BEES?!

Nice article! Those are some great pictures. I can’t wait for it to cool down a bit so I can check it out!

I grew up near Sugar Land and we saw them in the parks and fields in our neighborhood during the summer. Other places, too. 
I had always heard they preferred to be around water, but in my experience I didn’t see them much around the creeks/bayous- mostly open or semi-open areas like parks and such.

Cool! I knew about our (current and historical) native cats, but did not know about this site!

Related to this thread, METRO is currently designing prototype bus shelters with solar-powered fans and mesh screens to allow better airflow beneath them. They mention in the article that the 82 Westheimer(which will be getting upgrades as part of METRO BOOST) will likely get some of these new shelters.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/transportation/article/metro-fan-bus-shelter-solar-power-18298783.php

Sort of on topic, this was in the Chronicle. 

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/transportation/article/metro-fan-bus-shelter-solar-power-18298783.php

METRO is designing bus stops with solar-powered fans and mesh sides/screens to allow for airflow. It sounds like METRO is one of the first transit authorities to do this here in the US, so they’re having to trial-and-error a lot of this as they go. They are going to do a trial run, it sounds like, of 50 shelters. I think they are going to put some of the first ones on the 82 route. 

Article talking about the trail from Houston Landing.

I wasn’t aware that it wasn’t under the purview of the parks dept. it would probably be a smart move and help develop it as more a linear park and keep it well-maintained and safer along the whole stretch.

What’s rent like? I imagine pretty high, this looks like one swanky place! Did you get to check out that rooftop?

Great shots as always!!
I spy someone swimming in the pool! Bet they appreciated that shade today 😎

His channel is so great! Nice video!

Sounds like Greenlink (RIP)

They’re probably out there felling the trees for the wood floors and hand-twisting all the carpet fibers. 

They’re doing a BRT tunnel at the Wheeler Station intersection with the Red Line, aren’t they? It’d be neat if they could do more of them, though. 

I was surprised to find out about it, too! Honestly METRO’s descriptions of the BOOST routes are a bit…vague, but that’s info I cobbled together from their videos, site, and meeting packets 😅 

I hope we see a move to bus-lanes in the future, esp. on their high ridership routes. I’m kind of shocked that this isn’t the plan for 82, because I wanna say that is the bus route with not only the highest ridership in Houston, but in all of Texas, too. (I’m also not entirely clear on what their Signature Service is gonna mean, infrastructure improvements- wise. METRO being a little opaque again.)

Sort of like what they’re doing with some of the BOOST routes- trying to speed up the routes and make them more efficient through little infrastructure changes. (IIRC BOOST routes have some kind of signal improvements, raised stops so the bus doesn’t have to kneel, among other things.) 

I’m far from a train expert, but it sounds like they still want to use the Shinkansen stock, at least from their press release. I’m betting that they won’t be track sharing with UP or anyone if that’s still the case.

I also wonder if it’s an ROW thing with Amtrak. But this is all pure speculation on my part. 

I’m sure it was mentioned but I probably missed it, did TxDot ever say what kind of load/capacity they’re planning for when they cap the roads? Or is that still TBD? I wanna say there were options for low-impact, like parks only, med-impact for stuff like some low-rise buildings, and high for taller structures. I don’t remember ever seeing if they settled on what kind of structural support they were going to build into it. I think it was in talks with COH and other stakeholders…

Cool! I’m excited to hear more details about this! I’m not surprised they’d want to get into an agreement together, since I believe this was a route Amtrak was keen on reviving. 

Wow, those skyline views really are something! I see Downtown, Med Center, and maybe Upper Kirby, or Greenway? I’m assuming they’ll have west-facing spaces with Galleria views too. 

It really is brutal. Especially, too, considering those trees are a bit older, and it’s hard on them to be transplanted in the first place. The heat and drought have not been too kind to the trees this year! Feels a lot like 2011, but hopefully it won’t get that dry again and we may see some rain soon. 

We parked at Lyric whenever we went to the car meet up. It seems to draw a ton of people. We went last year, when the weather was better and it was packed.

On 8/1/2023 at 11:24 AM, ChannelTwoNews said:

This is part of an overall plan for reducing the heat in Gulfton, but it looks like it could be adapted anywhere. Some of this proposal would likely have to be tweaked to function downtown, in particular.

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/health-science/2023/07/20/457262/gulfton-is-the-hottest-neighborhood-in-houston-whats-being-done-about-it/

"A local architect firm, Ultrabarrio, created a mock up design that could provide shade on walkways too narrow for a tree. It includes a set of white trellises that could be adjusted to the size of the sidewalk. These would likely be placed on streets with high pedestrian traffic or areas around bus stops that can't fit a standard shelter.

The trellises are slanted in order to maximize the size of the shade and take advantage of the position of the sun in the sky during certain times of the day.

The design also includes an updated bus shelter with a green roof and light colored paint to reflect heat from the sun's rays."

 

Those are neat trellises, they’d go a long way to green up the area. I’m curious what plants they’d use to travel up them.

In their last meeting, the Capital & Strategic Planning Committee provided an update on the Green/Purple Line LRT extension to Hobby Airport.
 

Not a whole lot of details on timeline, but it looks like it is in the works, so I’m guessing we’ll see more regular updates on this particular project. I think this is the first they’ve really started talking about this extension, so that’s good news! 
 

Info on page 22/87 of the July 2023 meeting packet.

To be fair, I wouldn’t personally mind swimming in the shade, .

That’s interesting. I’d be curious to know why they changed it, too.