crock

the perfect buyer/builder for that lot would be if Automattic/Wordpress/Tumblr built their headquarters there. Their founder/head is in Houston... their workforce is all remote though.... sigh.  That's basically the only tech company we have that is large enough that could in theory build a small campus like that. 

20 hours ago, Triton said:

I think nearly the entire city would have to be underwater for this hill to flood.

maybe they're calling it Festival Hill because we can all go there to watch the world be inundated? 

1 hour ago, Purdueenginerd said:

That area is currently flood retention. I would assume the park will still be retention, so I would guess we should expect a decent amount of expected flooding at this park. 

You must have never been on the MKT.  this a rather elevate d ridge, when you're on the MKT trail this area is a hill above/next to you. It would only flood in extreme events.    

19 hours ago, Houston19514 said:

 

Meanwhile, on the east side, there's talk (and far more of it) of spending hefty dollars on a deck park over the below-grade freeway. (The deck park is on Houston First Corporation's agenda. I have not seen anything on their agenda about a bridge over Buffalo Bayou.)

 

Again, I ask, where does the project fail to keep local connectivity? I am not as familiar with Segment 1, so maybe up there.  But in neither Segment 2 nor Segment 3 is there a reasonable argument to be made that the project fails to keep (and indeed improve) local connectivity.

There is a huge argument to be made that the project fails to keep local connectivity between the heights and near northside. 

The current plan takes away the North Street bridge, taking away germantown's connection to near northside.  IIRC there is also a big question mark on if Link st and Cottage st are kept connected.  

also the deck park is a fantasy.  It would take 100 milion of private money to make any of that work. 

there goes one of the best views of houston (unless you're in a very specific-spot of potin's patio) 

and no street level retail... sigh.   

15 minutes ago, Houston19514 said:

 

But that is not "adding" twelve lanes to our current infrastructure.  Those replace how many lanes that are currently routed on the west side of downtown?  (I suspect this is exactly the area Speck is referring to when he says we are "adding" as many as 13 lanes in places;  another disingenuous statement, to put it lightly.)

it's adding.  Highway construction is not some cutesy libertarian math equation.  They don't get to drop the pierce elevated into the hole and reuse it.   

24 minutes ago, Houston19514 said:

Speck tells us that the plan adds "as many as 13 new lanes in some places".  Can anyone identify where the plan adds 13 lanes?

The current plan has 22 lanes being built underground between GRB and Eado.  This shows 8 lanes existing and 5 more if you count the feeder.  So 8 to 22 is 14? If you want to be generous, then i guess this is showing 13 lanes being subsumed by 22, so "only" 9?
 

5 hours ago, gmac said:

 

Excellent job displaying your complete ignorance. Bravo, bravo.

 

Might want to visit Katy and see how diverse it is, bubs. Nahhhh, easier for you just to sling BS.

saying Katy is diverse is fine and all, but you're the one displaying your complete ignorance if you think white flight is "BS" or somehow not racist. 

12 hours ago, Ross said:

 

 

The last time I was in Baltimore was 1976. I have no real desire or need to go there. People have to live somewhere, and all of you folks keep thinking it's not in Katy. Where would you have them live?

you say this as if Baltimore is supposed to care about Columbia's transit, or that Portland is supposed to care about Salem.   That is the problem with Houston, suburban people think they should have a say in the city itself, thats not true of other places. 

1 hour ago, Ross said:

"Urban" Houston is nothing like Baltimore, Portland, etc. Where would you run rail in "urban Houston" without also destroying the ability of people to get around the areas near where they live?

have you been to Baltimore? their rail/lightrail set up is very similar to Houstons.  Both Baltimore and Houston were built out with streetcar suburbs.  In what way is Houston "nothing like" Baltimore? 

Also, who cares about Katy? If people want to keep making unsustainable and slightly racist "But our school district" decisions, why should the urban core keep having to make the sacrifices? 

It's cute you're talking about "getting out of our subdivision would be difficult" out as if the reason the Afton Oaks people didn't kill the richmond line was pure and blatant racism.  
 

half expecting this to be the new West Elm location 

20 minutes ago, Ross said:

The points he makes are stupidly simplistic. He's a man on a mission to reshape Houston, a city he apparently hates, to fit a mold that will never work here. The outer suburbs are going to grow, there's little to be done about that, since the people who buy homes there can't find what they want at the price they are willing to pay, in the central area. Speck implies that if you make the highway suck enough, people will move closer to Downtown. Just where does he think the million plus people who moved to the area recently would live? How many people would be displaced to build Inner Loop housing acceptable to new arrivals?

they're stupidly simplistic because they've literally been proven true time and time again across the globe. 

trying to imagine the nerve/gaul/ignorance required to call something Founders District thats nowhere near the founding of anything. 

:((((((

newest chronicle article about buffalo bayou brewery had the owners saying opening is "sometime in October"

The hicks street bridge might be the least-used bridge in the entire county.  it doesn't have sidewalks, but it also doesn't have traffic.  Taking hicks is a more pleasant experience as a walker and biker than crossing studemont will ever be.  The curve around Arnie's warehouse, and the great skyline views you get make it a lovely place to walk/bike.   The townhouses and old brick warehouse are more attractive than the backside of a grocery store and a parking lot.     All i'm saying is we have a underutilized bridge over a major thoroughfare, and i really hope it becomes more utilized for pedestrians and the creation of a neighborhood.  

9 hours ago, ajgallion said:

As someone who is excited to move into the new Broadstone Summer Street apartments, the re-connection of Summer Street is great news. This area is becoming more and more a real neighborhood and I look forward to the days when people stop flying down Studemont as they try to get to 10 and pay attention to the pedestrians who want to walk Summer Street to get to the "Arts District".

There is literally Hicks Street bridge over Studemont, that should be where pedestrians go, not trying to cross at Summer st.   

https://www.lovettcommercial.com/properties/houston/polk---dowling

11 hours ago, Triton said:

Is there any indication from the city that they still plan to expand Sawyer? Haven't seen any reference to that since 2014.

I've lived in first ward since the start of the year and i've seen/heard nothing about that.  The only street stuff thats currently proposed is reconnecting summer street so you can actually get from target to kroger, and there is a request to the transpo board to change crockett from a major thoroughfare to a minor. 

THE FIRST LIGHTRAIL STOP WEST OF DOWNTOWN!!! We'VE FINALLY DONE IT!!!!!!!  URBAN DENSITY, HERE WE COME! 

24 minutes ago, Texasota said:

 

Any teasers for us?

i was at the meeting last night too and I saw no maps with potential changes.  It was just maps of what exists and maps of the most current txdot plans...... like the downtown partnership plans weren't in the building in any way shape or form.   

it was maybe 120 people?  It was the consulting firm, CoH, Metro, UH's design ppl, and some tdot ppl quietly listening.... they gave us a run down of where we are in the timeline and how f'd we are, and then had large tables (in english and spanish) for 4 issues (Connections, Traffic, Environment/Flooding, Property).  People were asked to sit in groups for 20 minutes and the consulting firm/UH/CoH people would lead discussions while a second person wrote all the notes down.  Some discussions were better than others, but there were just so many competing voices and issues for 20 minutes to be enough time...   a lot of 2ndward/eastside people were there and it was specifically not about their section, which got awkward real quick when they tried to ask about their part.    

There was absolutely no "heres our ideas!"-type of thing from the city or consulting firm.   

On 8/7/2019 at 8:17 AM, samagon said:

So, um, if the 'traffic fix' they hoped to implement is what has happened, then TXDOT needs to have some people sacked. 

 

the new solution is just as bad as it used to be.

 

if this is what the 45 project hopes to bring, they can keep it.

i don't think this was about traffic as much as safety (correct me if i'm wrong?) bc people would have gnarly accidents trying to switch at the last minute at night.  

because, yea..... if this was about less congestion, then all the engineers at TXDOT need to be fired and never allowed to work on road design ever again.  It is worse, and it is worse literally at all times of day.  before this, if you took i45north before rush hour, there was very rarely congestion, now there is congestion 100% of the time, 2pm-traffic, 9pm-traffic.  it is miserable.... and it will only be worse when UH starts.  

 

who in their right mind would be ok with putting their car into a mechanical valet box?  it's like... let's add the wait time and shitty classist nature of valets to the unreliability of a large public-facing machine?   there is literally no benefit to the consumer of this sort of system, it's all in increasing revenue, who cares if the moment this thing breaks there will be dozens of people not able to get their car at the end of the night.   

9 hours ago, Luminare said:

 

Yeah was about to say the same thing. Walked this area a few times now, and its mostly townhomes. Most of the old homes in that area are gone now. The ones that are left are in very rough shape.

the high first ward historic district saved a good number of them, and I literally live in a 1880s-built house in the lower first ward that i'd like to think is in better than very-rough-shape 😅

10 hours ago, Triton said:

 

nearly this entire picture would be in color.

everything that wasn't colored east of sawyer would be a house built 100+ years ago too. which i think is what makes 6th ward + 1st ward so special.