Nate99

Construction begins soon, right?

The last activity on the lot was the soil sampling. I check it frequently and will post up pics when they break ground. 

Sunbathers/swimsuit-clad frolickers in pool area renderings are the best, especially at dusk. 

The South End is HUGE! It used to be not much more than bleachers, now it's the tallest part of the stadium!

Apart from the gigantic video board, I gathered from the renderings that it will be about the same height as the Zone. 

The speed of this project is astounding. 

Nate, the flags were put up there in celebration of the topping out of the construction by the work crew. Anyone else doing it would not have been redass, it would have been dumbass.

Good to hear, and I agree, except that dumbass and redass were not mutually exclusive in my experience. It is certainly not something I would have attempted or encouraged at any point in my life, but I know of plenty that would have relished the opportunity. 

My assumption of redassery would have been through the lens of such a hypothetical college student. I checked the camera somewhat late the day before and did not see the flag and made the assumption that it was placed there overnight surreptitiously, I was wrong and gladly so.  Had they pulled it off, I would have respected the effort, but certainly not worth the risk.

I'm proposing a resolution to require everyone to acknowledge that just because something sounds good and worked to some extent in a culturally homogeneous Scandinavian country with less than 3% of the population of the U.S. doesn't mean it should be attempted here. 

Stockholm has roughly as many cars per person as NYC with a population density that is 1/3 of that of NYC total (not just Manhattan). To achieve the same results as Stockholm, NYC would have to implement vastly different approaches that would necessarily be more restrictive to all types of traffic, even if all New Yorkers behaved identically to Swedes.  

There may be some good ideas here and there, but just like a bucket of flags that keep getting stolen in Berkeley, they may not work here for all kinds of reasons. Everything has a tradeoff. Zero fatalities sounds great, but at what cost? At the end of that spectrum, making everyone's commute more miserable and expensive so that people who refuse employ common sense to manage their own safety don't get hurt doesn't sound worth it to me.  

The Swedish seem to be a very orderly people. 

Holes punched in the wall for the ramps, and they have taken out portions of the roof. You can see daylight through where it used to be. 

College students being what they are, this looks like a bit of Corps related redassery. 

No matter. I welcome the diversity.

Definitely beats an empty building. Interesting spot for high end specialty retail-ish. They have the store in the River Oaks shopping center too.

I have never heard of anyone buying a new piano, maybe I run in the wrong circles.  

Actually, a new piano store...

Alas, not likely to spur the street scene too much...

Interesting idea, sounds better suited for a drier climate than we have. I know those things are designed to work on ships in the ocean, but I wonder how long they are expected to hold up. 

Probably longer than a mobile home, but that's a pretty low expectation. 

Building them out is probably not that difficult. Getting it permitted wherever you intend to install it may be the more difficult part. 

Thanks again, Scotch. 

I didn't know the old name of the CQ hotel, nor that the lettering was still semi-visible until you pointed that out. 

That view gives a perception of density that I don't really notice walking around. Once this building is in and Capitol tower is up, it will be even denser, but again, you won't be able to see it like this. 

Another one of those "you won't see this again" views...

Spotted at the Houston Center food court...

The current PC had a very cool Swanky feel. At least it did the last time I was there. I wish they would keep a similar theme/design. Hope they have a sale.

I had been there a few times, very Mad Men, from what I have gathered about the show second hand. Appropriate I suppose given a club that had not needed to change a thing since the mid-60's.

It's an interesting bit of short term archaeology. About the time that they might have done a comprehensive re-styling, the bottom fell out of the oil market an Houston in general. So, missing that opportunity, it stayed as it was for long enough that people actually liked the styling again. 

This was in the Houston Club tunnel closure/demolition article in the Chronicle. They have the JW Marriott mislabeled as 712 Main, but you can see in their diagram a set of escalators or stairs in to the lobby right where it connects to 801 Travis (mislabeled as 501 Travis, nice QC). If you go through there now, you can see a construction project going on behind temporary walls. 

It will be interesting to see how it all comes together in to the lobby.

Odd, when I hotlink the image, the text does not come through, maybe they are editing out the errors.  The article link has them, at least in my cache. 

The construction along Capitol is going to be absolutely mad:  Capitol Tower, 609 Main, Texaco rehab, HSPVA, this project, Hampton Inn, the Nau Center, and the convention center garage.  Houston hasn't seen anything like this since the early 1980s.

East of Main down Texas and Capitol was pretty desolate for a long time. I'm sure the folks that refurbed the Magnolia are loving all of this. 

The 6 story at Capitol is staying for now. Skanska is paying big $$$ to convert that into a stand alone structure. The ramps for the garage are in the 12 story that is coming down. That's the reason for the steel ramps at Milam. The Demo Contractor is taking a two bay section of the 18 & 12 story out next to the 6 story, this will create space to drop the building in.

This will be fun to watch. 

They have already constructed internal walls between the 6 story section and the rest that you can see when they have the big doors open on Travis. Making it ready for implosion will be a neat trick. 

 

 

The easement idea makes sense from a legal standpoint.  It's creative, and it works. Ya gotta love the mano a mano involved in having a parking space that you simply won't sell at any price under a price where it makes sense to go ahead and literally blow up its previously attached building. 

Really makes me want to go in to real estate development if one can jump through all of these hoops and still make a profit. 

This would "complete" Texas Street from the bayou to MMP.

The Texas/LaBranch intersection will look like a completely different city if all of these go.

Good stuff.  

so why are they rebuilding/renovating the garage if the building is getting imploded in the fall..?

We've been through this earlier in the thread, but no one really knows.  Ironclad parking deals in perpetuity is anyone's best guess, but it's hard to square how building new ramps and internal structure is worth the money. 

Implosion should be interesting given that they will be leaving the shorter northernmost section. 

It's only funny because it's not my lawn.

 

 

HOUSTON - Police in Houston are looking for a man who has been defecating in the yards and driveways of some homes in the Woodland Heights neighborhood. Neighbors say one home has been hit six times. One fed up homeowner placed a surveillance camera in a tree and captured images of the man they believe is behind the poop. Police say they are now actively looking for the suspect.

Read More at: http://www.news4sanantonio.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/man-poops-front-lawns-neighbors-fed-up-11402.shtml?wap=0#.U2sBE8S9KSM