JJxvi

It seems like for the end user, its definitely more cost efficient to use transit, which explains why its a very common mode of transportation from the poor who cant afford the capital, maintenance, and red tape costs the car requires you to put in for the convenience of having it.   For the city itself I guess highways are better because you only have to pay for the initial infrastructure and maintenance and after that all the burden is shoved on to the populace.  Meanwhile for the people with the means to afford cars, they already are paying for that, so they probably don't want to pay for their car, and also pay for part of the costs for people without cars also even though their part of that would be way lower than whats its really costing them to drive.

One thing I am curious about. Is highway transportation really "more cost efficient?"  Clearly a lot of people think so because the build cost is relatively low and capacity is so much higher, but all in all you're not really considering all the costs.

Just using the $2billion as the cost does not consider the costs borne by the user (ie what they have to pay for their car in either depreciation or lease,  what they have to pay in fuel, what they have to pay in vehicle maintenance plus safety and emissions inspections and repairs, what they have to pay in insurance, etc, all of which is covered by the transit authority with rail and transit and only passed to the user via a user fee (and freeways have started getting in on that act too).

If its costing 150,000 people $5000 per year or more in costs to drive on the freeway that's like $750 million per year of costs to use that mode of transportation being hidden because its paid by the user.

GASP! 7:30 in the morning!?

Westpark dead ends into River Oaks Chrysler/Jeep/Dodge/Ram/whatever at Kirby. It does not exist east of Kirby, it does not exist at Shepherd/Greenbriar, presumably the voters did not vote to build a line that has it eastern terminus at Westpark and Kirby.

After spending a couple of evenings in two suburbs, it seems to me that the real traffic problem is not here in town, but in the suburbs. Last weekend, my son wanted to go to a store off 249 and Louetta, so we made the trek out there. Coming back we drove Louetta from 249 to 45. For much of that drive, it felt like there is more density out there than there is here in the greater Heights Area. Friday, we were out in Katy, at Fry and Westheimer Parkway for an event. I drove to get some dinner at a Chick Fil-a on Westheimer Parkway past Grand Parkway, and, once again, it seemed pretty crowded, with lots of traffic. The Chick Fil-a was jam packed, with the drive through line out into the street, and upwards of 100 people inside. Assuming all  those people would be willing to live in apartments inside the Loop, the traffic here would be an order of magnitude worse than it is now. I am willing to bet that of all those families, an average of one family member might make the trek into town for work. The rest seldom, if ever, go inside the Loop.

 

My conclusion from this is that, for Houston, we have organically come up with the optimum growth pattern for our geography. Anything else would be artificial, and make for less than optimum conditions.

 

I should mention that we took the I-10 HOV to Katy. For a Friday evening, traffic on all lanes was moving rather well, with no waits.

It's not population density, which is WAY lower, but the fact that road density is all WAY lower.  In a suburban area you have vast tracts of developed residential land developed along what is typically only 1 major artery.  The neighborhoods, in general, don't want to have streets cutting through them, so there are a limited number of entrances, and everybody gets a cul-de-sac lot on the interior streets which go nowhere.  There is usually one major road or maybe two in the area, so basically the decision literally EVERYONE who lives in the entire area makes when they need to go somewhere is "How do I get to the major rd and which way do I turn on it"

An area like the Greater Heights/Timbergrove/Lazybrook area is bounded by major interstate highways 610, 45, and 10.  It contains major cross streets cutting through it particularly in the N/S direction (Yale, Shepherd, TC Jester, etc) plus many smaller streets that cut through the entire area without ending (streets like the E/W numbered streets in the Heights).  So basically one can get on a major freeway at any boundary, and in addition the location is such that people within the area might all be going different directions, different people may choose to go West on 10, East on 10, North on 45 south on 45, northwest on 290, traffic is funneled many directions whereas in a suburban space which is the same size as the Heights/TG/LB area all traffic is funneled to just a handful of major streets where you can go one way or the other that everybody has to use.   The area bounded by Louetta, Champions Forest Dr, Kuykendahl, and 1960 is basically the same size as the are bounded by the North Loop, West Loop, I-10, and I-45, but the transportation options are basically limited to those streets on the boundaries, plus Cypresswood Dr which cuts through. You have a large land area with low density, but also very few real roads or highways (and the highways that do exists get farther apart as you go outward from town whereas they are very close where they meet in the cities).

So basically, although the inner loop has higher density, it also has many more roads to take people many more possible directions. As an added bonus, much of the infrastructure around the area is designed to handle rush hour through traffic, which means at non-peak times there are many ways to get where you are going on arteries designed to handle a lot more traffic.  Getting to the department store by getting on the freeway and driving 5 miles on I-10 is a lot easier than getting to the department store by getting on FM 1960 and driving 5 miles.

They should make it illegal to ever do extensive repairs on Richmond so as not to disturb the endangered and fragile businesses and residents in the area that would not survive any kind of construction process.

What I find fascinating about the widening of Washington is the way the northbound lanes line up as you cross the westbound I-10 feeder road going northbound now.

There are 4 lanes on the bridge and 4 lanes on the road in front of you, but the lanes are off center and the leftmost lane is left turn only. There is a dashed line on the rightmost lane which seems to indicate that the rightmost lane feeds to the rightmost lane but this dashed line has been blacked out on the concrete but you can tell it was there. Basically each of the 3 through lanes has a choice to go left or right. I'm waiting to see two cars on the outside each go inside one day and squeeze off someone in the middle who would be left without a lane.

TXDOT decided they need 8 lanes right into their campus.

Its probably a better location for Chevron. They should move everybody in Houston to Midland before Conroe.  Its West of Midland so its also closer to Odessa.  Midland is roughly the size of the Woodlands and Odessa is larger than Conroe. So an argument can be made that the "suburban Midland" campus is more "somewhere" than Camp Strake. The idea of moving to Camp Strake for a company that occupies 2 skyscrapers in downtown Houston  and is considering building a 3rd is ludicrous. Its not going to happen.

No. Exxon built a campus that Chevron only heard about in like the last 3 months, and it has shattered their world and caused them to rethink all of their facilities development. Its probably the most successful campus in history and its not even built yet. Chevron must follow suit, even if they have to move to Conroe.

How on earth did they come up with such a clever name?

NONE of the bungalows on the 1200 block of Rutland could be permitted today. They are all too close to the ground they ALL need to be raised by 8" to 16". How do you factor this into eave and ridge height requirements?

I imagine that the idea of restricting construction to something that cannot legally be built and therefore leaving development in gridlock actually fills him with glee.

Wise decision. If this guy doesn't ask for permission to build a train, what else is he plotting?  We've probably saved hundreds from rusty nail climbing walls, trip wire playlands, and hidden pitfall tiger traps.  If he didn't ask permission to build this train, what else is he hiding!?

Well, we did already know that you know a threat when you see one.

As for Shell, their current landlord seems busy building new office towers rather than worrying about filling the space of its major tenant.

Chevron is not moving to Camp Strake. It would be suicide by professional employee mass exodus. If something Exxon did convinced them to do that then I salute the nefarious Exxon masterminds.

I suggest passing the hat around for donations in order to turn the lot into the "StopClose the Heights Wal*Mart Protest Sculpture"

The neighborhood is a mish mash of size, style, age, and even use (ie chicken plants).  Neither history, nor architectural aesthetic is the goal, but actually an attempt to freeze the neighborhood at some arbitrarily "great" point in time like 1999 or 2004 (or whenever they bought their home).

I blame the people who were against the ordinance for any failures of the ordinance. -s3mh/Anise Parker/et al

I dunno about realistic right of way, but the ROW along Hempstead Rd runs to Hempstead, then through college station along Hwy 6 then veers off toward Mexia before you get to Waco, rejoining 45 in Richland and then along 45 through the southern suburbs at which point it comes to Dallas and can come in various locations around Dallas south and east of downtown or perhaps on the west side of downtown along the stemmons freeway.

Time for retribution against the Leader.

Why exactly is this being compared to the Pierce elevated, which was purposely built "elevated" to allow access across it?  If you're going to compare the way this affects traffic patterns on E/W bound streets, then your basis for comparisons are OBVIOUS and they already exist in the area affected...the North Freeway, the East Tex freeway, Hardy Toll Road, and the Union Pacific ROW along the Hardy.  I don't even have to see this thing to know that probably the main routes E/W are the same as they've always been and that they are the same streets that are able to cross the UP ROW along the Hardy toll road. Any bitching is just someone no longer able to cut across on a small street or lane like they used to, but I highly doubt that same small street got you anywhere else because of the freeways and existing rail anyway.

It might be the word that Chevron recruiters will use for it.

Its on Waugh. It "fits in the context" on Waugh.

Whew. Good thing they're not building it on Washington Ave then!