N Judah

They are not moving away from the "working man's U" identity.

http://www.thedailycougar.com/uh_to_seek_c...nsors-1.1331939

But I love the Smoothie King!

I much prefer Jamba Juice to Smoothie King. They're not even on the same level, imho. Comparing Smoothie King to a Burger King shake is about right.

I think there just aren't any good smoothie places downtown. Maybe it can replace "Lidz."

I think a Jamba Juice would be nice.

So it's 180M - 70M = 110M left for building 2 LRT lines? Or is the 70M (of the original 410M request) being pared down proportionally?

I am less concerned with what they don't report and more concerned with the bias of the stories they do report.

That may have been one of suburbanites' motives, but I really don't know.

Anyway for my part I am not sure where the emphasis on grade separation is coming from. The BRT alternative, touted way back when by the anti-LRT crowd, was made up of at-grade segregated lanes and priority signalling (ie LRT with buses instead of trains), and that seemed to be good enough for them then. I think they are hoping for massive cost overruns for use as future political leverage.

Alright, well, my overall point is that not everybody has the same criterion for what constitutes auto-centrism. From my perspective, "auto-centrists" were the people who successfully fought LRT in this city for decades. I seriously doubt they'll want to put more money into elevating it. Instead they will spend their time demanding (and receiving) billions for projects that have nothing to do with LRT.

As for your last paragraph, I do not think the political attitude is (or will ever be) anywhere near the "wherever and whenever" point.

I'm not sure what it is that you don't understand.

The Houston Press is so crappy I wouldn't be surprised. And if it weren't affiliated with some out of town conglomerate these sorts of issues wouldn't even be coming up.

I'm saying that getting people to not crash into the LRT must happen first before it ever becomes necesssary to drum up anti-LRT sentiment based on a more nuanced angle. You don't have to convince anyone that LRT is bad because they already think so from a very visceral, fight-or-flight standpoint. Houston is already that auto-centric.

If we're an auto-centric city then we should be concerned about the traffic jams that grade-level light rail causes in already-congested areas.

That would be an improvement. We're still in the phase of getting motorists to acknowledge that LRT exists.

Houston Area Residents' Vocational And Research -- Downtown

My understanding is that doing so would be like the Bush tax rebate thing in that it would result in a bump in consumer spending (not saving) causing another temporary mini-bubble with nothing to show for it.

If the spending of the last 10 years is indeed unsustainable, then we will never get back to those days, nor would we want to.

I'm guessing that the act of introducing a trilliion dollars into the economy (irrespective of where it goes) will loosen up the credit jam.

I bet the small towns love this project. Otherwise I can't really think of a reason to do it.

Only $12 billion for transit? That number is too low. This thing is shaping up to be a pork-fest.

Hah...being confused with TSU is a "serious" concern but being confused with UST is not? I think they should go back to being confused with U of H main campus.

I don't mind this. Build great parks, and then tout the development that they attract. A few more DGs around the city would be absolutely fantastic in my personal view.

I hate this digital tv crap. It just makes my life more complicated. Instead of a consistently bad signal now I get a slightly better one that goes completely out every so often. Also, the extra channels are not interesting to me.

Yes, but what I observed turned out to be just landscaping and not any kind of bicycle improvement.

Basically it's for drivers who don't check their blind spot for bicyclists/pedestrians when turning right (ie, almost every driver in Houston).

I peeked inside the windows of "Guadalajara del Centro" last night and it looks really nice. Can't wait to try the food when it opens.

I'm also looking forward to "Polk Street Grill" opening up (though I did not peek in the windows so I do not know how far along it is).

Instead of Lidz how about a cowboy hat store for the tourists?

The intersections along Houston Pavilions on the non-St-Joseph-Pkwy side of the development all have what I'm talking about, though upon closer inspection they are not exactly bike boxes but could possibly have a similar function.

Basically they put these little white divider things in a way that more clearly demarcates the parking lanes from the driving lanes, and put some trees in for further effect. As a result there's an open space in between the curb and the dividers that bikes can use as a bike box (I think).

Anyway, for whatever purpose they did it, it really does look a lot nicer and I hope to see similar landscaping around town.

It's not really a sidewalk, it's like an area where there once was a sidewalk but now it's level with the street. I need to get over there and make sure I'm remembering this correctly.

Anyway even if this turns out to be a false alarm, Houston could still use "bike boxes" around town.

They will be special silver buses.