KirbyDriveKid

Oh ya, no I fully agree on the bus route change. The linear system is good. I'm just hopeful that the increasing density around these streets will justify increases in frequency on those routes to match (or come closer to matching) the 82. If that was the case, you could have high frequency east-west buses within fairly reasonable walking distance from a good number of residences and businesses. Add in a few higher frequency north-south routes and you have a system that could stitch together those core neighborhoods with the sort of reliable 30-min-or-less transit times I have in my head as necessary to make car-free life feasible. Also agree about West Dallas. I'm hopefull that after some of the early steps they've taken with bike lanes (and with the destruction of the I-45 ring), the city might make that road a transit and bicycle route. Isn't a ton of car traffic at the moment since it parallels Allen Parkway and Memorial, and even West Gray seems to get more car traffic. Seems a good option for a road to donate a dedicated bus lane to.

That BRT line, the 82 on Westheimer, and hopefully some frequency upgrades to the 41 on West Dallas (my sleeper pick for most our soon-to-be most urban street), could really form the skeleton of a workable Montrose/UK/Midtown/Downtown transit system.

And don't forget the crown jewel!! 12-story Fairmont Museum District, Architect (unkown), Rendering (unknown). Time to build all those hotels we love to talk (argue?) about. Houston's tourism is about to spike!

Bayou looking a pretty shade of green in these! I say unironically... squint a little and it's almost blue!

Hmm, guess they weren't ones for a temporary greenspace. That surface lot is a little harsh and, given the size of the parking garage, it feels pretty unnecessary? Hope they can move forward with more of the master plan sooner rather than later!

Probably just adding floors to that monstrous garage 🥴

I love this new tower, but I guess I am a little surprised that their plan is to build two high rise buildings immediately adjacent to one another (reacting to the model showing this 40 story and the 25 or so story office building immediately across the internal street). Each seems to be directly cannabalizing the view of the other.

They are also very high end condos that happen to be situated across the street from an empty lot. HEB is doing them no favors. The field is ugly now and risky re future development. Even if I could imagine having that kinda money, I wouldn't drop $2 million into something without knowing what was going to drop in across the street. I expect whatever HEB does will be nice, ultimately, but it's been a long time... They bought at a time Whole Foods was struggling. Maybe they reconsidered going head to head?

Blast from the past... According to HAR there are 7 for sale right now. 32 total units I believe. Also wowza are they expensive for 2 or 3 bedrooms.

Sorry to do this, but what apartment building is that rising in the background? The one in this photo on the line between the Ismaili Center and the Hanover Autry Park. I think it is on Waugh?

I actually wasn't thrilled with the design in the renderings. I was worried it would be too plain a façade and the different "towers" wouldn't stand out enough. But... I have been so impressed as this comes together. I am so incredibly glad to see a fully modern office tower that embraces a different color palette from Hines' blue glass. Don't get me wrong, love the new blue glass, but was starting to get worried that architects were exclusively focusing on form and giving up on any variety in color. Skanska proving me wrong!

Huh, didn't realize that Buffalo Bayou had been worked so intensely previously. Always viewed the stretch between Shepherd and downtown as being pretty natural before the big renovation in the 2010s. But I suppose all those giant concrete culverts had to come from somewhere. Learn something new every day. Thanks, Wilcal!

Echoing BEES, the architect seems to have had precisely zero interest in keeping the little elements of the structure symmetrical (such as the disconnect between the hotel floors and the residential floors, whatever is going on with the first three glass floors facing the bayou, and that one infernal corner on the ~10th floor above the podium whose northwest corner for some reason does not match the northeast corner...). Can't decide if I find it quirky-weird or quirky-good. Either way, definitely rather it be here than not be here.

Memorial Park trail runners get a surprise as new section of Seymour Lieberman Trail opens https://www.houstonchronicle.com/lifestyle/home-design/article/Seymour-Lieberman-Trail-17494262.php#photo-23021416 It was her birthday and she was walking, not running, but 45-year-old Tammy Holmes and her co-worker Tony Clomax were enjoying the new section of Memorial Park's Seymour Lieberman Trail, which opened Friday morning after about nine months of construction. The third-of-a-mile section of trail was opened without a lot of advance fanfare, as park officials wanted the new route to be a happy morning surprise to those out for a walk or jog. This section routes walkers and joggers off of the noisy, exhaust-filled section of sidewalk that ran alongside Memorial Park. MORE FROM DIANE COWEN: Nancy & Rich Kinder give $100 million to expand Buffalo Bayou Park eastward Now, the experience is quiet, with a thick layer of crushed granite to protect runners' joints, new landscaping and three pedestrian bridges to carry runners over ravines. Instead of noise, heat and the loud whirr of cars passing by at 45 miles an hour, walkers and runners feel the cool shade of trees and, if they're able to glance off of the pass, will see shallow pools of water in ravines or the occasional glimpse of a fairway at the Memorial Park Golf Course. One in a series of finished projects, this $4.2 million trail improvement is part of the 10-year master plan well underway at the 1,500-acre Memorial Park. This project, designed by landscape architect Lauren Griffith Associates — who also is responsible for the design of Discovery Green, Market Square Park and the McGovern Children's Zoo — was funded by an Uptown Development Authority TIRZ and accelerated by a $70 million gift given to the Memorial Park Conservancy in 2018. Accelerated schedule Work began on this new trail segment in January, exciting park staff and fans, since wok on this much-talked-about plan wasn't expected to begin until 2025, said Randy Odinet, vice president of capital projects and facilities at the Memorial Park Conservancy. MORE FROM DIANE COWEN: New Houston Endowment HQ brings brings the city one step closer to new age of modern design The new section of the nearly 3-mile Seymour Lieberman Trail is located between the new land bridge tunnels and the Eastern Glades, more projects in the master plan. The Eastern Glades were finished in two phases, and the land bridge tunnels opened to traffic earlier this year, while the seeding of the native prairie that will cover them is still a work in progress. A new running complex with a 400-meter timing track and other amenities — including new restrooms and a cafe — is expected to finish early summer 2023. Then, a project called Memorial Grove, a more passive park area that will tell the story of the World War I camp that was once here, and then a new southern trail with a pedestrian bridge over Crestwood and the East Memorial Loop, will be tackled. "We haven't stopped working on something since 2015," Odinet said of the ambitious plan. "(This trail work) is finished before it would have even started. The tree canopy will make a tremendous difference in how comfortable it is on a hot afternoon, getting away from car exhaust right on the roadway. Users will enjoy how pretty it is once they’re back in the trees." The new sections of trail are 16 feet wide with a thick layer of crushed granite. The three pedestrian bridges range from 50 feet to 105 feet long and are made of reinforced concrete with steel posts and wood hand rails. diane.cowen@chron.com

This fella could have been a bit better about making room...

Took a distance shot on Wednesday before I had to surrender the view.

Don't have a drone, but I got to take a nice elevator to look down on this one.

I'm really not sure I can take 58 floors of this building. Any chance the tower is a little less... eclectic?

Chronicle has updates! https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/Exclusive-Six-years-after-Ashby-high-rise-17139055.php#photo-22424407 Exclusive: Six Years After Ashby High-rise Controversy, a New Luxury Apartment Tower Planned for the Site Since a judge sided with developers of the so-called Ashby high-rise in 2016, the grassy lot at the center of one of the most closely watched land-use battles in Houston’s history has sat untouched, surrounded by chain-link fencing. Now, the owners of the property are resurrecting efforts to build a high-rise residential tower at the corner of Bissonnet and Ashby Street near Rice University. They have brought in a new development team and a scaled-down version of the original plans they hope will win over neighbors who fiercely opposed the earlier iteration. Hunt Companies of El Paso is partnering with Dallas-based StreetLights Residential to build a 20-story luxury apartment community called The Langley. They plan to break ground in November and complete construction by 2025. The tower is one story lower with 94 fewer units than a 2016 version of the project. The new proposal also features a smaller parking garage at three levels instead of five. Fewer units mean fewer residents, which the developers hope will ease concerns over traffic on the two-lane streets surrounding the site — a key point of contention for the prior proposal. The Langley is expected to feature a classic design style taking cues from the nearby Rice Univeristy with brick colors and columns. The proposed 134-unit building features unusually large two- and three-bedroom apartments, mimicking the spaciousness of a single-family home. The Langley’s average unit size is 2,850 square feet, more than double the size of the average 888-square-foot apartment in Houston, according to RentCafe, an apartment search website. On HoustonChronicle.com: Eye-popping rent growth in Austin, Dallas makes Houston rent spikes seem almost moderate in comparison StreetLights Residential intends to reproduce the success of a popular luxury high-rise in Dallas called The McKenzie. There, wealthy empty nesters can pay between $3,000 to $20,000 a month for luxury rentals at the 22-story tower overlooking Highland Park, according to data from Houston Association of Realtors. While The McKenzie is not senior housing, the average renter is 57 years old. Tenants can’t be under 25. “The resident who lives at The McKenzie, as they will at the Langley, they can live anywhere. They can afford anywhere, and we have to meet the expectations they have,” said Stephen Meek, senior vice president with StreetLights Residential. “They have fine taste, and they know what elegance is that we have to provide.” When Hunt Companies saw The McKenzie, they liked it so much they brought StreetLights on to the Bissonnet project, Meek said. StreetLights replaces Buckhead Investments as the lead developer, although Buckhead remains a passive investor. Buckhead’s earlier proposals were also meant to appeal to affluent seniors who wanted to downsize from larger homes in the neighborhood. The proposal never had a formal name, but residents dubbed it The Ashby. Across the street from the site, a yellow-and-black sign with the “Stop Ashby Highrise” slogan is pinned to a fence - a reminder of the contentious crusade to halt the project years ago. A “Stop Ashby Highrise” sign hangs on a fence across the street from the vacant property at 1717 Bissonnet Street at Ashby Street in the Boulevard Oaks neighborhood, Friday, April 29, 2022, in Houston. Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer Memorial Hermann’s 30-story medical office tower is visible from the site, but Texas Medical Center’s skyscrapers still feel far away from the neighborhood where live oak trees tower over colonial-style mansions and Georgian homes with flickering lanterns illuminating manicured boxwood bushes. When Buckhead Investment first announced a project in 2007, it quickly drew the ire of residents who argued a high-rise was out of character for the neighborhood. They worried about traffic congestion and plummeting property values. The opposition sparked a yearlong battle to squash the project through protests and lawsuits in what became a symbol for fighting Houston’s lax zoning. Ultimately a judge sided with Buckhead in clearing the way for the developers to build. But the legal win for developers came near the bottom of the 2014-to-2016 oil bust, which made it difficult to attract investors to Houston, and the property instead sat undeveloped. A chain link fence surrounds the vacant property at 1717 Bissonnet Street at Ashby Street in the Boulevard Oaks neighborhood, Friday, April 29, 2022, in Houston. Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer On HoustonChronicle.com: Investment kicks off major growth plans for Texas build-to-rent developer Hunt Companies, however, didn’t shelve the project. The owners kept their original permits up-to-date with routine inspections and permit renewals every few months, said a spokeswoman for Houston Public Works Department. In a statement, the department said the city's legal team would review an earlier agreement with the project owners to determine how the new proposal might be affected. The developers have scheduled meetings with the city to determine next steps in the approval process, Meek said. The prior project was “another developer, from another time. We’re the right developer for this and we’re excited to see The Langley come forth,” Meek said. marissa.luck@chron.com

Apologies for the quality (iPhone through a window), but I was back in town for a friend's wedding and got to stay at the Marriott downtown and get a front seat view! The early morning whistles were only a touch annoying and didn't seem to be slowing down the party on the deck at all.

They're airplane window photos so apologies for the quality, but figured I'd share my shots from the ever-scenic Hobby Airport takeoff path.

My understanding is that the lot with the red circle is owned by Incarnate Word, so not currently involved in the development, although there could maybe be a parking garage arrangement where they keep the land but agree to lease the land for a garage with some capacity set aside for them but catering to the neighboring development. The Green oval is currently owned by someone else who, from what I've been told, has held out for a tower through a couple booms and busts. Orange is the corner of what the Astros own, continuing out of frame to the east. So, so far, not the largest parcel of land available to the Astros, unless they can work something out with Incarnate Word for a garage or Green Circle owner lowers his expectations a bit. People can let me know if I'm wrong about any of that.

Could be wrong about this, but I'm assuming Helfman is getting a pretty fantastic deal on the dirt (literally, if they haven't changed it since I went car shopping there a few years ago) that they are leasing under CenterPoint's utility easement. It might be nicer from a customer service standpoint to consolidate inventory into a garage, but I doubt land gets much cheaper than what they're using now.

Loving how this building is turning out, but this... this will haunt my OCD dreams. Why is this and only this corner not symmetrical?

Always grateful for all of our photographers on here, but wanted to say these downtown shots were absolutely fantastic. In love with the photo of the red line stop at sunset. Thanks for posting!