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Angostura

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Everything posted by Angostura

  1. Angostura
    According to this article from a few months ago, Phase 2 is 41-story residential, with the retail coming in Phase 3. I think the 41-story tower is slated to go immediately south of the Sovereign, but I'm not positive.
  2. Angostura
    Not sure why they'd need (another) one. It's already platted as continuous reserves.
  3. Angostura
    In another thread the complaint was that it's too big. Now it doesn't take up enough of the lot. FWIW, while they have some glass and steel on the façade, the Tanglewood and Montrose stores are both suburban AF in terms of site layout: store on one side of the lot, taking up about 1/4 of the area, surface parking covering the rest. Montrose gets some kudos for saving some trees and putting the back of the store against the street, but it's still a suburban store layout. Their only Houston-area stores to depart from that formula are this one, Bellaire and Waugh & Washington. Heights and Bellaire are largely similar in layout (ground floor parking, 2nd floor store occupying about 1/2 the site), whereas Waugh will sit under 6 floors of parking and apartments. Granted the Waugh store will be a lot denser than Shepherd, but building a ton of apartments is not a great way to ingratiate yourself to folks in the Heights. Waugh is also part of a larger development, headed by Midway. There's no third-party developer for the Heights or Bellaire stores. W/r/t to other chains, unless you count Phoenician, the only ones that come to mind with some kind of structured parking are midtown Randall's, Post Oak WF, and the upcoming midtown WF
  4. Angostura
    You must have been at a different meeting than the one I was at. A question was asked about putting something other than the parking structure at the corner of 23rd and Shepherd and the response was that they thought it would be under-utilized if it were placed there rather than closer to or inside the store. Nobody used the WF parklet because they would have to cross an entire parking lot to get to it. Same with whatever HEB could place on this corner. Show me on the doll where the bad grocery store developer touched you. The "giant store on Waugh" is slated to be all of 5% bigger than this one (91k s.f. vs 87k); smaller than San Felipe (99k) and way smaller than Bunker Hill (127k). McClelland didn't go into specifics (nobody asked about a cafe), but did say that they'd be throwing everything in their arsenal into this store in order to draw customers away from an established competitor down the street and to attract customers into a store that's not quite as convenient to access (due to the multi-story layout). Whether that includes something like the Table 57 concept at San Felipe & Fountainview probably depends on how successful that concept turns out to be in its pilot location.
  5. Angostura
    ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Apparently there have been incidents.
  6. Angostura
    Scott McClelland presented slightly updated versions of the renderings in the original variance request and explained their reasoning for wanting the 10-ft setback rather than the 25-ft setback required in Ch 42. Basically it provides a more "urban-feeling" streetscape while allowing them a few more parking spaces on the upper deck. HEB Sr Due Diligence Manager John Rose also fielded a number of questions, and a handful of other HEB folks were present. Some other issues that came up: HEB will submit plans by 19Dec, for consideration at the 5Jan meeting of the planning commission. Tentative opening date is March, 2018 Construction costs will be ~$35M Traffic Impact Analysis is already underway. John Rose went into some detail about how they do these studies, including studying circulation inside the parking lot. Store will be 87,000 s.f., falling somewhere in between Montrose (80k) and San Felipe @ Fountainview (99k). Scott seemed acutely aware of his competition 11 blocks down the street, especially w/r/t getting in and out of the store Texas has outlawed "travelators", so these are no longer part of the design. There will be a normal "up" escalator from the ground floor parking to the store, and tandem "down" escalators (one for people, one for carts), as well as 3 hospital-sized elevators. The parking lot will use full cut-off lighting, deployed at modest height (12-14 feet) to limit light pollution. There will be lighting on the underside of the street-facing awnings to provide illumination for pedestrians. The ground floor parking spaces will have red/green over-space lights to indicate available spaces Large delivery trucks will back up a ramp to a loading dock on the Lawrence-St side of the property. There will be a decorative wall obscuring the loading docks and for noise abatement. Pharmacy will be on the ground floor (potentially with drive-thru), everything else will be on the second floor. HEB looked at placing retail or a coffee shop at street facing location, but given how their customers tend to interact with their stores, concluded it wasn't feasible. (WF on Waugh apparently came to a similar conclusion when they removed the picnic space in the far corner of the parking lot). In addition to bike racks on the sidewalk, there will be a large bike rack on the ground floor near the elevators/escalators (looked like 30+ spaces) There will be a competition for an art piece/sculpture at the corner of Shepherd and 23rd. HEB will select a handful of finalists and nearby residents will vote on the winner.
  7. Angostura
    This is oddly similar to this recently announced development across Hempstead Rd. Both have breweries and a food hall. One has a hotel, the other has office space.
  8. Angostura
    That angle in the upper corner perfectly matches the one on the NW corner of this spot at 11th & Seamist where the rail right-of-way cuts across.
  9. Angostura
    I'm gonna guess 11th at Seamist, for no other reason than there being a roughly 8-acre piece of empty land there that can be accurately described as "just south of the Timbergrove/Lazybrook neighborhoods".
  10. Angostura
    Fair enough. Eventually the big warehouse immediately east of this site will be something else. But there's 600 ft of West Loop right-of-way on the other side, and no real street grid in the wedge between OKR and Hempstead.
  11. Angostura
    Admirably ambitious, but I don't know where those people are walking to. There's nothing else anywhere near this place.
  12. Angostura
    Anybody attend this meeting?
  13. Angostura
    HEB will host a public meeting to give an update on this store at the Heights Fire Station (12th & Yale) on Wed, 14 Dec, at 6:30.
  14. Angostura
    What I mean is, it looks like all that's left to do is the actual road surface and the railings, which should just be a couple days work. All the structural work appears to be done.
  15. Angostura
    Any reason this shouldn't be finished by the end of the year?
  16. Angostura
    Their soon-to-be abandoned campus is right next to Shell's already-abandoned campus. Contiguous plots of land that large (maybe ~80 acres?) in such a heavily-trafficked area are not all that common.
  17. Angostura
    There was a fair amount of hand-wringing and pearl-clutching at the meeting, as one might imagine. Concerns expressed included: "How will this affect children coming to and going from Helms ES?" (across 21st from the 275-unit building) "It's already hard enough to cross 20th at the bike trail, now it will be impossible" "Where will all the poop go?" "That sure seems like a lot of apartments. Couldn't you build fewer?" "If people park on Nicholson (like they do around the apartments on 23rd & Nicholson) it will be impassible." The irony of wanting ever more walkability but opposing every apartment development is apparently lost on the Heights. Also, the renderings kind of make these building stick out, but they're adjacent to a hospital and across from a medical building of similar height. The value of Alliance's bid won't become public until city council votes to approve the sale, but I'm guessing it's in the low 8-figures. I wonder what will happen when Chase realizes that their drive-thru lanes are sitting on $5M worth of dirt?
  18. Angostura
    Public meeting on the development tonight. Some very quick details: Tract 2 (NW corner of Nicholson & 20th) will be an 8-story, 275-unit apartment building (80% 1BR, rest 2BR) East half of Tract 1 (SE corner of Nicholson & 20th) will be a 63-unit "boutique" apartment bldg (90% 2BR, rest 3BR) Harres Exezidis (Cottonwood, Lagrange, Liberty Station) is a partner in the development for the restaurant spaces Each of the existing buildings (4000 sf reservoir, 1700 sf and 4000 sf pumping buidlings) will be restaurant spaces, with additional patio space, as well as space for food trucks. Up to 5000 s.f. will be community garden. They want to commission a sculpture made from the salvaged, excavated pipework. Planned construction start, late summer 2017, for 2019 completion. (Harres expressed a hope that the restaurant spaces would open earlier than that.) All of this is preliminary, of course. Deal is not closed, and permits have not been issued. Some photos of the posters at the event are below.
  19. Angostura
    The website is incorrect. Well, partially correct. It has both Landmark and Protected Landmark status. HAHC Report: https://www.houstontx.gov/planning/HistoricPres/landmarks/15PL123_Heights_Water_Works.pdf City Council Minutes: http://houston.novusagenda.com/agendapublic/DisplayAgendaPDF.ashx?MinutesMeetingID=176
  20. Angostura
    The wording in the article is confusing. They're contrasting Protected Landmark status with just Landmark status. Landmarks may be altered or demoed after a 90-day waiting period; Protected Landmarks may not. The Alabama Theater (mentioned in the article) only had Landmark status. The water works has Protected Landmark status. Anyone can apply for a building to be designated a Landmark, but only the property owner can apply for Protected Landmark status, which CoH did as then-owner of the water works site.
  21. Angostura
    The water works is a protected landmark, which means they can't be demolished without a Certificate of Appropriateness from the HAHC, which is unlikely to be forthcoming. Anything Alliance plans for that site will have to either incorporate or build around the three existing buildings. AFAIK, this only applies to the exterior of the buildings. Alliance can pretty much do what they want with the interiors without needing a CoA.
  22. Angostura
    AFAIK, City Council will have to approve the sale, at which point the amount will be public, if it's not already. Apparently there were 19 bidders and Alliance submitted the highest bid.
  23. Angostura
    In a lot of houses, the only access to the alley is via the overhead garage door (i.e. no gate in the back fence). This can lead people (my wife, for one) to be undisciplined about locking the door between the garage and the back yard, in which case it's not uncommon for things to go missing from the garage. If you keep that door locked, and avoid keeping anything of real value in the garage, you should be fine.
  24. Angostura
    Don't think they have a choice.
  25. Angostura
    Better than Moist.
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