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infinite_jim

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Everything posted by infinite_jim

  1. infinite_jim
    That's new glass they're installing.
  2. infinite_jim
  3. infinite_jim
  4. infinite_jim
    Around the base Before
  5. infinite_jim
    The Nashville comparison is just too apples vs oranges; I thought you'd get to the point that they may have a dated building in 20 years but it will still be a unique, "run-of-the-mill" work of architecture (i.e. expensive engineering on an expensive piece of dirt). None of your examples were of an existing, modular design that was renovated to today's standards. The Dome is from 1965 and has a high-modern internationalist exterior if not an outright brutalist one these days. I live in building also built in 1965, spalling is a deadly serious remediation issue from a structural as well as liability point of view. Restorative concrete work is not cheap in any sense, especially if it's structural. This all before we even consider the varying costs of high performance coatings (interior as well) which you know means that the amount of surface amount to be covered is quite a vast number yielding either an inferior specification or a massive budgetary item. Just as building the Astrodome was a historic engineering feat, restoring it will be just as complicated a feat, but in that sense I hope I'm wrong too. I do hope we're getting the insanely good deal you say we're getting. Is this too good a deal to be true?
  6. infinite_jim
    The Nashville comparison is not worth getting into, but I trust you do a lot of conventions, but to me that's a really nice convention center in terms of design. It's obviously 3x the value and it looks like the land acquisition was pretty long process; together that puts it out of this half-pasteurized Dome proposal's league. Also this article says it's was $585 million and goes into some detail about it's unconventional take on the convention center job. For OKC I can't really talk about something that's not completed yet nor do we know the form/site/etc. The Raleigh convention center was new site acquistion as well and it's largest span is nothing like that of the Dome's existing, not to mention it's a your basic warehouse structurally so all the money went towards finishes. Nice exterior and street face, but nothing like Po Boyin' the Dome. The Dome proposal looks like a "just do what we need to do to get paid and eventually we'll get a CO." job job. This looks like a hot mess they're gonna buzz saw headfirst into at that cost estimate; it should be 3x as much and include people movers, exterior escalators, etc. Good luck but I sincerely hope no one gets hurt on this project but it looks dangerous and I really am on your side in that I care about what happens to the Dome but a Home Cheapo re-muddle is not something anyone had in mind. Are we looking at the same renderings? The demo of the exterior stair wells could very well in up in extensive repair work on the facade. In fact the whole facade exercise is the worst sort of gloss over the big interior issues. I just don't understand how it can only be $150 million when it looks like in order to do a good job it will go way over that amount. A new convention space can be developed on site at some future time and not be locked into designing around the Dome's master plan configuration.
  7. infinite_jim
    I'm sure they are hoping it will rain during/after the implosion.
  8. infinite_jim
    Is it necessary for you to demonstrate your impotence in convincing anyone on this matter and therefore must resort to accusations against my judgement? Not a good look and it creates more divisiveness against the issue you support (politics 101). This election is on 11/05/2013 and who votes in off year elections? Old people. Maybe former Judge Echols can actually rally the old-timers to vote for it but from everyone I know that lives out in the county, they are against it. In my experience it easier to convince old people to be against something than to be for something (just the times we live in). Rodeo people and Texans fans seem to against it from my informal polling. Who's for it? people who love architecture, people who don't see or don't mind the increase in property taxes, people who love the idea of Houston's modern past, young people (who notoriously don't show up to vote), etc. I'd optimistically guess the dome's odds of survival are roughly 1 in 10. Even if it does survive, this plan is pretty expensive for what we're getting, and very hard to determine whether it will be a success or just another example of a decades long pattern of local gov't boondoggles. Even people who love architecture on this very forum have gotten the "give-a-crap" beaten out of them over the last decade by the shifting quicksands that is our elected reps decision making process. It's too bad that even if the Dome gets demo'd the taxpayers still have to cover that cost and the bundled debt of the 1986 renovations. Personally, I'd prefer door number#3, do nothing and just maintain. It was obvious that with hostile existing tenants that no private redevelopment was going to occur. If we wait we can force them to renegotiate their contracts, perhaps even punitively against their former actions. The People would then have the opportunity to be able to force the Texans and the Rodeo to accommodate their desire towards redeveloping the dome through a private developer or if that fails then to hold an open and public international design competition with at least one year's time frame to hold the contest. The issue has always been about accountability and transparency in the process, which we do not have on a county level of governance here in Texas.
  9. infinite_jim
    Let's be honest with ourselves here.. The dome is getting demo'd. I used to care about what would happen to the Astrodome but over the course of the last decade I've just lost faith in the Harris County public at large as represented by our elected officials and it's handling since the Astros left. I think nothing more of the engineering feat of the Astrodome now as I would the high art-deco interior detailing of the Houston Club bldg or the (about to be former) street window casements of the old Foley's. The Astrodome reduced to a memory may be Houston's chance to reflect later on architecturally (like the downtown dome idea) as a much older city but for now let the nihilists have the day.
  10. infinite_jim
    You're correct. I'm not sure where I heard about the Rice endowment thing but it looks like Sears has owned it for many decades now according to HCAD.
  11. infinite_jim
    Rice University owns that land. I'm pretty sure they're waiting on the University Line before moving ahead. Nice to see these renderings after hearing about them forever from my barber.
  12. infinite_jim
    The main concern should be how he integrates the sculpture garden into the complex. Everything else will be tunnel connected.
  13. infinite_jim
    To take a look into what Gensler is trying to do with this existing plaza from across Capital St. The lobby executes a couple of public design initiatives, first by opening up the streetscape into the tunnel system and by using the sunken lobby to frame a view of the Miro sculpture. It reinforces the bldg line set by the Houston Club bldg which in turn helps frame out the void carved out by plaza. This is one of main reasons folks have to excited about this project going up, it's solid interstitial design that pays complement to some very monumental yet standoffish bldgs by being their pedestrian hub.
  14. infinite_jim
    The thing is though, it's not IN their neighborhood it's adjacent to their hood. What's funny about NIMBY's is they never talk about the air rights of the developer or what they would compensate for those air rights. If they did then they would have to acknowledge that they are attempting to get something for nothing. As they say in NYC, "not a good look."
  15. infinite_jim
    I heard last night that this site is cursed by Warren of "Warren's" fame. http://downtownhouston.org/news/article/back-future/
  16. infinite_jim
    As far as synth pop goes, I'm surprised nobobdy mentioned the album of the summer 2013
  17. infinite_jim
    Well it's to the north of Frank's/BigBad bldg so maybe it's part of this development. Like a faux bldg that's actually a utilites alleyway with a facade-fence.
  18. infinite_jim
    There was talk of them buying the old Days Inn for demo and then developing that site as a park.
  19. infinite_jim
    On the Travis St. elevation what's the little 3 storey bldg with balconies north of the bldg? Also looks like a complete structural redesign in that there's more and thinner columns compared to before.
  20. infinite_jim
    For me it's Toto's IV album.
  21. infinite_jim
    Demo of the exterior overhangs is in full swing now.
  22. infinite_jim
    Flakey Lato?
  23. infinite_jim
    That would be the rent floor for an efficiency at only the Houston House, average rent would be in the $2500-3500 range. I'm saying having the low end of the market ($1000-2000) will help churn young professionals through the nab and establish the idea of downtown as a neighborhood. If only older professionals can afford downtown then they will not flock when they can get more space at a discount nearby or will lease the apartments as second homes (i.e. not actually live there like half of One Park Place). edit: Downtown's new problem will be a limited amount of the type/designs of available space. Maybe the city will allow developers to build micro-apts in the 300-600 sq.ft. range..
  24. infinite_jim
    Will downtown still be cheap to live in, in 2017? That's the big question, b/c if only those who can afford $1,700/month rent can live there, then I think it's a bust. If more condo's enter the market, then all bets are off. Downtown is still as sleepy as when I moved here in 2010.
  25. infinite_jim
    It's all situational whether to construct a tunnel or skywalk for adjacent destinations. Each has advantages and disadvantages. The first era skyscrapers all had pedestrian street level access so tunneling made sense b/c the lobby was at zero grade (ex. Esperson bldgs) The second era skyscrapers mostly of international styled modernism typically had a elevated, plinth lobby from which skywalks were a logical choice (KBR complex, Allen Center complex). This era's skyscrapers seem to engage the street level in a somewhat precedent way and therefore it's probable that tunnels have grown more advantageous to potential bldg developments. IMO, these transportation amenities don't impede street life b/c the tunnels and skywalks will never directly get you from point A to point B in a straight line nor in happenstance tangent versus taking the sidewalks to get where you want to go. Plus the tunnel system is like walking around at the mall, you get stuck behind groups of people and the airspace smells like grease. On the sidewalk you have more space, fresher air, and the ability to go directly where you want to go.
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