samagon

I was going to say a similar thing. Driving does offer a certain joy. For me, it's clipping the apex on a road course, waiting as late as I dare to hit the brakes, and even trailing into the turn with a dab of brakes to help me rotate the car, and certainly the biggest challenge of linking corners together. I gain minimal pleasure through the day to day drive to and from work. Well, except for the rush of acceleration when getting on the freeway, or ignoring the yellow signs that tell me how fast I should go on a corner when I have a clear view of the whole corner to know it's safe and clear. I don't begrudge the person who thinks they need a lumbering SUV, or truck (even though it's funny to watch them try to fit in some parking places, or navigate some of the streets), cause their excuses are just as legitimate as mine are for not just owning an appliance.

interesting, so they're going to go put signs up for the weekend, then take them down again? who wants to bet they don't come back down

radical!

Agree 100%. I recall there was a project that was supposed to go up on gray near la branch (seems to have stalled, but I saw a backhoe in there the other day where it looked like they were updating the board on the northeast corner of the lot), they were going to put their workout facility and some other amenities on the ground floor so that they could easily swap these out with ground floor retail when the time was right. It's a good way to have the option later on. I think though, the question is still a good one, even if it's just two 3000sqft spaces facing the park, 6000sqft total, the equivalent of 4 or 5 apartments, would it break the model of this complex? I doubt it, but if they think it will break the model, then they won't even consider it.

Schlitterbahn style? (using water from the bayou, instead of a river obviously).

Their brunch crowd is huge, but as a recent example, I went to black fin this last Saturday night and there were more staff than patrons.

That particular line is indeed indefensible, and I'd agree it's indefensible because it is over the top talking point, which shouldn't have really been taken as more than a frustrated outburst. More worryingly, all of the less over the top accusations of the HAHC are indefensible as well. That's because what they are being accused of is what people were afraid they were going to do with the wording of the Ordinance, and it's all coming true.

Surprised there isn't a thread on this. I'm sure most of the East End Haifer's know about it, but they opened about a month ago and are at Telephone across from the fire station between Dumble and Lockwood. They've been slowly adding stock and they do tuneups and such as well. It's great timing cause I got a new frame that I'm adding components to at a rate of once a month, I can just walk there and grab what I want after a quick stop at Bohemio's for a coffee. Also, they do a slow ride on the first and third Wednesday that hit a couple of bars on the ~9 mile circuit, they leave at 6:30.

And Double Trouble. I'm no fan of going there at night, but for a quiet Sunday morning coffee and people watching, it's great. The dogs humping in the lower left corner really do add something special to the rendering.

everything in there does amazingly well, except for Farrago. Barcadia only advertised free games on Tuesday night. I went a few times. I never understood the layout of the place, and it was clear they weren't an 'arcade bar' but a bar with some really crappy arcade games. Their games on the patio were genius though. I think had they set up a tournament night (like Wednesday or some other dead night) on their street fighter game (winner gets a party with $100 gratis), or a 'beat this high score for beer' challenge, they'd have drawn more attention, and certainly gotten more people in there. That place was just managed fairly poorly. maybe he's holding out for the right fit? maybe he's asking for too high of rent? I mean, there's a 3000 sqft place on the corner of lamar and la branch with a lot of room for tables/chairs out front. that could be a prime location for a European style cafe, or a really huge coffee shop (that sells beer wine to pay for what would very likely be an outrageous rent). there's always a lot of foot traffic on that corner every weekend at all times of the day. if I were running a ~40 story luxury condo tower with a first floor retail, I'd treat the retail as a loss situation and amenity for the residents, I'd not look for a profit on the retail because with great retail I could charge more of the people living there, but I'd not just take some random chain fast food sandwich, or starbucks, I'd hold out to fill it with high quality. This is probably why I don't run a ~40 story luxury condo.

Too bad Dave Chappelle isn't still doing his show skits, this could be another installment of "when keeping it real goes wrong". According to google maps 1000ft from the edge of that block goes out to Dallas, Crawford, Prairie, and Travis. That's almost all of downtown.

is s3mh's wall of text revisionist history, or am I just mis-remembering? I am too lazy to go back through the thread, but I could have sworn that the people who were against this were not just wanting to keep it from passing, or removing their property from it, but that it was far too subjective, and the way that it could be adjusted at any time was far too over-reaching. Hell, I only have skin in the game because my property could very easily be added to a historic district by city council members. Specifically, section 33-221 I chose to buy the house I currently own specifically so I wouldn't have to bother with a restrictive covenant, and it stands to reason that along the same lines, I would never choose to live in a historic district, and as a matter of fact, all this ordinance does for me is entice me to tear my house down as soon as I can afford to build another house that has no defining historic merit at all so that I will be excluded when (not if) the city council shifts their gaze in my direction. Please don't get me wrong, I enjoy my house, I enjoy the historic nature of my house and I want to do what I (emphasis on I) can do to preserve it, but I like someone else looking over my shoulder telling me how to do it at their subjective whim so much less that I would be willing to take a wrecking ball to my house to avoid it.

In defense of that person, even though it is indefensible, I'm sure he would have found a way to try!

There is the Walmart that's supposed to be going in at Wayside. Granted all they've done so far is tear down the old buildings and it's been sitting there for months with no activity. I'm not a huge fan of grocery shopping at Walmart, but I'll give it the old college try. At the very least it will siphon some people away from the HEB at Gulfgate which might make it easier to shop there.

that's why I never go to the Dr. or get regular checkups. No Dr. visits means I have no pre-existing conditions

since we're playing sim city here, maybe they should at least do retail on the bottom floor facing the park? I could imagine a restaurant with a patio facing the park could do really good business.

lol, now there's an idea, get the greyhound terminal moved to the amtrak station. it's better for connections, and it's closer to the police station.

lol, you'd be very surprised! there's an impreza club for the wrx and sti, and we have a weekly happy hour (basically just sitting in a pub and drinking and talking about anything but our cars) that used to pack about 40 people, these days we get about 10. either way, thanks to the internet, there's clubs for virtually any car out there, if you have a 1983 Chevy Celebrity, there's an internet forum for you to talk about whatever chevy celebrity owners would talk about. in a tangent to the tangent, I'm very impressed that in 1976 (before the internet) that as many trans-ams were able to be assembled, I guess they used phones and newsletters via the regular mail? I can only imagine how difficult that was.

they could get a variance, I'm sure. I'm not certain what the minimum distance is, but I think it's walking distance, not direct (as the crow flies) distance.

as midtown continues to ascend there will be more and more pressure for greyhound to clean up the terminal. I don't see them going anywhere, virtually every big city has got a terminal in the core. it is better than it used to be, I mean, how long has it been since someone's been shot in the mc donalds across the street?

those pictures are awesome, I can only imagine that in 30 years someone will find a picture of my subaru among a group of 20-30 other subarus sitting in a parking lot in front of some random landmark that people are conversing! I only hope that our clothing isn't as garish.

so the parking garage is going to be built around the light rail? that will be interesting.

It's definitely faster. Thanks Editor for your efforts!

thanks for looking into it, it was convenient! I did also find that on the left, next the thread title, there's a dark dot when there's an unread post, if you click that, it takes you to the first unread post. So it's still there, just somewhere else.

IJ, you've got a very tough road to hoe. pertaining specifically to this park, it's going to be bum guarded very well. the overall perception of bums is at best that they are the same as those people who come knocking on your door trying to get you to read scripture, or join their church. a minor inconvenience that people sneer at. some would say it's more annoying, some would say less. I can choose not to answer my door when they knock, I can open the door and confront them (going by the theory that being of some faith they would generally choose to turn the other cheek than engage in a confrontation), on the street I can ignore them, but they can persist, I can also confront them, but who know how they would respond. That the best perception that they would be offered. typically though, people perceive them all to be thieves and drug addicts, and they'd just as quickly stab you as ask you for change. I'd say that it's probably somewhere in the middle. It's doubtful they'd randomly attack someone without being confronted, but if you think that they won't commit crimes of convenience, I think you're wrong. Park your car on a side street in midtown where there won't be much traffic, and make sure there's a loose rock sitting next to your car and just a single flashlight sitting in the center console where it can easily be seen. most times when you return to your car, the rock won't be sitting in a pool of broken glass, and the flashlight won't be missing, but it will happen, and I'd bet if you had a video feed, you'd see a homeless person walking away from your car with a new prize in hand. It doesn't help that a very good portion of the homeless are homeless because they have mental health issues and no one cares enough about them to take care of them correctly.