kylejack

Well I never got an answer as to why it is so crucial to maintain motorist traffic on Main Street. The speed limit in all of Downtown is 30.

Yes, but the foot traffic -at least from what I saw- isn't that heavy that it becomes a particular obstacle.

I'd recommend checking it out at night.

Anyway, it's like saying that a bridge isn't needed in a particular area because nobody is swimming across the river. Building pedestrian-friendly environments will attract new pedestrians.

A decade ago, construction cut the vehicular traffic from three lanes in each direction to one in each direction. That alone made more difference in the area becoming more "pedestrian friendly" than the improvements you're proposing.

And so what? There's no need for Either/Or. We can do that then, and still do this now. Cutting the lanes to one is precisely what makes it not a great street to drive on. So simply redirect that traffic to other streets with better capacity.

Besides, looking at the current Google Street View shows planters in the median (though when I went downtown at the time, those had been torn up, so I dunno what's there now).

If you're talking about in front of Flying Saucer, all that has been taken out to build the transfer station.

OK, here's another idea I had: we move the southbound rail to run down Travis Street. The old southbound rail becomes the new northbound rail, the old northbound rail becomes the new southbound vehicular lane, and the old southbound vehicular lane becomes a bike path. Alternately, the old median becomes the new northbound route while another road is designated as the southbound lane.

Why is it advantageous to preserve motorist traffic on Main Street? What purpose does it serve? There are no garage entrances on Main Street. There is precious little street parking available. All of the properties are accessible from other streets. Driving on Main is a futile experience because of the aforementioned reasons.

Is the "pedestrian mall" idea really the only thing at play here, or does anyone have any better ideas?

They do not, because my idea is the best idea.

They didn't cannibalize a north-south corridor (for one thing). Secondly, the existing sidewalks aren't particularly narrow or busy. If a friend and I can have a beer outside of The Flying Saucer and still have people walk by without squeezing past each other, then you don't need a wider sidewalk. Or even on a mid-day weekday (and I've seen both). If it's after hours that are the biggest thing, consider putting gates that block traffic between 10 pm and 5 am.

I've lived in the same building as Flying Saucer for 4 years. People do squeeze by, and that portion of sidewalk is particularly narrow after factoring in the Flying Saucer's patio and fence.

There is no need for cars on Main Street downtown. It's a lousy place to drive. You can never turn left. You can only travel several blocks before Main Street Square forces you to turn off onto another street. The roads parallel to Main are 4 lanes wide or better.

The big problem about closing the rest of Main Street is the train's still there

So we protect the pedestrians by putting cars in their way as well as the train? That seems odd. Seems to me reducing the vehicles to dodge makes them safer.

Lol we have 2 completely opposite desires here.. I too hope they close the rest of main st through downtown, or at the very least extend the pedestrian only zone from Main Street square a few blocks north and south, so that the road is closed to at least greenstreet to the south, and the new central station to the north.. Though it would be cool to connect the pedestrian area all the way to the historic/market square district.

Yes, I think foot traffic and a friendly pedestrian environment would be a boon for all the new bars and restaurants coming in on the North end of Main Street.

Close the rest of Main Street to vehicular traffic, through Downtown at least. That's my dream.

Oh but I did account for the surface parking lots that will exist in the Sky House development.  Every one of them.  There aren't any.

e.g. http://swamplot.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/skyhouse-tower-retail-plan.jpg

I know.  That's why I wrote 3/4 of a block for Sky House.  (The existing building that had to be demolished occupied 1/4 of the block.)

 

Well, then you don't seem to be accounting for the surface parking that will exist in the Sky House development.

I count 30 such blocks out of a total of 63 blocks in the specified area (counting Toyota Center as 4 blocks, which is the number it covers.  The good news is, that is 10 fewer blocks of surface parking than just a relatively few years ago:

 

Toyota Center and Tundra Garage and Hilton Americas/GRB Garage:  7 blocks

Sacred Heart Co-Cathedral:  1 block

Sky House:  3/4 block

Main & Leeland Apartments:  1 block

 

 

More good news:

 

There are apartment towers seriously proposed that will take away another 3 of those blocks.

Sky House block had buildings on it that had to be demolished.

The very first scene could have been a street in Midtown or Museum District over 59 or 288. Other than that, there were no exterior scenes that seemed to be shot in Houston, except one Downtown shot from the Sabine Street bridge. Certainly not the park with the giant fountains.

Edit: Nope, I used an apartment complex sign to confirm the location of the first scene. It was shot in Los Angeles, right here: https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Tesoro+Del+Valle&ll=34.07858,-118.220007&spn=0.002894,0.004128&client=firefox-a&fb=1&gl=us&cid=2619391441908811940&t=h&z=19&layer=c&cbll=34.078648,-118.2199&panoid=cxK5t20F5Df6aK3zMzC3ig&cbp=12,56.52,,0,1.93

Maybe that park that St Joseph's owns with the waterfalls should be bought. It's often locked up.

Well, there's Root Square, at least.

When I was shopping for apartments last summer and asked about all of the new construction, I was told it will make no dent in apartment rent rates as demand is so high all of the new projects will simply fill existing/future demand. If anything, prices will continue to rise.

Then it *will* make a dent, because without the new apartments the future demand will make prices rise faster.

Not NECESSARILY old railroad ROW, though if it were up to me, the light rail on Harrisburg would go up Milby and on the old ROW (remember, that was originally supposed to be a highway at one time), cross the railroad with an elevated platform (no expensive underpasses), there's ample ROW where there is a railroad (no spurs!), take out the Sonic (now closed anyway) and two other buildings, and you're at the transit center. Harrisburg Blvd. is improved with sidewalks etc., and the light rail is not very far away from commercial businesses.

Where? The existing railroad that's still in use?

What IS lacking are places to buy clothing and blenders and such.  And a dry cleaners - there's gotta be one closer than Midtown, I just don't know where.

We lost clothing and blenders when the Macy's closed. Wolfe Cleaners at 227 Main is great for drycleaning.

Not at all. His discussion is centered around a government planned district. Low level retail should develop organically without government involvement as a response to market demand. As I've stated in other threads, I believe that low level retail will develop in downtown Houston once there is a sufficient population to support it. In my opinion, CoH is doing the right thing in that area - incentivize residential and let the market provide the retail once sufficient demand exists.

Downtown Management District and the City subsidize businesses that wish to open in Downtown. Georgia's, The Burger Guys, Phoenicia, etc...they all got incentives.

We moved out in 2004 for a house with a real yard and no strange people walking by. Having a kid changed our perspective on how much weirdness we were wiling to tolerate, plus schools are a real issue in that part of town.

 

We still go to Midtown frequently, and I just don't see any real rail oriented development there.

 

Well, it's difficult to discuss this since you keep moving the goal posts.

Let's get on the same page. What's "real development", as opposed to fake development?

The light rail opened in January 2004. Here we are 10 years later, and we are just now getting some development. The recession didn't hit until 2008, what was going on between 2004 and then?

A few supposed non-existent entities, according to you, off the top of my head:

2004 Post Midtown

2005 Tacos A Go Go, Julia's Bistro

2007 Reef

How did you live in Midtown during this period and not notice these openings?

My personal experience is that the rail makes it very difficult to get from West of Main/Fulton where we live, to East of Main/Fulton, where my in-laws live.

 

Well, things change. Midtown had the same problem when rail was built. Then people just learned to go around on the through streets.

Traffic is not "messed up." It is simply re-routed.

Looks like they are closed for renovations already....

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/houston/morning_call/2013/12/another-midtown-houston-bar-shuts.html

I've heard the renovations lie before. Businesses that are locked in to a lease will sometimes say this so they can extract all their furniture and equipment before the landlord changes the locks.

The Good Life joins Warhal's in the list of bars that have both opened and closed in 2013 in Midtown.

There's a fence up around the entire block as of yesterday.

They just fired their entire Houston corporate office. http://swamplot.com/yet-another-sign-of-a-coming-randalls-houston-pullout/2013-12-11/

Prohibition is closing their Galleria location in order to make the move (http://houston.eater.com/archives/2013/12/05/the-shutter-43.php). As much as I would like to see more restaurants and bars decide to move downtown from elsewhere in Houston, I'm not thrilled about Prohibition. The rule of writing good fiction also applies to bars: "Show, don't tell." Compare Prohibition which "tells" you its concept through 1) its name; 2) having its bartenders and servers in costume; 3) having a picture of Al Capone up to much more tasteful speakeasy-style bars in NYC like PDT and Death & Co. or our best hometown speakeasy-style bar, Captain Foxheart's Bad News Bar & Spirit Lodge

On the other hand, if they make good drinks I'm delighted to have them fill a long-empty space.

Another Randalls bites the dust.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMGMZsKXz94#t=0m25s

The record for truck to brick and mortar conversions is pretty strong in Houston.  Eatsie Boys is great and Fusion Taco is also pretty phenomenal. 

Green Seed Vegan, The Modular became Goro & Gun, and Bernie's Burger Bus is on the way to brick & mortar.

I guess people are going to asphyxiate now. I'm curious as to how the Sonic is going to make money--the aforementioned one in College Station's mall didn't make much money at all. The tunnel hours are even more limited: no half-drunk people coming in at 11pm.

The same way Whataburger does, I suppose.