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livincinco

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Everything posted by livincinco

  1. livincinco
    So let's assume that you're right about everything and then put it in perspective. Let's assume that (and I don't agree) that the city made a poor investment of $6 million and could have achieved the result without the investment. I don't know if you're in the business world, but bad decisions happen. They happen at every level of business and at every level of government. You accept them, move on, and try to make a better decision the next time. The annual budget of the CoH is approx. $1 billion, so we're saying that the city potentially made a poor investment decision on 0.6% of its annual expenditures. That is not significant. It's done. Move on.
  2. livincinco
    This is a 3200+ post obsession with how 50 acres inside one of the least dense cities in the country was utilized. You are absolutely correct that it's a free country and I retain the right to make fun of the fact that this discussion continues when the thread should have died a year ago.
  3. livincinco
    Let's see...what's happening in Houston right now... Residential and office developments popping up all over town. Downtown is starting to boom including several new skyscrapers. Three light rail lines under construction. Several parks under renovation Forget all that boring stuff...LET'S TALK ABOUT WALMART!
  4. livincinco
    It seems to me that the current trend is to put a higher emphasis on features other than exterior appearance right now, but that's strictly a layman's perspective. LEEDS certification and how "liveable" a building is inside, seem to be a much higher emphasis. Asking that question to the pros in the room, is that an accurate assessment or am I way off base?
  5. livincinco
    3200 posts and still going strong! This thread truly is the gift that keeps on giving!
  6. livincinco
    You apparently missed the words "shop keeper" in my post. BTW, I have nothing against personal choice in buying organic, fair trade, independent, etc. It's your money, do what you want with it. I do many of those things myself. I do not however place value judgements on people who choose to live their life differently.
  7. livincinco
    Your comment reminds me of the classic Winston Churchill quote. "Capitalism is the worst economic system, except for all the others."
  8. livincinco
    I find the benevolent shop keeper who isn't interested in growing his/her business to be an urban legend that is mostly perpetuated by movies from the 1930s. The ones who claim that's what they want are the ones that don't run their businesses well enough to grow them. Am I generalizing? Heck ya.
  9. livincinco
    I'm not looking down interaction with businesses, but I am disagreeing with your generalization of large chains having anonymous minimum wage employees. You're assigning attributes that aren't related to the size of the business. Businesses staff based on their target audience and any business, regardless of size, that appeals to higher income levels is going to staff accordingly. The same is true with any company that appeals to a price conscious customer. You're essentially lumping all chains into a single category and that's a gross generalization. I have no problem with small businesses, I support them when possible, but I also don't complain about large chains because most of them are small businesses that succeeded. Bottom line is the same for any business. At the end of the day, you have to provide a compelling reason for someone to buy from you. If you can't do that, you go out of business. If you do it extremely well, you continue to open locations and become a dreaded chain. The person that I have issue with is the person that will eat at Torchys now and then will stop eating at them when they start opening locations in the suburbs.
  10. livincinco
    I've gone through this before, but the obsession with boutique retail always fascinates me. Most of the time, chains are boutique retail that succeeded due to running their business well. They then leverage their size and buying capabilities to create more value either for their customers, their shareholders, or both. Earlier in the thread, having Torchy's open on 19th street was viewed as a good thing. Torchy's is a chain. It's just a chain that opens its locations in urban areas. My guess is that Torchy's will continue to grow, will start to open locations in suburban areas and then Heights hipsters will turn on it. Hey, if feeling like you have to personally approve of every store that opens in your neighborhood makes you feel special, more power to you. I prefer to judge a store on service, price and quality of product rather than whether they are "boutique."
  11. livincinco
    So forgive me if I missed something, because I really have no interest in reading all preceding 107 pages of this thread, but I'm trying to figure out when this parcel turned into such an untapped pot of gold. Isn't this a site that has industrial on a couple of sides of it and borders a railroad track? Looking at Google maps, it looks like the properties directly across I-10 on the Heights side are DP Dump Truck & Bob Cat Services and a couple of warehouses. Not exactly screaming mixed use to me. I get that the 380 probably should have been written better, but you guys must have a lot of free time on your hands to get so excited about this.
  12. livincinco
    There does seem to be quite a few abandoned warehouses is that area. Not sure that I would categorize land availability as "extremely limited".
  13. livincinco
    I have to go back a couple of pages here to the comment about getting rid of the "hideous" Zone D next to the Galleria. C'mon people, if anyone is serious about historic preservation in Houston, than Zone D should be designed as a landmark. This is a monument to Houston's lack of zoning laws and putting that building next to the Galleria is the greatest "I don't give a cr*p what you think" statement that I've ever seen. The only thing that could possibly be better would be if Neiman Marcus was in the Dillard's space so that all the Neiman's customers could pretend to be offended by the sight of it while secretly shopping there (with sunglasses and hats on).
  14. livincinco
    I don't agree with you that Yale and I-10 is a better location then City Centre. City Centre has very close proximity to very wealthy areas, is located at the intersection of two major highways and has the advantage of being a destination for the entire west side of Houston. As was also pointed out, it has close proximity to the jobs of the Energy Corridor and Memorial City which are both growing rapidly. I don't think that it is by any means a given that City Centre is an equal success if it was located at Yale and I-10.
  15. livincinco
    I agree that light rail is a contributing factor. I also know that there is a lot of development happening around the parks in Houston. I further know to never take what a spokesperson says at face value. BTW, the idea that parks contribute to economic development isn't exactly a radical idea people. http://www.planning.org/cityparks/briefingpapers/economicdevelopment.htm
  16. livincinco
    I'm not trying to be antagonistic, but I have difficulty attributing the growth that's occurring around Market Square Park to light rail. Look at the timeline. Light rail opened in 2004. Market Square Park was renovated in 2010. The vast majority of the development in the area has occurred since 2010. Isn't it reasonable to attribute a large part of the development that has occurred in that area to the renovation of the park? After all, both Discovery Green and Market Square Park experienced major growth in the surrounding areas after renovation and development along the light rail line has been spotty. I think that a more accurate assessment would be that proximity to light rail is one of several contributing factors.
  17. livincinco
    I don't think that's the point that Red is trying to make. I think that his point is that compelling developers to include GFR isn't a good idea. If the developer doesn't think that they can lease that GFR, then the whole equation changes. They may question the economics of the development and not move forward with it, or they may build the GFR and have it sit vacant which is of no value to anyone. I think that everyone agrees that GFR is nice if the market will support it. The question is whether it is makes sense to require it when the developer doesn't think that there is sufficient demand.
  18. livincinco
    Usually I put a degree of research into my posts and get single sentence responses that don't display any thought. I decided to see how the other half lives yesterday.
  19. livincinco
    Guilty as charged! That's what I get for posting from my phone.
  20. livincinco
    I agree. This is a good thing from all angles. Let's just be realistic about what it is.
  21. livincinco
    Is this going to turn into another "nothing good ever gets built in Houston thread"? It is going to be complete garbage. It's a Hampton freaking Inn. I challenge anyone to find interesting architecture on a single Hampton Inn that has been built ground up anywhere in the world.
  22. livincinco
    It's a common misconception that the Heights refers to altitude. It actually refers to residents heightened sense of pretentiousness. It is also well known that all Walmarts exude an aura that extends at least six blocks from the actual location. That activated the "Heightened" pretense sense.
  23. livincinco
    I've never seen a Hyatt Place with ground floor retail. Not saying they don't exist, I'm just not aware of one. Didn't they just open one in downtown Austin as well?
  24. livincinco
    You're probably not going to get good architecture from a Hampton Inn, regardless of who builds it. Set your expectations low and hope to get pleasantly surprised. I've generally had good experiences at Hyatt Place locations. It's one of the best of the budget hotels. Homewood Suites is ok.
  25. livincinco
    By the way, belated congratulations to all for zooming past the 3000 post barrier on this thread with no signs of slowing down. I have a high degree of confidence that you will be able to exceed 5000 by the end of next week at the current pace.
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