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Houston CBD Poised For Building Boom


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Here's a new article in Texas Real Estate Online that talks about development in Houston DT:

http://www.texasrebusiness.com/articles/MAR07/feature3.html

This was written by a principal in the Houston office? What, had he been in Houston only a week when he wrote this? Some of the things mentioned are indicative of a person who doesn't know anything about Houston (e.g., people are living in the city again; yeah, about 2mm). Wow...

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Obviously this writer doesn't know that Uptown Houston has at least 5 highrise residential buildings on the drawing board, nor does the writer know that where Allen House stands will be an urban mixed-used development, nor does he know BLVD Place and yada yada .... does he even know anything about Galveston's highrises or the ones on Clear Lake or the Bay? Basically, he pays attention to downtown, but Houston is way to large to be focusing on one segment, clearly probably the most important (downtown), but perhaps dude needs to read HAIF more often. :blink:

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MexAmerMoose: good to hear from ya. You have been quiet for a bit, or I missed some of your cool posts. But this Houston CBD poised for building boom sounds nice ... doncha think HAIFers??? Yeah, real nice. B)

i've been busy building a gokart during spring break....most of the other college students went partying but i have no money for that :angry:

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Very interesting story in the Chronicle today. I knew about a couple of the buildings, but there are more. The downtown skyline will soon be changing. Hopefully they will design some interesting buildings.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4663689.html

Also check out this article from a week or so ago.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/busine...ff/4639327.html

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Yes but there is more than just the Discovery Tower. The article unveils plans for several others.

The other article I mentioned from March 18th talks about the trend that many Houston architecture firms are moving downtown over the last year. I know my firm did.

It's possible that these firms could simply be moving into these other projects that are mentioned in the Discovery Tower article, right?

Or do you think they'll do their own work?

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Discovery Green is probably going to have an advantage over quite a few of the other projects downtown.

While the rest of the projects are waiting for a major tenant to sign on, DG's speculative stance will likely fill spaces as it's being built for some of the smaller firms that are currently being squeezed into some of the other buildings around town.

perhaps DG won't have one MAJOR tenant, but it will be filled by quite a few smaller companies that need the space and are often neglected by the current crop of buildings that are out there.

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Well my firm designed our building downtown 20 years ago then moved in January 2006 after rennovating it. I think we may be one of the few though. Does anyone know? We have designed several other office building downtown as well.

Heritage Plaza? (1987) Only skyscraper I can think of built 20 years ago.

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I am hoping that this boom turns out to be real. I would honestly like to see a nice spire as a part of our skyline. Even if it isnt the tallest, it will still give downtown a more modern look. The new condo towers are great but for the most part, they are all the same color with the same design theme. I would like to see more creativity in the designs for these buildings so they compliment the CBD rather than merely add to it. Something like this will not only look good but will make a statement for Houston. As long as they don't build too many of them. After all, we are the Space City.

hotel-diagonal6.jpg

Barcelona_-_Agbar_Tower_-_night%20wikipedia%20small.jpg

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Yeah i know. The guy who designed it called it the "Penis" and seems to be obsessed with "devices" like these in his designs. I just brought it up because it is modern and gives the city a space age look.

Where is that? And no thanks, I don't want a "massage appliance" in our skyline. Although, it is cool lookin.

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Where is that? And no thanks, I don't want a "massage appliance" in our skyline. Although, it is cool lookin.
It's the Swiss Re headquarters in London ( 30 St Mary Axe) aka "The Gherkin".

"The building also won the 2003 Emporis Skyscraper Award for the best skyscraper in the world completed that year."

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It's the Swiss Re headquarters in London ( 30 St Mary Axe) aka "The Gherkin".

"The building also won the 2003 Emporis Skyscraper Award for the best skyscraper in the world completed that year."

Actually, I believe the original pic is of a scraper in Barcelona. And, yes, I'm sure we're going to get something near Dicovery Green with much less emotive impact than the building exhibited if and when a new scraper is built in DT Houston. I'm sure we'll continue to play it safe for the all mighty profit motive while other cities encourage profitable development that strives for architectural significance... Don't 'cha just love the Houston development community? They couldn't design their way out of a box. Actually, I take that back. We have a city of boxes... Simply stunning 90 degree angles...

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