website not updated to reflect this work.

Damn these lazy webmasters.

Yeah, and seriously don't EVEN bother visiting the PR firm's website. It's a Flash nightmare.

But I grabbed a copy of the press release, and I happen to have some OCR software, so here ya go:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Marta Fredricks

February 27, 2007 Christie Peeler

Dancie Perugini Ware

Public Relations

713.224.9115

HOUSTON PAVILIONS BREAKS GROUND AND

ANNOUNCES FINAL ANCHOR TENANTS

$170 Million Downtown Urban Landmark to Open October 2008

HOUSTON - The Houston Pavilions, a four city block mixed-use development that will become downtown's premiere entertainment, retail and urban office hub, broke ground on Tuesday morning, February 27th. The $170 million project is scheduled to open in October of 2008.

The project will be comprised of 360,000 sq. ft. of retail space, 200,000 sq. ft. of office space, and a 480,000 sq. ft., 1,525 space parking garage. The development will be bounded by Dallas St. to the north, Polk St. to the south, Main St. to the west and Caroline St. to the east.

The developers, William Denton and Geoffrey Jones, who separately have been responsible for numerous commercial, office and residential projects in Houston and other major cities, revealed the identity of the Pavilions' two latest anchor tenants during the groundbreaking ceremony.

Each of the new anchors is in excess of 24,000 sq. ft. A two-level Books-AMillion Superstore and Forever 21 will join the project's original anchor tenants, the House of Blues

NEW ANCHORS: Books-A-Million Superstore, and Forever 21.

Also, they have a nifty mockup under the tent.

Not a very big crowd for the groundbreaking. Oh well.

New pic.

THANKS

Anythin going on on the block touching Main?

Nope. It's still just a lot full of parked cars.

Okay okay, here's a new photo.

Has anyone tried the newish Saigon Express in this building?

I've tried it, and I wasn't that impressed. I ordered some sort of garlic tofu thingy, because I'm a big fan of garlic, and I'm pretty picky about the quality of meats (seems like most places are serving up chunks of fat & gristle these days). When I got my lunch back to my desk I discovered that they had given me something with beef instead of tofu and little-to-no noticeable garlic. And sure enough, the beef was mostly chunks of fat.

Anyone stay in these apartments. How are they. I noticed online that there are only 82 units. Does anyone know anything about the occupancy?

Thanks.

In the spirit of Better Late than Never, I figured I'd go ahead and reply to this. I live in these apartments, and I am a very satifisfied customer. I've been here since April 2004, and I'm about to renew my lease for another year. I work two blocks away, so what I'm paying in a little bit higher rent is more than offset by not having to pay for parking, and only having to fill my gas tank once every couple of months.

This is also the quietest apartment I've ever lived in. But in order to get that peace and quiet I had to sacrifice what some might consider the coolest aspect of living in a downtown highrise: I have no view of the city. There are exterior apartments with city views (and street and rail noise), and then there are interior apartments with views of an empty hollow core (and some Marriot hotel rooms on the other side). Here, let's go the satellite view and you'll see what I mean:

Empty hollow core of despair

I'm about midway down on the right. Wait, hold on, and I'll go lean out the window and wave...

Okay I'm back. So anyway, I don't hear the rail, and when hurricanes threaten us, I'm probably in the safest home in the entire city.

I'm in an ~700 sq. ft, 1-bedroom unit, and I've been paying $1040 since I moved in (it's about to go up to $1060 on this renewal, though). That gets me:

• A nice, quiet, secure apartment walking distance to work
  
• One reserved parking space in the garage
  
• Washer & dryer in the unit
  
• Walking distance to Warehouse Live, Meridian, Verizon theater, Toyota center, Minute Maid park
  
• Rail access to Continental Club and Reliant park (rail tokens not included)
  

The not-so-great stuff:

• The walk to or from some of the more distant music venues *can* be kinda scary sometimes
  
• My vision of how cool it would be to hang out at the hotel bar was waaay off the mark
  
• If you give too much money to the neighborhood panhandlers, they might be waiting outside to greet you in the morning
  

Official (albeit dull) website

thanks for the picture - taken from the marriott?

Yup. I am a tenant of the Humble Tower apartments, which is part of that same property. The pic was taken from the apartment complex's roofdeck. I suspect that once groundbreaking occurs, I'll periodically go up and snap a new picture of the progress being made... er, assuming my rent doesn't suddenly skyrocket and I have to move out.

Eagle-eye view of the lots, from a few minutes ago

No ground broken yet.

Okay, maybe a grackle-eye view.