ADCS

Would someone please explain to me what will this do to the plans for the TMC research center with UT opting to build

their own center. Lets just leave the local schools out of this for a minute. Will this cause TMC to not go forward

without UT's cooperation and money?

I honestly think this will enhance whatever's going on at TMC. The two sites are separated by 3 miles as the crow flies, and already have light rail-ready infrastructure between them.

I will make it very  simple to understand.........would Texas A&M be OK with UT building a UT-College Station Campus miles from Texas A&M?

 

The reasons they would NOT be OK with it are the exact same reasons why UH would not be OK with it. They are both LARGE State schools paid for by the tax payers of the state of Texas.

 

UT can build a campus in any city in TEXAS except for:

 

Houston (University of Houston)

Lubbock (Texas Tech)

College Station (Texas A&M)

San Marcos (Texas State)

 

BECAUSE the state of Texas already has millions (if not billions) of tax payers money invested in public schools in those markets. Make those schools BETTER...don't dilute the product by making them worse with more state school competition.

Says who?

Each one of those schools are serving a certain niche. A&M wouldn't like that campus because both schools are serving similar niches - drawing from a large population base to drive high levels of research, and serving high-caliber students who for whatever reason weren't able to make it into an elite private university.

UH doesn't serve that market, especially since Rice is next door - it's geared toward educating professionals who intend on staying in the Houston area. There's nothing wrong with this mission, as it allows for flexibility and innovation that wouldn't be available at the larger universities.

I think we just have a tendency to act strangely when we think others are looking down on us.

It's all a power play to either get PUF access or Big 12 membership. Think the local leadership is shooting themselves in the foot here.

Pardon if this has been addressed here but what about the idea  of having an Uptown station and a Downtown station (barring cost factor), where the rail is submerged into a tunnel to downtown near the Uptown station. Passengers have a choice of either destinations, Downtown Houston to/from Dallas and Uptown Houston to/from Dallas.

Tunnel would probably cost ~$3 billion itself. Not likely to happen up front when you're being funded through private investment.

At tonight's public meeting I spoke with a team member who was very knowledgeable on the project. He appeared to be the lead consultant for the alignment.

 

For the alignment along Hempstead, they are still working toward a fully elevated structure along Hempstead road, generally on the south side of the road and on the north side of the existing freight railroad. This type of design is depicted in one or more of the documents on the Texas Central web site. The alignment would dip to ground level only at Beltway 8 to go underneath the highway lanes.

 

In general, Texas Central wants the HSR project to be independent of TxDOT plans and anything the Gulf Coast Rail District may plan for the future. The independence will reduce or eliminate the risk of bureaucratic delays or snafus. So this rules out any cooperation with TxDOT to design the facility to be friendly to TxDOT's plans for the Hempstead toll road. The GCRD appeared to have some concerns about leaving enough space for future commuter rail, but I did not get the details of specific issues of concern.

 

It seems to me that the positioning of the elevated structure between the railroad and Hempstead Road may not be consistent with the Hempstead Toll Road plan. I'm thinking it would push the toll road corridor further north, requiring more right-of-way acquisition and possibly making it infeasible. As a practical matter, it could potentially preclude the Hempstead Toll Road from being built, although it is difficult to speculate without knowing exactly where the columns for the rail structure will be placed.

So, sounds like they're going to leverage that to try and get some cash out of HCTRA/TxDOT for the corridor, to make sure that there is space for the Hempstead TR. I'd guess that it would go to drainage improvements in the area, to keep things quiet.

Smart if that's the case.

This isn't like United vs. Southwest. This would be like GE creating 2 subsidiaries that operate in the exact same industry and then locating both subsidiaries' headquarters in the same city. And then giving one subsidiary a 5 times larger budget.

 

UH and UT are essentially owned by the same parent company, i.e., the state. And both institutions' funding comes from the same pie.

 

Instead of "wanting to get UT even more" because they have better funding, the solution is much more simple, just have the state give UH better funding.

Perhaps it's more like GM's brand differentiation, where one is clearly supposed to be a prestige brand that appeals to higher-end customers, while the other is a more mid-market brand serving a wider audience at lower operating costs.

There are too many damn "powers that be" in Houston.

It's getting old.

Eh, there are really only four - land developers, auto dealers, engineering departments and wealthy middle age to elderly residents with strong opinions and without jobs 

I think I figured out why it doesn't go downtown. If we assume urban areas are more expensive to go through (more sound walls, more crossings, etc.) it mostly has to do with sprawl and where the rail is coming in.

The "urbanized" area from Dallas downtown area to less developed areas (around the I-20 border) is about 9 miles. From the first "urbanized" area (development on both sides of the track), for Houston, that's Barker-Cypress Road. Onto Northwest Mall is 23 miles, then add on another six if you wanted to take it downtown. Houston's not the only one with sprawl, if Houston was north of Dallas, then there would be 30 miles of sprawl from downtown to McKinney (as the crow flies), then it would be less than 19 miles from Highway 6 (near Alvin) to downtown (following the tracks), or if the tracks came in from the northeast, about 9 miles out of downtown before hitting "the city".

Also, the folks in south and east Dallas aren't rich white folks with political connections and the means to litigate.

I really doubt that TCR is going to build some crown jewel station at NW Mall anyway.  If it is a success, then maybe they will extend the line downtown anyway at some point.  I suspect though that NW Mall will actually be viewed as being a pretty good location in the long run.

It will likely be nicer than you think. The model is for most of the money to be made off of retail to begin with. It wouldn't surprise me to see something like a CityCentre be developed beside the train station.

How would it be a massive disaster?  Are Hobby and IAH massive disasters?  Neither one has light rail service.

 

Not only that, but it's as if taxis/towncars/Uber don't exist.

As much as I'd like some sort of rail out that way, it's likely that the target consumer for TCR would prefer taxis or rideshares over public transportation, anyway.

Karbach brewery is going to be within walking distance.

Now there's an idea... why not set up a TIRZ for the transformation of that area into the Brewery District or something like that (maybe the Texas Central District if they agree to an increased tax share)? Might also incentivize some of those industrial businesses to start moving outward on 290.

I personally have always presented myself as a NIMBY.  To that end I would dispute your reference to territorialism; generally when people make a purchase of a home, it is not unilateraly for the x,000SF parcel but for the community and the immediate surrounding area.  So it would stand to reason that projects, regardless of what they are, that impact the community would have relevance to a resident.

 

I get that NIMBY'ism has probably prevented good projects from ever happening, and this might be one of them.  But to discount what a person should and shouldn't care about, b/c they do not "own" the land in question, is an overreaction IMO.

 

We can agree to disagree, in the long run neither of us really have impact on the decisions made.

I would like to present a challenge - would you please lay out the disadvantages to routing the HSR through that corridor that do not have to do with the following:

1. Property values

2. Perceived neighborhood character

3. Noise and visual blight

4. Traffic disruption

Relative to the HSR? Absolutely.

But there is a general perception that the NIMBY mentality is directed at all things related to rail when its not the case.

I dont oppose HSR overall, though I don't believe it will successful as an alternative travel mode.

See, this is the sort of circular reasoning that NIMBYs use to justify what is primarily an irrational emotional response. Yes, it's agreed that the project is needed, but not anywhere near me - that's not a logical argument, that's emotional territoriality. It's based on an unjustified belief in the ownership of one's proximity, as opposed to the plat of land that one has title to.

You see this all the time in infrastructure projects - usually landowners do not mind giving up rights of way or easements - that's either a lucrative one-time transaction, or a steady source of income over the years. Their neighbors, on the other hand, are usually the biggest opponents, and the opposition is couched in terms of territoriality.

If there's a perception that the NIMBY mentality is directed at all things rail, that's probably because they're usually more successful there. There are too many strong countervailing interests in Houston to block a major road project (for example, the Grand Parkway F-2).

Before all of the NIMBY comments come rolling in, the Houston HSR Watch is supportive of improved connectivity for Houston which includes light and commuter rail.  They are not against HSR, save for the infrastructure and disruption that would have been necessary to bring it downtown.  

That's the very definition of "not in my backyard".

I wish NIMBYs were more self-aware.

Really snarky write-up by the Houston Press. I'm curious why this is their stance on HSR; mysterious land-owning benefactor, or something else?

Probably lives or has friends in the Rice Military/Wash Ave corridor. Those folks really don't like the idea, and rationality has not a whole lot to do with it.

I hate the idea of "let the incoming students decide the mascot!"

I got to vote for Cy Ranch's colors and mascot which ended up being The Mustangs, when the losing option of "Wolverines" sounded so much more bada$$

Do you think the administrators actually pay any attention to what's in the ballot box?

Not a fan. Why not honor the history of the area and call it "Klein Kohrville" or "Klein Louetta"?

Any thread not posted in the trains sub forum will inevitably get off track

Amazing how rail always seems to derail these threads.

Anticipating this to be a very nasty zoning fight. Some neighborhoods that have been in the KHS zone for a while will need to be moved out, and with the KHS rebuild, they'll have no desire to do so.

It was incredibly shortsighted to put HS #5 on the backburner simply because of KHS's political pull.

I get the point of freeways, I really do. I just don't understand the pride one gets from seeing a highway cut across an untouched landscape that will soon fill up with the same boring, cookie-cutter, suburban hellacape that it will inevitably become. The fact that our flat city only exacerbates this issue makes me more frustrated.

I don't want to speak for him, but having read his previous thoughts on the subject, he does make a fairly compelling argument about this - the suburban hellscape, while awful and alienating for many, represents comfort and opportunity on several orders of magnitude greater than where many, if not most, of the newcomers to Houston come from.

If you're privileged to come from a relatively stable society, where your environment is generally trustworthy, and you can count on greater complexity leading to greater opportunities for personal development, then yes, suburbia is oppressively banal. If, on the other hand, your previous life experiences are of a relatively chaotic environment, where institutions cannot be trusted and you're stuck in a small, cramped, dangerous living environment, those suburbs represent space, safety, stability and the opportunity to realize dreams that were impossible where you grew up.

There's something to be said for that point.

Rail?! Rail in general tends to be a bad cost-benefit proposition, but why would you ever consider building one when one *already exists* a mile to the west perfectly connecting the Med Center and Downtown?  There *might* be a good argument for extending the existing line south (although I doubt it), but there's no universe where it makes sense to build a parallel line!

While I tend to disagree with Mr. Gattis over the desirability of rail in general, I've got to agree here. The only thing advantageous about this corridor as far as rail goes is the relative ease of construction. The location poses significant barriers to pedestrian traffic, and exists on the periphery of Pearland's development, limiting its usefulness as a commuter route. After all, if you're already driving to 288 to get on the train, and the express lanes are a similar price, why wouldn't you do the familiar thing and just take the express lanes?

Any sort of heavy rail in Houston would do best by serving dense, central corridors that are already relatively underserved by the freeway system.

It's been a gradual thing, but on WN it seems like the equipment went to consistently full regardless of the destination or time of day about 5 or so years ago.

Guessing that the addition of post-9/11 security, as you mentioned, made the benefit of 30 or 15 minute headways much less apparent. What's the point when you're necessarily going to spend 45-90 minutes at the airport before your flight, anyway?

My father says that when they proposed an HSR in the early 1990s, they determined to be profitable they would have to get everyone off of I-45 from Houston or Dallas (all of them would have to be riding the train), and is convinced that the whole thing is a lot of noise about nothing. Now, there's more population in Texas now, but also ROW is more expensive overall. Remind me again, who's proposing the railroad again?

IT, there's been a lot that has changed since 1990. For example, let's take the population changes since then:

DFW MSA (1990):         3,989,294

Houston MSA (1990):    3,321,926

Total (1990):                  7,311,220

DFW MSA (2015):         6,954,330

Houston MSA (2015):    6,490,180

Total (2015):                 13,444,510 (83.9% increase)

It's not implausible at all to think that today, you'd be able to find the equivalent ridership of a significant percentage of the 1990 I-45 traffic. The population growth alone since that time would allow for this. Likewise, it's primarily regional air traffic that would switch to this mode of transportation.

There's no reason to be scared of a bridge based by age alone. An old, but well-maintained bridge is safer than a new but shoddily built bridge

Looking at it a little more closely, it's more of a capacity issue than anything. The current bridge is 48 feet wide, which means you'd only be able to fit in three 12 foot lanes with six foot shoulders for one-way traffic. The new bridges will be 70 feet wide, meeting interstate standards with 12 foot travel lanes and 10 foot shoulders.

Not a great example, but the main idea I was thinking was "unpretentious".

However, the use of rhetoric like "car-centric" says all I need to know about where you stand on issues like this.

Are you saying that Houston's development scheme since World War II has not been primarily oriented toward automobile access?