sidegate

LOL, I was waiting for this post. There was an op-ed piece three weeks ago (which I guess you missed, or at least muttered sulkily as you read it) in which three BIOMEDICAL faculty (not four Arts faculty), and one arts for that matter, supported the merger. Oh and Rice's President too, forgot about him. Apparently four years at Rice has taught you just to see what you want to see and hear what you want to hear. Seems like a waste of money to me. You'll note how I didn't lurch on to HAIF when that editorial was published, as you have done with this one, because I know that everyone's mind is pretty much made up on this merger, yours and mine included, and in doing so I would have achieved little beyond burdening the Internet with more pointless bytes of information. As you have done.

That would explain it...

No idea, just an observation. I thought it might be related to the planned development on Allen Parkway, but it's a separate lot (right?). They weren't more than ten years old, I'm fairly sure...

Well it didn't take long for townhomes to start coming under the wrecking ball. A couple of apparently perfectly healthy specimens have been torn down at the corner of Woodhead and West Clay (behind the Kroger).

Phew! We're short of those... Fingers crossed for something cool as far as the commercial goes.

Yes, I meant the old diner. I think I read somewhere on the board that it's still doing business in some form but I've never seen much evidence for it.

I'm all for local colour but not when owners let a place go. I was a big supporter of restoring Wilshire Village but I'd take new construction any day over what it had been allowed to turn into. Dark, sparsely frequented places that are a shadow of their former selves - Charlies, Mary's - just bring a place further down. And Chuy's is damn good at what it does....

That strip of Westheimer has magically been transported to my own personal kingdom where I have limitless wealth and no-one to argue with me. Here's what I'd do Find a tenant for the marquee building and incentivize its restoration and use as the front entrance Find a tenant for Charlie's who will turn it into a lively restaraunt/bar a la Chuys Knock down the strip mall and rebuild it with storefront windows in all the units and a zero foot setback (like the Montrose side is) and stick the parking behind. Move the Bookstop there. Move Mo Mong's there. Introduce a sign ordinance and if Burger King and their ten foot sign don't comply boot them out Knock down Mary's (it's going to happen anyway...) Ban drive throughs on that corner Find new tenants for Prive and the Mexican place...

Well putting it down to yuppie-zation is probably not entirely accurate. The area is attracting more families with children (try taking a couple of screaming kids down to browse videos) and older empty nesters, who would be less inclined to make the journey to a brick and mortar video store. If anything, yuppies out and about of an evening in their X3s would more likely to frequent a physical store than those other demographics. Anyway, for the convenience of Netflix and now Amazon VOD, it's hard for me to justify a trip to a video store.

I didn't even notice they were gone, that's how crappy the area round the marquee has looked for a very, very long time. I never understood why they didn't put their storefront on Westheimer. Sort of a moo point now.... Eh, and since when did yuppies not rent videos?

Wow this dog is sure doing a lot of wagging. So now people who obey the law and play by the rules are required to inconvenience themselves to effect a change in behavior on the part of common thieves who are too lazy to carry their groceries home, and, god forbid, maybe lose a few pounds in the process (radical concept). That's at least as vile a state of affairs as the one you cite.

That's certainly an alternative approach.

When I was a student, with no car, i rode my bike to the grocery store and got my groceries home that way. you can walk a bicycle home with 20 pounds of groceries on each handlebar with a bit of practice. I never DREAMT of stealing a trolley cos, y'know, it's stealing. why is that a problem for these people? I appreciate they can't afford a car, they're just doing what they can get away with. The problem is the stores, they know being assholes about people taking trolleys will translate to reduced profits, so they don't do it. They, too, are just doing what they can get away with. So don't go after the people taking the things, pass a city ordinance that would penalize the store for every one that is found off the premises. I think the problem would go away fairly rapidly. As to the POV that is just part and parcel of urban life, I've never seen it in any other urban area I've lived in. One person's urban flavour is another's eyesore garbage. Such is life's rich pageant.

Like I said, it matters little what you, I, the alumni on either side or anyone else thinks. If being ill informed is working for a departmental head at one of the institutions involved who is on a joint academic committee overseeing the merger then I guess I am. My apologies. It's going ahead, so let's all make the best of it.

Academics are conservative by nature. Add to that the fact that this is a conservative school in the South (which makes it pretty conservative), and I'm not in the least bit surprised Rice faculty aren't turning cartwheels over this initiative. It's progressive. It's bold. It breaks the mold. Everything that conservatives aren't/don't do. The reason for the silence is that if you enjoined the faculty on either side in this, you'd never get a thing done. This is for the administrators to handle, that's what they get paid for. It'll happen whether the faculty approve it or not (I doubt many will resign over it) so everyone needs to just grab an oar and make it work.

That's quite a bit of a land. I hope something cool & walkable goes in there. That intersection needs a face lift - I liked when the cafe opposite had tables out the front on the sidewalk. And why Hollywood doesn't use the front entrance to its space opening onto Westheimer has always puzzled me. That big dark space gives me the creeps.

man that's steep rent for the size of the place

Yay more townhomes

GREAT! anyone have any info on when other s/ds in the area will be getting them?

People have already started dumping crap on the site, I saw 5 or 6 yards of debris on the edge by Dunlavy the other day. There's no perimeter fence to stop this happening. Let's hope for a quick sale.

Spotted several green wheeled recycling containers out for collection yesterday on a few streets between Richmond and Alabama just west of Dunlavy (just south of the former Wilshire Village). AFAIK this wasn't one of the neighbourhoods in the pilot program. Is it being rolled out over the City...? Here's hoping. Even with the Chronicle down to four pages or something with the 200% humidity this week my recycling bins easily weigh 30 pounds each.

Article from this morning's Chronicle.... Gasp! Is that the Z word in the second paragraph? To arms! I love the name Houstonians for Responsible Growth - like anyone who disagrees with them is somehow irresponsible... ---------------------------------------------- City moves to encourage pedestrian zones Walker-friendly areas would be near rail stops By MIKE SNYDER Copyright 2009 Houston Chronicle Aug. 19, 2009, 6:55PM Passengers stepping off trains in Houston's expanding light rail network will be more likely to encounter walkable environments and interesting destinations because of action taken Wednesday by the City Council, city officials and transit advocates said. The council unanimously approved changes in development codes intended to promote dense, urban-style development along the Metropolitan Transit Authority's Main Street rail line and five planned extensions. The pedestrian zone requirements and incentives were developed through more than three years of work by city officials, consultants, development experts and others. Councilwoman Toni Lawrence said the changes, coupled with plans to expand urban development regulations from Loop 610 to Beltway 8 and high speed rail proposals under consideration for commuters, will have a major impact on automobile-dependent Houston. The measures take effect immediately. “I'm excited about it,” Lawrence said. “We're behind cities our size to move forward with rail.” The changes drew support from real estate organizations including Houstonians for Responsible Growth, which generally resists new development regulation. But others who have followed Houston's efforts to encourage so-called “transit-oriented development” offered only qualified praise, noting that the city's consultants recommended more far-reaching changes. “On the whole, it's a teeny-tiny step in the right direction,” said Andrew Burleson, a development consultant and blogger. While the incentives for enhanced pedestrian amenities aren't sufficient, Burleson said, the measure makes progress simply by providing a good definition of “quality urban development.” The new rules will require unobstructed, 6-foot-wide sidewalks — two feet wider than the current standard — for new development along transit corridor streets and certain intersecting streets near transit stations. In most other areas of the city, the sidewalk standard will be increased to 5 feet. Developers who provide additional amenities such as transparent building facades and doors that don't swing into the pedestrian area would be permitted to bring their buildings closer to the street, providing more space for revenue-generating shops or offices. Mayor Bill White said the changes reflect the need to prepare for how people might want to live in neighborhoods served by transit. However, he played down the immediate impact of the measures, saying the development transit proponents hope to see often takes 15 or 20 years. The new development created under the new measures will become part of the daily lives of more than 160,000 people the Metropolitan Transit Authority expects to be riding its trains by 2030. Within the next five years, the agency plans to add five new rail lines to the Main Street line it opened on Jan. 1, 2004. mike.snyder@chron.com http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/metro/6578467.html

Yes, very much so. A couple of the buildings are rubble. Big ugly sign showing where demo vehicles are exiting. Well now that it's happening I hope to heaven they build something decent there.

I live two blocks from the corner of Westheimer and Dunlavy and attended the parade last year with my six year old daughter who unfortunately did not have the advantage of being six feet tall and seeing the horses coming. She was busy collecting beads and next thing I know, a large, stressed-out unfavourably disposed cop astride a snorting wild eyed horse was a foot from her face. Their actions reduced her to tears - score one for HPD public relations. I can't speak for Montrose and Westheimer but the neighborhood sections of the parade, which I would classify Dunlavy and Westheimer as, isn't remotely comparable to the bacchanalia further down the road. There are small children watching the parade at these points and HPD should have acted accordingly. Ironically, I actually thought this year that the cops were more restrained so was disappointed to hear about this incident. The bottom line here is that Pride needs to do the parade right or not at all. Fence off the entire length of the parade and forget the cost. They've only themselves to blame if this goes to litigation.

You did get one thing right though. I'm the biggest green, small-closet-having, sitting on my porch with my neighbours-drinking-wine snob you ever met. I read every post that tries to defend these houses, the people who build them and the people who buy them with a snort of derision. Ditto all this stuff about freedom of expression - I've seen the result of this in my own neighbourhood and cringe every time I pass it. TheNiche I've read about your dream house and all I can say is thank heavens for deed restrictions! And before you strip a gear decrying my personal taste in houses, just as you crank your megaphone up to max to declare yours, I'll save you the bother....I don't care.