ChannelTwoNews

Planning on coming down just before Christmas and spending overnight in College Station. Would love to go in and and check this out in person if I get a chance.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/food-culture/restaurants-bars/article/original-ninfas-day-50-anniversary-tex-mex-18487955.php "The city of Houston declared Nov. 12, 2023, the Original Ninfa’s Day as the iconic Tex-Mex restaurant celebrates its 50th anniversary this year."

Guess it wasn't meant to be for the Taco Bueno - it's already closed down it seems.

https://ig.ft.com/us-cities-index/ "Houston has taken the top slot as the best US city for foreign multinationals to do business in the second annual ranking compiled by the Financial Times and Nikkei. It gained the top spot by offering business friendly policies, excellent logistics, affordable cost of living, and a diverse community for overseas companies." https://www.ft.com/content/8854bb17-938d-4dd5-88a8-c1605a4c5bce "Ever since crude first gushed from Spindletop Hill in 1901, Houston has been an oil town — the epicentre of America’s oil and gas industry, its fortunes rising and falling with those of the sector. Today, though, America’s fourth-largest city is rapidly expanding beyond the industry on which it was built. Not only has it become a centre for green energy innovation, but other sectors, including medical technology and aerospace, now call the Texas city home."

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/09/united-airlines-nonstop-service-iah-tokyo-haneda.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=0#cxrecs_s "Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) could soon be welcoming more daily nonstop flights from Tokyo’s Haneda International Airport. Chicago-based United Airlines (Nasdaq: UAL) filed an application with the U.S. Department of Transportation on Nov. 9 to begin offering this route. If approved, United will become the first U.S.-based carrier to fly nonstop service between IAH and Haneda. United currently offers nonstop flights from IAH to Tokyo’s Narita International Airport. However, Haneda is Tokyo’s close-in airport, while Narita is more than twice as far from downtown Tokyo."

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/08/regal-princess-cruises-galveston-texas-homeport.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=2#cxrecs_s "Santa Clarita, California-based Princess Cruises has made a big splash in Galveston less than a year after returning to Texas. Regal Princess is now sailing out of Galveston, making it the largest Princess ship ever based in the Lone Star State, the company said Nov. 5. The 1,083-foot ship has a guest capacity of 3,560 and carries 1,346 crew members. From Galveston, Regal Princess will sail 21 roundtrip voyages to the Western Caribbean through March 24. The ship is expected to carry about 75,000 travelers during that time. The voyages will range from seven to 12 days and visit destinations such as Cozumel, Mexico; Costa Maya, Mexico; and Roatan, Honduras."

https://smseminary.com/history-of-the-seminary "Bishop Wendelin J. Nold marked the celebration of the golden anniversary in 1951 with two major announcements: The Vincentian Fathers would replace the faculty of diocesan priests, and a new seminary would be built in Houston. A fifty-acre tract of wooded land located at the present site on Memorial Drive was donated by the Laurent, Smith, and Strake families. A fund-raising campaign yielded over three million dollars for the project. Maurice and Charles Sullivan were contracted for the architectural design, and the Linbeck Construction Corporation was selected to do the construction. On November 4, 1954, Samuel Cardinal Stritch of Chicago dedicated the seminary with a host of bishops, clergy, and local dignitaries in attendance. At that time the plant included all the present buildings with the exception of the library, gymnasium, and Nold Education Center. As with the seminary in La Porte, the number of vocations increased greatly. With gifts and donations from both clergy and laity, the furnishings were completed in 1958."

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/shows/houston-matters/2023/11/07/468764/an-original-performance-piece-captures-a-portrait-of-houston/ https://www.diverseworks.org/in-the-works/exhibtion-performance/lands-portrait-of-the-city-of-houston/ "LANDS examines the past and present of Houston and its growth toward becoming the 4th largest city in the United States and invites audiences to reimagine the city’s possible future. The evening will feature a series of outdoor performances that Cottencin and Huynh choreographed with their Houston-based collaborators: Anthony Almendárez, Liyen Chong, Ayla Davis, Isabella Mireles, Roger Moore, and Henry G. Sanchez, who will then guide the audience from the outdoors into the MATCH theater to experience the film installation.

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/08/angel-lagoon-dayton-entertainment-district.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=3#cxrecs_s "The Lagoon Development Co. started construction on June 1 on a 4-acre artificial lagoon at state Highway 146 and River Ranch Road in Dayton. A groundbreaking ceremony is planned for Nov. 16.

The one pictured above - the Field Street Tower - was announced in 2021 as a spec tower by Hillwood. Nothing has been heard of it since though. These comments from Ross Jr. from June didn't sound too cheery about building new office towers anywhere for some time. The other I'm aware of is on hold as of the end of last year. It may or may not be built someday. CBRE has leased space for their HQ in an existing tower for the time being. The site is Uptown though, not Downtown. Yup. It too has just as many towers as the McNair development in its present state - none. It too is Uptown. It is likely all that will be coming out of the ground at this point. This among other projects, also has brought about good questions about what should be done to keep Downtown Dallas competitive given the trend of corporate movement to the Uptown area and places further afield there. If I'm not mistaken, it's still a bare lot that housed an old mall that was demolished earlier in the year. And it took about 10 years just to get to that point. The back and forth getting just to that point sounds interesting though. The first component is fairly modest and makes sense as it's low-rise apartments over shops. The developer is realistic about the negative prospects for developing office or anything substantial currently and how it's ultimately a long term project. It's interesting to see some of the similar discussions we have locally taking place there about location and wanting to be where the people are and with density and things like that outside of the urban core. The rendering makes a number of assumptions because, of course, it's a rendering. -That Newpark's 20 acres (far left cluster of towers) is built. It received city funding for a portion of the project last year but it's been quiet since then. -That the HSR terminal (Top left) is built. -That the nearly 30 acres opened up by the demolition of the existing space up to the old arena (which will be saved) and on the edge of Pioneer Park & Plaza is actually developed and becomes something other than greenspace. I do like the idea of the I-30 deck park and improving the connectivity in/around the Hyatt/Reunion Tower/Union Station area and integrating it better with this part of downtown. I wonder how the existing DART stop inside will be reconfigured if at all. It also would be nice if it tied a bit better into the streetcar that's available as well.

A few of the potential/existing prospects for conversion. A number are from the same company, Pacific Elm Properties, who have a mix of concepts envisioned for each site - residential among them. https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2022/01/14/downtown-dallas-developments-will-convert-offices-to-apartments-and-add-new-towers/ Bryan Tower “Our plans at Bryan Tower include converting roughly half the building to luxury apartments,” Woods said. “We are going to spend between the common area improvements and the conversion of the upper floors well over $150 million upgrading that building." Santander Tower (Thanksgiving Tower) "The developers are also planning a redo of the 50-story former Thanksgiving Tower — now Santander Tower — at 1601 Elm St. The owners also plan to convert multiple floors of that 1.4 million-square-foot skyscraper into housing. https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/08/04/new-downtown-dallas-rental-address-is-ready-for-residents-in-a-converted-office/ "The Peridot apartments in Santander Tower are the latest generation of rental units developers are carving out of surplus office space. Close to 2 million square feet of Dallas high-rise workspace — much of it built in the 1980s — is targeted for conversion into more than 1,500 new urban housing units. Comerica Bank Tower https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/02/03/big-changes-on-the-way-at-downtown-dallas-landmark-comerica-bank-tower/ "Our development projects are all a combination of office, residential, hospitality and food and beverage,” he said. “We think there is a very interesting opportunity to convert a large portion of Comerica Tower into a luxury hotel. Energy Tower "The upper floors of the tower will house 294 residential units. And the lower portion of the building will be remodeled into first-class office space. Cityplace Tower https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/08/22/dallas-cityplace-office-tower-is-next-up-for-apartments/ "NexPoint is remodeling the 1.35 million-square-foot high-rise, revamping its office space and adding a 222-room hotel and conference center. 1600 Viceroy https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/09/13/office-building-near-dallas-love-field-eyes-residential-units/ "Now the owners are planning to convert half of the building into apartments, according to planning documents filed with the state. Construction is set to start late this year on the conversion of four floors of the property, which is owned by an Irving investor.

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/07/28/developers-plan-two-more-downtown-dallas-towers-in-1-billion-field-street-project/ "The $325 million, more than 915,000-square-foot development could kick off in March, according to planning documents just filed with the state. The project is described as an “office tower and 300 multifamily apartments on an above-ground podium garage with lobby and retail on ground level.”

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/11/07/ground-will-be-broken-this-week-on-new-bank-of-america-tower-in-dallas/ "Construction is scheduled to kick off on Thursday on a new Dallas tower that will house operations of Bank of America. The 30-story office high-rise will be built overlooking Klyde Warren Park at Harwood Street and Woodall Rodgers Freeway."

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/11/08/first-look-new-high-rises-on-the-way-north-of-downtown-dallas/ "The project is planned to include a 21-story, 396,000-square-foot office tower, a 27-story 287-unit residential building and 19,725 square feet of retail space.

https://www.chron.com/culture/article/houston-jeweler-closing-iw-marks-18465727.php "To carry out the liquidation sale, Marks collaborated with Tony Bradfield of Tenenbaum Jewelers, which is presenting the event. The sale started Wednesday and doesn’t yet have an end date. Tenenbaum told Chron that they are assessing the sale weekly to determine how long it will run." Never shopped there myself, but their advertising was fairly ubiquitous for many years, especially among wrestling fans of a certain era...

https://abc13.com/does-houston-texas-have-any-theme-parks-mayoral-candidates-stance-on-infrastructure/13966362/ "In February 2020, right before the pandemic, Turner sent an email that read, "I have decided to name the Theme Park Task Force the end of the week. Orlando has a population of about 250,000 people but receives 75 million visitors a year. We need another major attraction." A city staffer replied, "Hershend (Dollywood) signed a real estate deal with Cushman (Dave Cook) for seeking sites and related real estate services. Of course, the task force could also work with other producers."

https://pagewood.com/properties Fully leased by Daikin https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/03/daikin-leases-pagewood-290-warehouse.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=0#cxrecs_s "Japanese air conditioning and refrigeration manufacturer Daikin Industries Ltd. has signed a multiyear lease for all of the 500,840-square-foot warehouse located on 64 acres along the southern edge of U.S. Highway 290 between Field Store and FM 2920.

I recall going to downtown St. Louis before and after the project was completed and for what it's worth, the Cardinals project was built somewhat piecemeal. The "Village" portion originally consisted of the building and plaza known as Cardinals Nation. This was also the first part of the "Live!" branding. The Loews hotel, office building (apparently the first Class-A space they had constructed downtown in 30 years!?!) and apartment tower followed a few years later. There is still surface parking immediately adjacent to that project and it does have parking gates - even along one of the primary streets through it. Maybe those lots will be integrated into the overall project one day with additional development. I mention all of that because I was curious about who owned the large lot that combined blocks (100/120 - ADLA/Rusk/Crawford/Capitol) just north of the Marriott Marquis. That overview that was posted before showed a possible extension of a skybridge or something to it though nothing was presently proposed for it.

There are already a few large scale solar farms in the County. This one is the most recent to go online it seems. https://corporate.totalenergies.us/news/totalenergies-starts-texas-380-mw-utility-scale-solar-power-plant-battery-storage From the press release... "Located south of Houston, Texas, Myrtle has a capacity of 380 megawatts peak (MWp) of solar production and 225 MWh of co-located batteries. With 705,000 ground-mounted photovoltaic panels installed over an area equivalent to 1,800 American football fields, Myrtle produces enough green electricity to cover the equivalent consumption of 70,000 homes. 70% of Myrtle’s capacity will supply green electricity to the Company’s industrial plants in the U.S. Gulf Coast region. It is part of the Company’s “Go Green” Project, which will enable the Company to cover, by 2025, the power needs and curtail the Scope 1+2 emissions of its industrial sites in Port Arthur and La Porte in Texas, and Carville in Louisiana. The remaining 30% of Myrtle’s capacity will supply green electricity to Kilroy Realty, a publicly traded real estate company, under a 15-year corporate power purchase agreement (CPPA) indexed on merchant prices. In addition to the photovoltaic installations, the solar power plant also features battery energy storage equipment to meet the need for grid stabilization. With a total capacity of 225 MWh, this storage is made of 114 high-tech Energy Storage Systems (ESS) containers designed and assembled by TotalEnergies' affiliate Saft, which develops cutting-edge industrial batteries."

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/02/houston-astros-hotel-entertainment-center.html "The project will include a 17-story, 300-key hotel with approximately 60,000 square feet of retail and entertainment space, Giles Kibbe, Astros senior vice president and general counsel, said at Central Houston Inc.’s 2023 State of Downtown meeting on Nov. 2. The team plans to break ground on the project by the end of 2024. The mixed-use project will be located on Texas Avenue directly adjacent to the Astros’ ballpark." -No formal timeline or costs noted -Noted as in the "design development" phase. -Still seeking hotel flag, retail/restaurant partners -Hines is working with Crane/Astros as developer, HKS is master plan architect. Still seeking architect of record.

Not sure where it will be in the development as there's nothing in the most recent leasing info about it - but it looks like Kelsey Seybold will be building a clinic in or around the center. https://www.kelsey-seybold.com/newsroom-landing/archive/kelsey-seybold-announces-new-clinic-in-rosenberg "Kelsey-Seybold Clinic announced plans today to build a three-story, 54,000-square-foot clinic in Rosenberg that expands health care options for residents. Kelsey-Seybold Clinic – Rosenberg at 23337 Southwest Freeway, in Brazos Town Center, is Kelsey-Seybold’s first clinic South of the Brazos River."

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/chevron-noble-energy-office-tower-houston-sells-18462511.php "A New York development firm is making a bet on Houston’s office market after buying an empty 20-story office tower where Chevron has a major block of sublease space it’s trying to shed. Williamsville, N.Y.-based Acquest Development revealed its plans this week for the 4.7-acre property, a major piece of the former Noble Energy headquarters in northwest Houston, that it bought through an affiliate in September. The deal at 1002 Noble Energy Way included a 20-story office tower, an eight-story parking garage and an adjacent 25,000-square-foot meeting/sports facility off Louetta Road and Texas Highway 249."

Renderings from the article

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/01/original-ninfas-adds-robert-del-grande-new-chefs.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=1#cxrecs_s "Robert Del Grande — Houston's first-ever James Beard Award winner — has joined as a culinary mentor to the Original Ninfa’s management team. He also is serving as an adviser to Niel Morgan, managing partner of Houston-based Legacy Restaurants, the current owner of the Original Ninfa's. Additionally, Morgan named Justin Solomon as the new director of operations for the Original Ninfa’s. Solomon previously was Houston operations manager for New Orleans-based BRG Hospitality. He most recently led the team behind Eunice, BRG's first Houston restaurant. The Original Ninfa's also hired chef David Luna from Goode Company Restaurants as director of culinary operations and Patricia “Patti” Delgado from Vibrant to take the executive chef role at the Original Ninfa’s at Uptown in the Blvd Place mixed-use development in the Galleria area. Angel Belman, formerly of Hugo’s, has been named beverage director."

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2023/11/01/iah-viva-aerobus-new-flights-destination-mexico.html?cx_testId=40&cx_testVariant=cx_27&cx_artPos=5#cxrecs_s "The new nonstop flight to Queretaro, which begins on Dec. 2, will be offered four days per week on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Queretaro be the airline's fifth nonstop connection from IAH to Mexico. Also starting in December, Viva Aerobus will increase the number of flights it offers from Houston to four of its popular destinations: IAH-Leon/Bajio will increase from four flights per week to five flights per week. IAH-Guadalajara will increase from four flights per week to daily service. IAH-Mexico City will increase from six flights per week to daily service. IAH is the only U.S. airport that has a direct flight to Mexico City's new Felipe Angeles International Airport, according to Houston Airports. IAH-Monterrey will increase from 13 flights per week to 19 flights per week."