JLWM8609

21 hours ago, iah77 said:

This area clearly needs mental health assistance and not affordable housing as no one has been priced out of parking lots.

Why not both? 

5 hours ago, Big E said:

Why do these guys even care? The Ion isn't even located in the Third Ward, but Midtown. I know that areas was historically considered the Third Ward, but that area hasn't been part of the "Third Ward" in over half a century at this point.

I take it you don't live in the area. That area isn't wholly Midtown or Third Ward. It's a transition area that encompasses both communities. 

On 5/19/2021 at 8:53 AM, samagon said:

dang, that is old, I only remember the dead sea being sick.

Do you remember Methuselah? 

I wonder if removing the spires had anything to do with nearby helicopter pads?

11 hours ago, X.R. said:

Southmore is generally done. They've planted a ton of trees and grass on the feeder by the bridge, its going to look green in a year or so. I think that portion looks nice. It makes the other bridges in the area look much more terrible however, so I hope they are getting redone or at least a paint job or some trees or something.

I hate the white piping they used for the pedestrian bridge though. Makes me think of that sort of crappy bridge into the neighborhood over there by gulfgate.

The all-white is pretty bland. They were originally painting the bridge in the TxDOT Wave Design Scheme like the rest of the new bridges, but they stopped and painted it all white instead. The renderings showed the bridges in the wave scheme and also showed the pedestrian bridges using a more throwback style rail similar to what they did on the new Homestead overpass. https://goo.gl/maps/cBajZyxT9jaK7FTj7

4 hours ago, Sunstar said:

They redirected Buffalo Bayou to go around the Police Officers Memorial, so a project like this isn’t unprecedented, although in this case they’ll have to go though devolved land and city infrastructure to make it happen. 

That bend in Buffalo Bayou around the Police Officers' Memorial has been there since before the memorial was built. It's present in a 1915 topographic map. They recently did some channel work there, but the bayou wasn't redirected.

On 5/16/2021 at 2:24 AM, cloud713 said:

To add to JLWM's list from January about problems found with the 288 project so far.. when driving south, I noticed there is no exit/signage from the main lanes to the Beltway. Only a beltway frontage road exit off to the right, even though you can exit the main lanes into the toll lanes, and then go up the toll ramp directly onto the beltway that way. Im not sure why there's no signage for that, or why they didn't make a nice defined double merge from the mainlanes and the toll lanes into one exit ramp like they did from the south side of the beltway going north..?
 

I think there's one little sign that tells you the cost to access the Tollway direct connector as well as as FM518 and Hwy 6 from that point instead of a big green sign like the northbound side. Not sure why they did that instead of a big green sign.

Ugh. Anybody know why they decided to remove the spires?

On 5/5/2021 at 7:29 AM, Specwriter said:

Since everyone seems to be walking around staring at his or her i-phone do we really need information kiosks? Besides, those distracted pedestrians will probably walk right into the stationary kiosks then want to sue the City for putting them there. 🙂

Or they'll be riding one of those rental scooters when they collide into it. I see more of them downtown now since vehicle and pedestrian traffic is lighter.

2 hours ago, august948 said:

I'll take a contrary position on this.  Most likely they'd not want to locate where there are a lot of hotels because they would want to build an attached hotel/resort and profit on that as well.  They'll be looking for (relatively) cheap land to build a full resort on.

I could see them doing that. Maybe somewhere along the NE Grand Parkway. Lots of undeveloped land out there. Not sure if it's cheap though.

12 hours ago, Houston19514 said:

There are two alternative crossing within a mile to the southwest and two alternative crossings within a mile to the east.

You can also take a u-turn on MacGregor just a block or two west of the bridge to cross to the other side.

26 minutes ago, citykid09 said:

I like trains in urban environments as well, just not country a** Union Pacific trains. I like subway trains. Lol

Country a** Union Pacific trains help move and make this city. I guess we ought to keep freight trucks off of pretty Westheimer too? 

18 hours ago, samagon said:

recently, NB traffic seems to be horribly bad beginning near the bridge for Brays Bayou, and then opens up at the split for 59.

traffic is still bad for 3 lanes going to 2 lanes in prep for the pierce elevated, it typically starts before Scott street, and the traffic for people choosing at the last second to go north on 59 rather than south is usually backed up to the Cullen overpass.

this is in the afternoon, like anytime between 4 and 6, I stay away from the freeways in the mornings, but I imagine it's much worse.

what was the purpose of this project again? 

did the construction project at 610 and gulf freeway finish and all lanes are open? if that's not complete yet, this is only going to get worse.. 

The purpose was to untangle the backup and eliminate weaving caused by traffic entering at Scott and getting off at 59/288 and to eliminate the left lane exit to 59/288. It succeeded in eliminating the left lane exit and weaving, but like you said, there's still a backup caused by 45 NB going from 3 to 2 lanes, and I think Scott St. traffic entering so close to the Downtown exit may be a culprit, too. Perhaps eliminating the Scott St. onramp and directing I-45 NB traffic from Scott to the Cullen onramp or through downtown along St. Joseph Pkwy or Pease would help along with making both lanes of the downtown exit from 45NB exit only so it whittles down to 2 lanes without that taper after the exit. 

I think the project at 610 is complete. Both new flyover ramps are open.

On 4/27/2021 at 4:59 PM, august948 said:

Typically, the city owns property wider than the street itself so it can build whatever it wants along it's right of way.  So the question is how far past the curbs does the city own?

 

IIRC from dealing with HCFCD during the Ardmore St bridge project, the ROW extends 16 1/2 ft from the back edge of the curb.

11 hours ago, hindesky said:

I saw those pics. What could possibly cause this? To the untrained eye it looks like bad compaction, wrong type of stabilized soil or just shoddy work by the contractor. Who is responsible for fixing this?

I wonder if the freeze had something to do with it? I've heard of potholes getting worse from the cycle of freezing and thawing. Could it have destabilized the soil underneath? There's also buckling in the retaining wall and embankment slope.

A major pavement failure on 288 SB has shut down all lanes just south of 610. I've been watching the fissure slowly get worse over the last few months. It started as a crack which they filled with tar. When it got worse, they started an asphalt overlay. Then you could see the crack getting worse underneath the overlay over the past week or so. I'd started driving in the left lane to avoid it. Traffic is being detoured to the toll lanes with tolls waived between Southmore and Beltway 8. 

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Damaged-pavement-shuts-down-part-of-Texas-288-16110760.php 

7 hours ago, ttuchris said:

It really is amazing.  I moved downtown in September 2017 and this project was underway.  You can see date stamps on the concrete, 2018, 2019, 2021.

I didn't know it's taken that long. The Atchafalaya Basin bridges didn't take this long to be built, seems like this project should've been completed at least a year ago. 

The big construction sign on Almeda and MacGregor says the Almeda Rd. bridge is closing on April 16th.

On 3/13/2021 at 9:29 PM, Highrise Tower said:

Braeswood at Chimney Rock. They're creating one wide bridge to replace the two small bridges? Just like they did down the block on Hillcroft.

They didn't replace any bridges at Hillcroft. It's been one big bridge since the 60s. They raised the current Hillcroft bridge.

One thing about this project is how a lot of this work benefits Midtown more than any other area. While other areas are going to see properties taken for new ROW, Midtown will actually see infrastructure removed for their benefit. In addition to the obvious removal of the Pierce Elevated, they're removing the entrance and exit ramps to 288 from Chenevert and Jackson. Initially, those ramps were going to be converted into ramps for the toll lanes on 288. 40 years ago when the area was mostly black, putting those ramps there was a part of "progress". Now that the demographics have changed drastically, TxDOT is being more sensitive to that area and restoring the street grid and not catering wholly to commuters from Pearland. It's interesting.

6 hours ago, august948 said:

Back during Bill White's terms as mayor he had a project that improved the light timing fairly well.  I recall it made a big difference during rush hour on Westheimer at the time.  There was a document put out that went into detail and supposedly the timing was going to be maintained into the future.  I guess that fell by the wayside after he left office.

I remember that. It was mostly downtown and Midtown and it was kind hard to pull off at the time since some of the traffic light control cabinets were the old electromechanical type from the 50s and 60s and couldn't communicate with the new cabinets. I imagine the addition of the east-west light rail lines has made it a bit harder to synchronize traffic light timing too in later years.

On 3/8/2021 at 2:56 PM, BeerNut said:

Managed, maybe elevated lanes considered for I-10 as TxDOT tries out options for clogged corridor

Saw this on reddit...

That might work if they can produce a self driving hoverbus in the next 10 years!

On 3/8/2021 at 4:07 PM, X.R. said:

Living most of my life near freeways and feeder roads in less desirable parts of Houston, I genuinely thought increased lanes on highways and stuff didn't happen when you got closer to more affluent areas. 

That area didn't start becoming affluent until about 15-20 years ago and the freeway was routed through there over 50 years ago, so it's not as well insulated against big road expansion like areas that have been continuously affluent from the start like River Oaks. 

19 hours ago, hindesky said:

I wonder if this is part of the IH 45 realignment? They are doing some major pier drilling here. Maybe new bridges over IH59/69.

The new bridges will be longer, but I think the new length will come from the other side where more ROW will be taken.

15 hours ago, august948 said:

Isn't that the area they were calling "Kush Corner" a few years back?

Yep, that's it.

On 2/12/2021 at 1:02 PM, Triton said:

Latest detail from the City of Houston. So it looks like San Jacinto will be a tunnel with some sort of ramps that traverse to the west side of the road and go to I-10.

Is that a typo or will they really rename Rothwell/Nance between N. Main and McKee to Lyons Ave.? Why not call it Nance all the way to N. Main for consistency? I don't think Lyons ever historically ran to N. Main in that location if at all in the pre-freeway days.