IronTiger

I *think* there might be one left, but another one of the unique Houston items...gone.

For the last few days during these humid/foggy nights I've noticed a spotlight going back and forth west of Shepherd and 610. It's not Williams Tower, and from that intersection it looks like it is from the inner loop (fairly close). Anyone have an idea what the source is?

I wonder if the adjacent Fiesta will close too. Was that announced? I believe the Fiesta was on land Sears leased, and that property is now Rice's...

Oh, so it's actually closed? When was the closing date?

I've noticed on my morning and evening commute that there's still a lot of gravel on certain bridges that were added on that hard freeze day in January. It got rid of some of the ice but made driving even more of a pain since it got on windshields, and the windshield wiper fluid was frozen over since I thought that the "Summer Formula" would be good year-round for Texas (I imagine that I was not the only driver who had that exact situation). There just still seems to be a lot of gravel/sand left on bridges despite some showers and other rainfall. Are those ever going to get clean or washed away?

So, it looks like the "express lanes" construction also involves a total rebuild of the 288/610 interchange. This includes a temporary situation where the 288 S exit (eastbound) from 610 has gone from its 2013 reconstruction (two lanes splitting off from 610 to two lanes on 288 instead of one lane turning into two) to a scary exit-only lane with a really sharp turn. The original 288 interchange wasn't bad in itself (unless you were a truck with a penchant for going too fast), with the only most obnoxious part having the 288 North exit being BEFORE the 288 South exit, if you were going eastbound on 610. Westbound made a little more sense, with the traditional "exit and split" routine seen at the other interchanges. The rebuild seems to place the ramps at the same level and does not address the fact that the westbound 610 frontage road is not contiguous.

All railroads cost money to operate and maintain, and very few make a profit. Even the MTA (New York City's transit system) only gains back about 50% what they put in the budget. If the HSR was built and didn't make a profit, the state could sell the line to Union Pacific, who could use it as a super-fast way of getting from Dallas to Houston, and definitely turn a profit off of it.

Nah two is also bad because it will basically confirm what everyone in the counter-rail group is thinking, that it's just a long-range con to scam taxpayers and not actually deliver a functional, profitable private rail line. Already we've been going from "Hey, this is privately funded and operated, we're not like California here, ha ha" to "Yes, it's privately funded but have you considered eminent domain? It's only a narrow little strip!" No way would anyone living near the Heights Bike Path would allow HSR down it. In addition to having needing far more ROW than the Katy railroad ever had, it had all sorts of twisty turns that would make it impractical to freight and HSR alike. Whoops, critical research error on my part. For some reason I read Hobby opening in 1969, not IAH. Point still stands though. If this is anywhere close to a major hub as a contingent of this thread believes it to be, downtown is neither necessary or pragmatic.

LOL to the "why not downtown" arguments. If this is supposed to be an airport alternative, why does it have to be downtown? If HAIF had existed back in the 1960s, would there be just whole pages of complaints about the future Hobby Airport being outside of the Loop?

Didn't HAIF change ownership a few years back?

Comparing freeways to trains is a false equivalence, and even there was a equivalent, it would probably be to block, say, South Freeway from being built with federal funds (it was the last of the Houston freeways to be built). And even that's not entirely true, because Culberson didn't want rail going on Richmond and I think he even said something about being okay with METRO continuing to develop the light rail parallel to Westpark Tollway. But, METRO wanted Richmond because of better access and (projected) ridership numbers.

Just because someone has a different opinion than you doesn’t mean they were paid to do so. It’s like the accusation that there’s funding for people to get paid while posting negative things about President Trump, but even if that’s true (we’re not here to argue that) does that mean that every negative comment on the Internet about Trump is because someone paid to do? Of course not. I’ve noticed your opinions about Trump on this website, were you paid to write them? If yes, I don’t think TxDOT or a shadowy but well-funded anti-transit "think tank" has people paid to say negative things about mass transit, and if not (the most likely answer though I can never tell for sure), then he's probably not paid by anyone either.

I'm sure I've heard the argument on this very website that the green and purple lines (along with the red line extension) were supposed to make the light rail really cook, and now it will be the University line that needs to be built. And if that's anything less than a massive success, when is the answer NOT "we need to build more rail"? That's the funny thing--if I recall correctly, all Culberson did was block federal funding for the University Line, not actually block it itself (arguably, Culberson deserves some credit for actually fighting for his Afton Oaks-area constituents, a rare but admirable trait for a politician). It was METRO's choice not to build it. From the maps I've seen, it would've required them to clear out a small strip center and build over 59, so it's probably one of the more expensive routes to build, but if it was really pressing transit-wise (debatable) then METRO should've pushed for it, and that's on them.

It's not a "wake up call opportunity". A big company passed Houston up, and it's not like it was Houston's last big chance to become a "real city". It already has tons of big companies, tons of people, and a baseball team that won the World Series. Also say what you want about rail, but in no way will rail "reduce sprawl". Heck, rail INVENTED sprawl, when there was suddenly a way for people that could afford it to move OUT of the crowded big cities. Anyway. The post I wanted to write dealt with elevated rail. You could point to Chicago for the biggest example of elevated rail, but it definitely isn't feasible for a modern city in this day and age, and would've had to been done back several decades ago. The "El" in Chicago only had less than 10% ADA compliant stations in 1990, and even as of 2016, about 30% still were not compliant. I wasn't kidding when I was talking about building demolitions earlier for compliance. That's straight out of Chicago Transit Authority's website. It was either in this thread or another one where I mentioned I "rolled my eyes" every time someone brings up more trains in Houston, because I have yet to read a halfway compelling argument that brings up past Houston projects (Whitmire's monorail, Katy Freeway, etc.) without gross oversimplification, misinformation, or blatant falsehoods.

I'm at work right now so I can't make a super-long, detailed post but elevators aren't enough in some cases. To put elevated rail downtown would mean that there would be substantially less stations or more building demolitions, probably both.

The "loudest voice" in this case are actually the ones who think we should Houston should have an East Coast-style commuter train system when more sensible heads know that the cost/benefit is very little. Anytime Katy Freeway is mentioned I always roll my eyes because there's so much misinformation about it. First, it was TxDOT that bought the line (from 610 to Katy, at least, I don't know if they were involved in the Inner Loop portion at all), not METRO. The only reason METRO was even involved in the Katy Freeway was because of the federal funding used to build the original HOV lane (which the rebuild would've replaced), and decided to pour money into over-engineering Katy Tollway to potentially be used as a rail corridor, even though HCTRA and TxDOT would be unlikely to let it go. Yet no one brings up this incredible waste of money as to why there's not more rail, blaming Culberson is more politically convenient. Additionally, thinking an elevated rail (especially downtown) would've been feasible post-ADA is laughable.

I accepted a job in Houston so I'll be moving down there in a few weeks or less. The question is, I won't be making a ton of money (about $13.6/hr.) and I know I got denied at a lot of places when I was working part-time a few years ago. Now, with rental history and a better, more stable job, I feel like I could make it work but I've also got Harvey working against me, and I know a lot of apartment complexes in Houston are still out of commission. I'll be working in the Inner Loop but I think it would be cheaper if I tried to go for more suburban apartments. What do you suggest?

But the Heights is naturally densifying just because of market forces. Also, "parking requires as much infrastructure as a two-story building" is objectively wrong (little to no electricity being wired, maybe a storm sewer but no water connections, no gas, etc.). More restrictive development won't cure the "parking lot problem", either. If you want to see what I mean, go to Historic Aerials or Google Earth and type "368 Fell Street, San Francisco, CA". Navigate back to the early 1990s. There's a row of parking lots in a diagonal pattern stretching about seven blocks northeast. With the land value in San Francisco, Hayes Valley being relatively nice or at least nice enough to attract new construction, and with everything else being developed with hardly any surface parking, all that would become buildings again, right? Wrong. In 2008, after more than 15 years (including a better economy) those parking lots still reigned, and most of the recent development was done in the last five years. Reason being S.F. is notorious for being hard to develop in, so much so that it was actually cheaper to let them stay as parking lots for decades despite lost tax revenue. Start requiring nonsense like "no parking in front" and you'll start seeing existing parking lots stick around a lot longer, but they won't be free or usable.

Because of a lack of engineering. Have you noticed older roads that haven't been touched since at least the 1980s will flood even at even brief but intense rainfall events?

Because I got in a lot of pointless arguments with Slick Vik which dealt with almost the same talking points and more recently a discussion regarding the Galveston rail (especially if the argument was both "before its time" and "instant economy just add rail"). Also, I noticed that you changed your argument ("add rail" -> "more density" to "more density" -> "need rail").

Not this again. I'm not going to break down everything but... - A lot of the Inner Loop has densified in the last 10 years without rail - Traditional METRORail wouldn't have worked at all outside the Inner Loop, Dallas-style commuter hybrid rail would struggle to gain ridership due to the slow speed, and either way the street-running rail system would be dog slow - Even as it is, the Red Line is highly successful but it takes nearly an hour to go from Northline to Fannin (52 minutes according to METRO's schedule) whereas the equivalent drive is about 20 minutes in non-peak freeway times

It does make me think why Amazon was even looking for large A-class cities to begin with (Houston, Philadelphia, NYC, Chicago, etc.), which already have big problems with housing prices, homelessness, and traffic. That's why I think they should be looking for B-class cities that have good connections with A-class cities but aren't connected, like Pittsburgh, places in Ohio, etc. (I would consider Detroit and Austin to be B-class but not good candidates but different reasons).

Yeah, but what actually matters more to you, what local residents want out of their community, or your idea of a master-planned community? Like what Houston19514 already said, I have nothing against the latter (several unbroken blocks of shops and buildings would be nice) but do be honest with yourself instead of hiding behind buzzwords.

If it's facing north (roughly) and paralleling the Gulf Freeway, why does there seem to be an elevated freeway in the background? The half-cloverleafs wouldn't have existed at the time. Or that just a big building?

While regulations may have to do with the lack of redevelopment, wouldn't the type of development you're suggesting (no setbacks, no front parking lot) make things less likely to develop in most cases? The reason why its undeveloped is lack of demand. If the Houston Heights had some sort of merchants association, they would probably push one way or another on what to do with it. And if a parking variance is defeated by Heights residents, isn't that the point of "people oriented development"?