79ta

now they're double dating.

7 hours ago, editor said:

When I reorganized some of the sections, State Politics inherited the restrictions of another section.  I've fixed it.  You should be able to post there now.

Thanks for looking at it, but I'm still locked out.

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First look: Designs for Oracle Corp.'s pedestrian bridge spanning Cumberland River

Oracle Corp. (NYSE: ORCL) is giving a glimpse of one prominent piece of its Nashville waterfront tech campus. Mayor John Cooper on Tuesday released a conceptual image of Oracle's proposed pedestrian bridge, which would span the Cumberland River and connect its 70-acre East Bank property with Germantown, immediately north of downtown. 

https://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/news/2023/06/20/oracle-pedestrian-bridge-rendering.html

@editor @Triton please see above

On 5/23/2023 at 8:20 PM, texan said:

DISCLAIMER: Not related to the W Hotel project (sorry, I know that's what y'all really want).

SB 1057- giving Houston a similar hotel occupancy tax system to Dallas and Fort Worth (who both receive a larger share of HOT than Houston) to allow for funding convention center and venue renovation, upgrades, and construction- has passed the Texas Legislature as of today. It has not yet been sent to Governor Abbott but I believe the necessary actions to get there are just formalities (assuming the small amendment on the Texas House floor to make the language slightly more ambiguous does not cause any issues with the Texas Senate).

https://capitol.texas.gov/BillLookup/History.aspx?LegSess=88R&Bill=SB1057

This passed and was sent to the Governor on May 29th. The bill is still sitting on his desk... and seemingly up in the air if it'll become law.

A Tribune article from yesterday -

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On Wednesday during a bill-signing ceremony at the Capitol, Abbott raised the possibility of vetoing a significant number of the hundreds of bills that he hasn’t yet signed. With lawmakers still deadlocked on property taxes, Abbott said he “can’t ensure that any bill that has not yet been signed is going to be signed.”

The governor has two more days to veto legislation before those bills from the regular session become law, with or without his signature....

In the last four days, the governor has axed four bills authored or sponsored by state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston, the Senate’s top expert on property taxes.

I think permissions may have been turned off? I'm not able to post there either...

edit: the Way Off Topic forum is open but the sub forums (local, state, national politics, and religion) appear locked.

This is an article about a Hines mass timber project but had this note. 

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Memorial City's 3.5 million square feet of office space across 11 buildings is 95 percent occupied, according to MetroNational. Its newest building at 9753 Katy Freeway, which is slated to open in October, is fully leased. New retail places are being developed at Memorial City Mall, which opened in 1966.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/bucees-founder-texas-a-m-hines-mass-timber-18152806.php

11 hours ago, Highrise Tower said:

 

These trees already look really lush and like they're providing shade. This is going to be a really nice campus once it fills out more. Really hope Houston lands those Federal dollars to compliment this project.

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Face to Face: The Ion's executive director has big plans for the new district

The Ion stands in Houston’s Midtown as a symbol of the future and a reference to the city’s past. The sleek building opened in 2021 after an expansive $100 million renovation to bring the 1939 Sears department store into this century.

The innovation hub plays host to several technology giants, such as Chevron, Microsoft and Transwestern, but the vision is to be more than the landlord of innovators. The Ion District will eventually stretch across the 16 acres controlled by Rice Management Co. to become a destination for entrepreneurs and collaborators to gather for work and play, with retail, restaurants and, potentially, multifamily living.

The building is already 86% leased, with the recent addition of 10 tenants including Rice University’s Office of Innovation. The opening of the highly anticipated Late August restaurant by "Top Chef" alumna chef Dawn Burrell is set for this June, which promises to draw even more attention and visitors to the Ion.

Executive Director Jan Odegard has been involved with the Ion since it opened its doors, first as senior director for industry and academic partnerships. Odegard spent more than 18 years at Rice University, with his last position as the executive director of Ken Kennedy Institute for Information Technology.

What is the thought process behind the Ion’s development and tenants?

When we started thinking about building our innovation hub, it was like, “Well, what is that and what ingredients does it need to have,” and it became very clear very quickly that you have to create a place where people want to be. It needs to be mixed-use because you need to have different stakeholders feel like this is a home for them. So, we have restaurants and food and beverages.

We have programs and open spaces with our partners and for our partners. We also needed to figure out flexible office access, so there’s a place for that, and we have coworking spaces in the building. And then we wanted to have corporations in the building that was part of that full value chain — for entrepreneurs with ideas that want to get into the tech ecosystem to collide with people that are looking for a talent pipeline and looking for new companies and startups.

We wanted to build the entire ecosystem and then repeat it across the district and actually add even more dimensionality to it so that it truly becomes a place where you want to never leave. You want to come here, be here, live here, work here, play here, so that’s an important part of what we do.

The initial build-up was done as a strategic investment by Rice’s endowment. Future ones will be done more as a joint venture with developers where we’re looking that they will invest in most of the vertical while we kind of do land leases and some ground plane activation

 

Why do you think multifamily living options need to be included in the Ion District?

I think this is what people are looking for. You’re looking for that place where your office is next door and you have access to things that you wouldn’t have access to otherwise. I think all of these spaces are amenities that actually create value even for residential spaces. If I think about myself, I want to live in a place where I have access to restaurants and people that are changing the world and whatnot, and I don’t want to get in my car. I’d rather leave my car in the garage. I may be biased because I’m European.

We’re already making significant investments. We’re continuing to make those investments in the city. We’re going to be announcing a couple of other things and strategic investments in that portfolio very soon. There’s more coming and we’re one year in with that report, we’ve just started year two deployment. So there’s a lot more to come there, but we are seeing that traction, we’re seeing the engagement.

1 hour ago, houstontexasjack said:

@ChannelTwoNews or @CREguy13 - would either of y’all be able to quote snippets from the article?  It’s paywalled.

Here are a couple of snippets that jumped out to me

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Exclusive: Engineering giant Fluor to leave Sugar Land office campus after nearly 40 years

Construction and engineering giant Fluor is moving its Houston-area hub to the Energy Corridor after almost 40 years in Sugar Land, the company said Wednesday.

Irving-based Fluor recently signed a 12-year lease for the entire 308,186-square-foot office building known as Three Eldridge at 737 Eldridge Parkway, according to landlord Plano-based real estate firm Granite Properties. The lease is the largest publicly known new office lease signed this year in the Houston area, according to Cushman and Wakefield, the real estate brokerage that represented Fluor in the transaction.

Fluor plans to move more than 1,300 employees to the 13-story building in summer 2024 from the firm’s campus at 1 Fluor Daniel Drive in Sugar Land, said Jennifer Kim, vice president and general manager of Fluor’s Houston office.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/fluor-energy-corridor-sugar-land-move-office-lease-18073782.php

So Fluor sold off their 50-acre property last year (that transaction was covered in this thread) and now they're leaving the SL campus for the Energy Corridor. Curious to see what's to come of these properties.

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2023/05/02/fort-worth-developer-plans-luxury-apartments-and-restaurant-building-on-oak-lawn-block/

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Fort Worth developer plans luxury apartments and restaurant building on Oak Lawn block

The site on Lemmon Avenue in Dallas was previously planned for H-E-B supermarket

Trademark Property Co. hopes to develop an apartment and retail project on a high-profile site near Lemmon and Oak Lawn avenues. The apartment and retail building on Lemmon Avenue is north of Oak Lawn Avenue. (Contributed / GFF) The project at 3900 Lemmon between Throckmorton and Reagan streets would fill a mostly vacant block that’s been owned since 2017 by San Antonio grocer HE-B. The property was previously considered to be a future store location for the popular supermarket chain

Instead, Trademark Property Co. wants to build a 415-unit luxury rental community on the block that will include a corner restaurant spot. The seven-story building, designed by Dallas architect GFF, will have underground parking.

 

On 9/15/2022 at 5:31 PM, J Money said:

75k square foot tenant… first guesses are a City Target or a Trader Joe’s? 

Good guess!

3 hours ago, monarch said:

^^^ what's with that strange "MF" moniker?  what does this mean?  everytime that i see it, i keep thinking about the BAD WORDS. what on earth?

magic fingers as @IntheKnowHouston pointed out makes sense. I was thinking it had to do with multi-family or...

Hopefully there's some bylaw stating neither Astros nor Texans shall be permitted to move from their current venue until their retractable roofs are fully utilized. It's sad how little they're open.

On the other hand, the Rockets looking ahead seems reasonable. They called The Summit home for 29 years and are now at 19 with the Toyota Center. If building a new stadium takes five to seven years then planning for the next arena should begin relatively soon?

21 hours ago, JClark54 said:

I doubt the railroads are worried about customer product stolen from trains. It appears they build in protections for these scenarios into contracts. 

I'd say you're right. Jesse, Walt, and Todd got away with hundreds of gallons of methylamine....

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/generation-park-mccord-houston-12-billion-17655009.php#photo-23276395

Not sure how much of the information is new but here are some of the key points:

• Generation Park lost out on a $550 million biomanufacturing plant

• San Jacinto College and the National Institute for Bioprocessing Research and Training are in late stage talks to create a new Biotechnology Training Center

• new high-tech distribution center planned by Ikea

• (posted above) 6-acre man-made lagoon with waves meant to mimic surfing, called HTX Surf

There's a good Q&A at the link too

rendering of a proposed life sciences building

the six-acre lagoon

Is this a half block or 3/4 block? Either is better than a parking lot.

4 hours ago, shasta said:

yes, what is he waiting on? I though the renderings for the "Astros Village" were going to be released at the start of the season.

Any updates?

From this Nov. 5, 2021 article - Astros owner Jim Crane said Friday that construction on a ballpark entertainment district surrounding Minute Maid Park is set to begin “probably within 12 months.”

Perhaps it's more likely they're waiting for progress on 59/69 construction?

It seems that Midway knows what they're doing given their projects at CityCentre and East River so I'm interested to see how this develops. It's a little more than 3 miles west of CC. So, is there enough demand to support more mixed-use high end retail and hotels this close to Memorial and CC?

Awesome pics @hindesky! Most of us are happy with anything that is posted on here.

5 hours ago, EllenOlenska said:

So, are we ready to discuss that the building actually kinda looks good. 

And how good it'll look when the 58 floor tower is next to it....

4 hours ago, hindesky said:

https://theallendevelopment.com

How does one get a 360° unobstructed view of downtown from a single fixed location?

9 hours ago, ChannelTwoNews said:

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2022/08/29/moody-rambin-town-centre-two.html

2nd office building near Town & Country Village finally coming soon. Should be complete by 2023.

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Houston-based Moody Rambin is set to break ground soon on a new 167,141-square-foot office building next to CityCentre and Town & Country Village on the west side of town. The eight-story Town Centre Two will be the latest addition to the company’s Town Centre development, the first phase of which broke ground in 2013. Moody Rambin expects Town Centre Two to be completed by the third quarter of 2023, the company said in a news release. The new building will be located at 730 Town & Country Blvd.

No render yet I guess. The only image is of Town Centre One.