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wxman

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Posts posted by wxman

  1. I was reading this article below in the Houston Biz Journal and noticed something interesting: The U.S. Census Bureau has changed/updated the names to metropolitan areas across the country including Houston's.

    The new name for our metro is the Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land metropolitan area. The old name was Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown metro area. Has anybody heard about this?

    Read the link below:

    http://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2013/03/14/houston-harris-county-among.html

  2. Wiki says the Huntingdon is 34 stories and is currently the tallest residential in town and it's just around the corner in River Oaks, so this will eclipse it by 6 stories and I am guessing it will be the tallest residential in town.

     

    EDIT: The latest info says this is only 35 stories. I've updated the thread title. So it will just be a single story taller than the Huntingdon.

    Dude, you have wrong info. Change the title back---for the second time. Thanks. I hate to sound like a d-bag about it but it's annoying when people take it upon themselves to change things up based on faulty info. It's going to be a 40 story building. Not 35.

  3. Wow, what an awesome thing to log in and see. In one of those renderings, the building looks to be significantly taller than MainPlace. Is that accurate? 41-stories should make it SHORTER than MainPlace...even with the slant, yes?

  4. I dunno---I'm a HUGE fan of The Woodlands. I think it is top notch in every way. However, I'm not sure that area can support a big high-rise condo tower, much less many of them. I love that The Woodlands has its own "downtown" now, I really don't want huge developments taking over the place and it lose its seclusion feel. I love concrete and steel at much as the next guy but if you can't hear the birds chirp for the sounds of cars on the ever expanding Woodlands Pkwy, then The Woodlands really loses the magic that made the community different and coveated to begin with. Just my opinion.

  5. I was counting it up earlier and if I am correct, we have 21 buildings that are 20 or more floors tall that are either on the drawing board, have broken ground or almost complete. 

     

    5 Allen Center: 50-stories

    600 Main: 48-stories

    State Grille Condo: 40-stories

    Anadarko: 32-stories

    1500 Post Oak: 30-stories

    Astoria: 28-stories

    The Soverign: 22-stories

    Hanover: 30-stories

    Blvd Towers 1-5 (not including Hanover) 20/30-story ish

    BBVA Tower: 20 stories

    3333 Richmond: 20 stories

    Noble Energy: 20 stories

    Marriott Downtown: 30-stories

    Ashby Highrise: 20 stories (ish---forgot exact #)

    New Apartment Tower downtown: 20+ stories

     

     

     

  6. The Chron has picked up the story, too...

     

    http://blog.chron.com/primeproperty/2013/02/bhp-billiton-office-tower-to-rise-on-post-oak-boulevard/#comment-21660

     

     

    BHP Billiton Petroleum said Monday it will hire hundreds of new employees and lease a 30-story office tower to be built at 1500 Post Oak Blvd. to accommodate its expanding shale business and future growth.

    Construction is expected to start later this year on the new building, which will be connected  to the company’s current headquarters at 1360 Post Oak Blvd, creating a two-tower campus. A glass skybridge will connect the structures.

    The buildings will house several thousand BHP employees, many still to be hired. Some 1,800 existing BHP employees will office there, including workers in other locations. Employees in downtown’s Wells Fargo Tower and a building in Tulsa, Okla. will relocate to the Post Oak headquarters.

    “We’ll probably be pushing 3,000 when we move into the new building,” CEO J. Micheal Yeager said at a press conference.

    In total, BHP will occupy about 1 million square feet in both buildings. The new tower will have 560,000 square feet.

    Transwestern will develop the new building for owner TIAA-CREF.

    BHP Billiton deals in natural resources ranging from iron ore and uranium to oil and natural gas. The company is headquartered in Melbourne, with a major office in London, but the petroleum division is based in Houston.

    Architectural firm Pickard Chilton designed the building, which is expected to open in 2016. Gensler also was involved.

    “We have designed this new building with employee productivity and appeal as top priorities to retain current employees and attract prospective employees,” Yeager said in a statement. “We plan to hire hundreds of new people in the immediate future. To attract the most talent, we believe we need to offer them the best possible work environment.”

     

     

    • Like 2
  7. This came out of nowhere wouldn't ya say?

     

    http://www.yourhoustonnews.com/humble/news/grand-texas-theme-park-continues-plans-to-move-into-east/article_502edc4a-9c53-51c3-9dc2-3eefa9ac345b.html?mode=story

     

     

    Grand Texas Theme park continues plans to move into East Montgomery County
     
     
    511e6a53a2d9b.preview-300.jpg Grand Texas Theme park continues plans to move into East Montgomery County
     
     
     

    Posted: Friday, February 15, 2013 10:58 am

    By JENNIFER SUMMER

    New job creation, money back into the county and surrounding school districts and entertainment are just a few of the things the Grand Texas Theme Park will bring to the community.

    The plans continue to progress for the educational theme park as developers work through agreements with the East Montgomery County Improvement District, Montgomery County and the Montgomery County Municipal Utilities District #4.

    The Grand Texas Theme Park is slated to be located around FM 242 and Interstate 69 which means ad valorem tax will benefit both the New Caney and Splendora Independent School Districts.

    Representatives discussed the park and how it will benefit the community at the EMCID board meeting Feb. 14.

    “Grand Texas is the name for both the theme park and the entertainment district. This is a theme park based on Texas history and culture,” Monty Galland with the Grand Texas Theme Park said at the EMCID meeting.

    “The park will feature the elements of a typical theme park with a couple of major roller coasters and carousel to name a few but it will also have elements that you will not typically find in a theme park like a museum, a focus on live entertainment like music and dance and an exploration of Texas history and culture.”

    The projected closing date on the land is April 30, 2013 and between April and October 2013, they intend to have all of their pre-development, engineering and planning completed.

    By mid-October, they plan to have site work and infrastructure begin and they are looking at an opening date of March 12, 2015.

    The total capital cost of the water park, the theme park, the amphitheater and the paintball is $118 million.

    The peripheral development such as the restaurants and such will add another $95 million.

    The total development costs are $205 to $220 million.

    Information about the Grand Texas Theme Park was first introduced at January board meeting as a compliment to the Earth Quest park.

    They are continuing with the developers for Earth Quest Adventures theme park, Contour Entertainment, who presented updated information to the board at their December meeting.

    EMCID required for Contour Entertainment to meet three requirements including hiring a qualified investment firm, purchase the land where EarthQuest is set to be situated and present an investment package proposal detailing fundraising and efforts leading them to meet their financial goal.

    “A main goal of EMCID is to drive tourism to our area which will benefit all of the businesses in our community as well because families will travel to the area and go to the restaurants and stay at the hotels,” Frank McCrady, president of EMCID, added.

    “The addition of a second theme park will give families a reason to stay a night or two at our hotels. We are excited about the possibilities of this coming to our community.”

    Grand Texas Theme Park has budgeted to reinvest between $33 and $42 million over the first seven years back into East Montgomery County with a total economic impact of $334 million over time.

    The organizers of the Grand Texas Theme Park hope to incorporate everything from ragtime music to zydeco music to Tex-Mex food; they will have a little bit of something for everyone.

    The park will feature four dining establishments, a full-service hotel with 200-400 rooms, two limited service hotels with a combined 175-210 rooms and reception hall and chapel.

    “We want to make sure all of the elements are successful and there is enough traffic to support the business so we are planning very conservatively,” Galland added.

    “This will also bring a lot of new jobs into the community that could truly make a difference for a teenager who is looking for a job or a family who is looking for an additional job to help pay the bills or more savings. Also, this will benefits teachers since there will be a lot of educational elements at the park; they could work during the summer to teach about Texas history and culture.”

    They are expecting first year attendance to be around 665,000 rising to 904,000 at the theme park and for the core elements to boast an attendance of 1.4 million growing to a little over 1.8 million.

    The entertainment district will be anchored by four primary elements which are the theme park, Big Rivers Water Park, the Pine Grove amphitheater, which has an 8,000 person capacity and a baseball stadium.

    They will also have the Gunslinger’s Paintball experience for guests to enjoy.

    “With the theme park being the anchor, it is very important for us to have a great team. We have a very strong team including Chuck Hendrix, who oversees the planning and operations for the theme park. He has years of experience since he was previously responsible for operations at all of the North American Six Flags and former general manager for Six Flags’ Astroworld,” Galland said.

    The rest of the team have all worked at various theme and water parks in the Houston area and retail areas like the Marketplace in the Woodlands and for the most part, live in the Houston area so that is one of the reasons they chose to open a theme park in the East Montgomery County community.

    The Grand Texas Theme Park has partnered with Brae Burn Construction who have a $100 million bonding capability and they will help with construction once they officially sign on to the location of the park and they make their agreements with the three entities.

    They also plan to have an agri-tainment arena where the guests can learn about different things like how to drive a tractor, where to plant crops, how to milk a cow and enjoy petting zoos and horseback riding.

    “That is what this park is all about is having families interacting with each other and the animals. We want to incorporate the educational aspects of the theme park with fun. It is an exciting venture that we are excited to begin,” Galland said.

     

  8. It's pretty cool to see major highrises being built in the suburbs. It's funny, you drive into Dallas on 45, you don't even know you're in a major metro area until you get downtown. In Houston, the freeway opens up in Conroe (40 miles out) and the density really begins to pick up in ernest when you get into The Woodlands (25 miles out). 

    • Like 1
  9. Also in the Bizjournal article linked above was this last paragraph.

     

     

     

     

    I'm so lost on the twists and turns of Blvd Place.  Can someone simply explain where the other 645 high-rise units are going and where the hotel is going.

     

    Last I knew,  only high-rise buildings being built were Hanover's (above) and whatever Apache builds.

     

    I apologize in advance for being dense on this one.

     

    Yeah, I kinda agree. Can somebody clear up the BLVD. mess and which is which?

  10. I suspect that's a lot bigger lot than we realize. Astoria isn't a big tower anyway, just taller and that McDonalds is like the biggest I've ever seen. The footprint of the new McDonalds will be far smaller. Plus removing that trailer thingy on the site will open up the area quite a bit. I mean look what they build downtown (Mainplace) with that while building (forget the name of it) sharing the lot. I thought that was much more impressive.

  11. not sure. Hines has a building coming out of the ground, and all indications are that Apache will occupy it. Location and size are unclear, but it's happening for sure, and it's going to be tall.

    "...and it's going to be tall.''

    Does that imply that it'll be unusually tall? I mean we all know a 30, 40 or 50 story building is tall but the fact that you included ''it's going to be tall'' peaks my interests. lol

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