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Nate99

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Everything posted by Nate99

  1. Nate99
    So, there's a crane going in on Texas...
  2. Nate99
    The tunnel side renovation reaching back under 801 Travis:
  3. Nate99
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  5. Nate99
    Looks like there will be flood lights going up the corners illuminating the quoins.
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  7. Nate99
    Is anyone left that is not thinking "I'll believe it when I see it" on this thing?
  8. Nate99
    They are very nearly done with the stone work on the Main side. I did not look down Rusk to see what was left. I'd guess that the scaffolding will come down soon and we'll get a look at this thing for real.
  9. Nate99
    A fair number of folks sit at the tables outside of the Jones Hall main entrance across the street. Outdoor seating in Houston could use more deep, cave like shade such as this. Even at Jones Plaza, what shade you may get from the structures around lunch time is going to be a few feet away from uncovered pavement that is radiating heat like crazy. Not sure how many places that type of set up is feasible. You would almost need a pavillion over a large portion of the whole block to do that at Jones Plaza, which would be difficult to keep from becoming a stanky bum camp. The Rice Hotel front along Texas does a pretty good job of it though.
  10. Nate99
    Very true, though the time pressure/incentives on this build have to be more than a little different than the large scale continual construction that seems to be going on around the campus. This is spending $450 million, the vast majority of which has to be done in two eight month chunks.
  11. Nate99
    Eventually the whole thing will come down, but as I understand it, the "new" garage portion (with the tacked on ramps) will stay until a new garage can be constructed on the rest of the block, whereupon it too will demolished to make room for the rest of the tower. Those structures will be in the way of an unfettered view, but there will be more stuff visible than here was before for a time. They ar taking a slice out of the middle to enable implsion of the big side without harming the "new" garage. They are down to the mural now, it is coming out.
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  13. Nate99
    Tunnel retail is fairly confined to that which survives on peope's lunch breaks. I'm sure the restaurants would love to get evening traffic, but apart from that, the types of retail that residents would need/want will have to be new anyway and accessible after the hours that the tunnels will be open, so I think street life will come as a necessity. Not that I am personally that big of a fan of vibrant street life as a standalone concept; discrete desirable things along the streets may bring more people (including me) out to them and be worthwhile, but more people crowding around me is a net negative in my mind. I know I am in the minority around here, but all of the urbanists' paridises I've been to, I would not have wanted to live in any of them unless I was filthy rich.
  14. Nate99
    It has been covered quite thoroughly here, re: tunnels/street life, but it is worth noting that in the first pre-Dome years of Major League Baseball in Houston with the Colt .45's, the players that were accustomed to playing outdoors exclusively (and mostly afternoon games) complained about the climate. It sucks to be out there this time of year, n two ways about it. IMO, the tunnels and consequent undergrounding of the street life are a response to the climate. If they somehow disappeared, people still wouldn't walk around out there very much during the summer, and a four to five month slow down in foot trafic would make owning a business out there a pretty dodgy proposition given the few types of businesses that survive in the tunnels as it is. Folks living downtown will make street life more viable, and the sprawl/congestion is making that a more reasonable option.
  15. Nate99
    Agreed. Plenty of folks with decent jobs that still can't afford rent at the high end stuff popping up recently would like the option, I would guess. The drunk tank isn't the easiest neighbor to sell, but such a compromise could keep rent down if/until people figure out that it is no big deal. I always liked that converted building on Chenevert right by the 59N entrance ramp, but it is even closer to the "Sobering Cener".
  16. Nate99
    I would imagine that he has a hedge in Vegas on the whole season win total O/U payout. That the bar is set at 65 games is almost too sad to have publicity value at all.
  17. Nate99
    So, they want all of the various fiefdoms to work together on a plan to be named later? Seems rather backwards.
  18. Nate99
    They cranked up the video board for the first time yesterday. A great pic by 'spudag' over at TexAgs.
  19. Nate99
    The Woodlands : Irvine New Caney : Anaheim _________ : Newport Beach Fill in the blank for me accurately, please!
  20. Nate99
    No argument there. It turned in to a beige box. I do wonder how long those big switching centers will be kept around. There are several in DT alone (one on the Magnolia's block is several stories tall) and other notable locations taking up good RE. I guess as long as some are using the land lines, they will be there.
  21. Nate99
    I was thinking the same thing. Looks like two of the same type of "sump" that they put under 1111 Main.
  22. Nate99
    His post was sarcasm. The hate for he Embassy Suites as it ended up is pretty well unmatched. The AT&T building he was referencing is a windowless switching bunker.
  23. Nate99
    The gravitational pull of a multi-hundred million dollar project in a ~230K population area must spawn some wierd economics. One wonders if some of wherewithal devoted to Baylor's stadium might divert south over the next year now that it is mostly complete.
  24. Nate99
    Not sure of the particulars. There is a Facebook feed called "Traces of Texas" that I subscribe to and this one popped up there, though I had seen it here before. Of course, I can not find the specific post this was from any more, because Facebook. A google search turned up this link (with lots of cool old Houston pictures/stories): http://tanasreminisce.com/background.html It was S.O.P. for the circus to march its elephants through town from wherever they stopped the train to the arena to market their performance/announce their arrival.
  25. Nate99
    They have been busy down there...
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