MyEvilTwin

No, in the end, they are saving their revenue's, one of which is a non profit who provides far more than any hotel would provide to Houston. They are looking out for their LEGAL contracts which are thankfully protected by law, not just the whims of people wanting to give away county owned land.

Yours and Kinkaidalum's comments aren't mutually exclusive. In protecting their rights, they could still be doing themselves a disservice, PR-wise. People around here love their Texans and the Rodeo, but like it or not some love the Dome even more. Woe be unto he who brings the wrecking ball to Judge Hofheinz's baby.

I'm not thrilled about this garage at all... They've reached the top in construction already, though only on one side of it. Driving in from Allen Parkway, it looks like it will hide a majority of the Doubletree from the skyline view when completed. I hope it looks ok when it'd done, but I'm not that optimistic.

The Doubletree guest rooms are definitely losing their views.

Now remember, he's interested in the High Street Project. This is the Highland Tower Project site.

The pipes were definitely on the High Street site. I can't say one way or the other about the Highland Tower site -- I was on Westheimer, and Highland Tower is set back quite a bit from Westheimer... no?

It's clear in my head which projects are which. It's the threads that are messed up. Oh well. I'm just interested in High Street for now. Been by lately?

Drove by on Sunday and it looked like they had lots of pipes sticking up from the ground -- must be about ready for some foundation work?

Swimming in that lake is bad. Please let's stop it at that and let's not get personal. I live in surburbia Manvel and have visited the park twice. We dined downtown on one of those visits. My wife can't have enough of the park. By the way we lived in SW part for 3 years and never visited DT. Great to have something to cheer downtown apart from the Rockets.

Not much of a baseball fan I guess.

Just do what I do, watch the break lights.If they flash, go around. If they slow down and there is a bus stop there, go around him. Be sure to do a courtesy honk as you turn in front of him so he knows your intentions.

I didn't think any horn signal translates to "courtesy honk" in Houstonian...

True, but I do wish the police would better enforce the speed limit between Shepherd and downtown. It's not a freeway and many people treat it like it is. There are pedestrians and local traffic, unlike I-10. The speed limit is only 50 and many people drive through there at 60+ in the mornings.

Actually, it is a freeway between Shepherd and downtown. A road doesn't have to be labeled an Interstate Highway to be a freeway... A freeway is just a road that has no at-grade intersections, therefore it's safer at high speeds than the alternative. (See this entry on Wikipedia, for example).

So it shouldn't surprise you that people drive on it like it's a freeway. Though I'm not claiming it's ok to drive 60+ on it.

(Granted, there are pedestrians. But only on sidewalks -- there aren't any legal crosswalks.)

I was at a conference at the Hilton Americas today, and an attendee from Dallas made the comment that Houston is "so much greener than Dallas." Now, Houston's always been greener than Dallas, but I had to wonder if that same comment would have been made had the conference been overlooking a sea of surface parking lots instead of Disco Green.

I hope they have a different entrance than just Barker-Cypress. That intersection at 290 looks like a nightmare. I bet at around 5:45pm people wait 20+ minutes to get from 290 to Barker-Cypress.

From the Towne Lake Map it looks like they're extending Skinner Road through the community. There's a Skinner overpass on 290, so that ought to provide an alternate to Barker Cypress. I don't think there's an entrance ramp to 290 between Skinner and Barker Cypress (but I might be wrong on that) -- that's relatively easy to fix, though (not to mention the looming 290 rebuild).

Nonetheless, I'm sure this will eventually put a lot more traffic on the 290/Barker Cypress intersection -- one that's probably impossible to widen with the big train overpass. I live just off West Rd. and am actually more leery about what it will do to that. When 290 goes under construction I'm afraid West (and others like) will get really bad, really often. Still, it's a nice looking development. I've got to say they've been moving a truly impressive amount of dirt out there over the last few months, creating small hills & (I assume) digging lakes.

I nearly fainted when I saw parents allowing their kids to climb on the Debuffet sculpture.

The front page of the Chronicle had a picture of parents actually helping their kids climb on Margo Sawyer's colorful garage entrances. Made it seem like that's what was expected. Is it? I'm guessing not -- and that makes me wonder how long it will be before they have to do somethig to prevent it that makes the art less attractive. Maybe they can try something subtle like gluing shards of broken glass atop the blocks...

Seriously -- unless I'm wrong and those were intended to be climbing walls -- I think it's pretty irresponsible of the Chronicle to publish that picture, at least not without mentioning they're not supposed to do that.

Nice park! What other land do you guys think exists for another similar park? I was thinking somewhere along the LRT line along the East End.

There's a huge green space at the south end of the Light Rail line that would be a great spot for a park! Maybe even an amusement pa...... oh, damn.

I agree with some of the old posters that yeah, some parts did seem a little run down but i guess that goes along with the industrial character. I guess this is due to the fact that this is a rental conversion. There is an upgrade package available but it is pretty pricey and honestly I would rather do the upgrades myself. I do like this look compared to the edge condo's which are next door. The edge is more a traditional look and layout, not your urban loft space like Rise. The edge is also more expensive per sq/ft, I guess this goes along with other posters stating that you pay a premium for a new building. It also has more ammenities, a gym, movie theater and a lounge.

Having watched the Edge's construction daily from my office window... I can say that it's just wood-frame construction on the 4 residential floors, atop a concrete parking structure. It may have better soundproofing than Rise, but somehow I'd have to be a little more confident in Rise's... well, hi-rise construction. I know nothing about that though -- am I wrong?

I'd also add that during construction the Edge went for literally months during the rainiest period of the year with no glass on the big corner rounded windows. Is that really ok? I guess the wood is treated (and heck, trees like rain, no?), but I just felt like that wood frame & floorboards had to be saturated for months. This was last spring/summer, when Houston's rain totals were sky-high. Seemed like they must have had trouble getting those windows ready to go, because the windowless frame stood for a really long time.

So... does this pretty much make Jones Plaza obsolete? I haven't been there for a while (not since Party on the Plaza maybe 5 yrs ago) but I'm assuming most outdoor, small-ish downtown concerts will now be at Disco Green?

EDIT: The article says West Ave. will only have 38 apts???

I noticed that too... It actually says "a total of 38 apartments on five levels." I was thinking MAYBE they meant 38 apts per level -- obviously that would not be the correct way to express that, but West Ave. definitely will have more than 38 apartments total.

Why does the Mix @ Midtown have the same picture as the Highland Tower/High Street section?

I'm guessing that picture is supposed to be the Mix because it looks like High Fashion is included in the pic. Unfortunately they didn't really give any details about the Mix, either. The article was describing the site across the street with the 24 HR Fitness.

Nope, that's definitely the High Street pic (same one that they have on the High Street website).

I bet the 002 layout folks were confused by the "High Fashion" sign just like you were!

There is water in the lake now (not full though).

I think they will have boats you can rent to use, or something to that degree.

To be a little more clear, I think that "lake" is just for model boats. (it's referred to as the "model boat basin" on the DiscoGreen Map)

Paddling around in a life-sized boat in a lake that size could get old pretty quick.

Found what I was looking for.

http://www.houstonarchitecture.info/haif/i...mp;#entry236925

I could have swore when I passed by it today (Westheimer@Yorktown) that the banner mentioned the "aloft" concept was brought to you by W Hotels.

Perhaps I was mistaken.

Actually I think this might be what you're looking for: http://www.houstonarchitecture.info/haif/i...;hl=round+round.

The aloft thread that you linked is about an officially announced development of a hotel set to open in March 2009 at 5433 Westheimer. The W thread is a bit more speculative, suggesting there might be a W hotel coming to the same area, presumably the River Oaks District (4444 Westheimer, where Westcreek Apts. is now). It ultimately spawned this thread (http://www.houstonarchitecture.info/haif/i...r+oaks+district.), with updated renderings, etc.

W is a Starwood Hotel brand, and aloft is a newer Starwood brand that they refer to as "A Vision of W Hotels." Why it's affiliated that way with W and not with Sheraton or Westin or the other Starwood brands I can't say, but I think W and aloft are both supposed to be the trendier side of Starwood so maybe they're paired up for that reason. I believe W is generally quite a bit more upscale than aloft, though. (I'm sure I'm butchering their brand positioning -- Starwood, please forgive me!)

I take issue with that. Provide one example of a for-profit hotel within the original deed-restricted TMC campus.

Well the Crowne Plaza was recently imploded to make room for an expansion of Texas Children's Hospital. That leaves 3 possibilities:

1) The Crowne Plaza was not within the TMC campus, nor will the TCH expansion be.

2) The Crowne Plaza was not within the TMC campus, but the campus will be expanded to house the TMC.

3) The Crowne Plaza was within the TMC campus.

I'm not saying anything one way or the other -- I have no idea. Anyone? The building clearly is one of several hotels within the shaded area of the TMC map (here) but that might just be imprecise mapping.

Anybody ever notice they're building this with a future "phase 2" in mind?

Here's a link to a rendering with both phases complete: http://www.collaborativeresearchcenter.org..._Overall_NE.jpg

I can't find any info on timelines or other plans for phase 2. It looks about 2 stories shorter than phase 1.

In the historic district, pretty much every parking lot or garage you see used to be a 2-3 story (or in some cases 5-10 story) old building. The worst tear downs have been around Market Square and along lower Main St. There is a parking lot at Main and Prairie that until 1993 was the site of Houston's oldest commercial building, the original Foley Bros. Dry Goods store (predecessor of Foley's department store). It was structurally sound when it was destroyed. There is a parking garage on I think the 200 block of Main that used to be a classical bank building.

Just to play devil's advocate... don't you kind of have to wonder whether buildings like the Rice Hotel would have been renovated had it been surrounded by abandoned, decrepit old buildings? Sure, surface lots don't make the best neighbors either, but there's no question about what might be lurking inside (misconceived though that impression might be). Certainly Houston's architectural history includes many tragic losses... but it's complicated!

South and Southeast Downtown have a ton of blocks open for development. I'm thinking after the east side starts filling up, we'll see the south end of Main St and southwest downtown start being developed. Then, I think land would start becoming scarce. I can't imagine this happening for another 3-5 decades, obviously depending on the city's economy.

On that side of downtown I'm as much interested in buildings going down as up -- namely that rotting old Days Inn building. That's one block where a surface lot would be an improvement!

(Though of course a renovation would be better)

I'm sure it will be expensive to get those things up there and they will require constant maintinence. This building will sit there for decades though so I wouldn't be surprised if they pay for themselves eventually, especially if energy costs keep rising.

Of course it will be expensive to get those things up there. But it would also be expensive to put a crown, neon lighting, or any other window dressing on top of a building that would otherwise be an indistinctive box. I generally think that, as building trinkets go, this idea is more marketable than most -- so depending on how much more it costs vs. the other options, and what the present value of the future energy savings is, it just might a pretty good idea. If this is the first of its kind (and I have no idea if it is), I bet there are some other green-minded developers out there who are just a little jealous that they didn't think of it first.

By the look of their picture, looks like they don't have much longer. 1.4 million isn't good enough for he amount of time they have to live? C'mon.

My God, did you really just say that? Wow, that's just... wrong.

Good bye transparent tower, and hello mirrored 80's facade.

What makes you think this building isn't already designed with a mirrored facade? The renderings we've been seeing are dusk/night shots, when the lights are on inside. Dark outside, light inside makes the glass transparent, mirrored finish or not. No?

^It's hard to believe that we've been discussing this puny thing for nearly 3,000 posts.

For those of us who measure downtown progress in terms of surface parking lot shrinkage, 3 blocks is by no means puny!