The Woodlands 11-07

[Boris]

Market Street area:

[Issa]

[Boris]

Waterway Area:

[Issa]

Adios

..

[lockmat]

Those Brownstones, or whatever they're called, are just awesome.

[memebag]

So THAT'S where all the white folks went!

[dalparadise]

Funny, these look like just the type of pics occasionally posted on this forum that cause people from Houston, Dallas and Austin to start trash-talking about how the Houston area will never have / doesn't need / shouldn't try to build / cannot support / is jealous of / is too slow in building / is copying / is too individualistic to copy / isn't "urban" enough to understand / is too "urban" for / etc. this type of development.

[texas911]

I thought Disney wasn't coming to Houston?

[bachanon]

great pics boris. i think i saw you take the picture of the waterway square development poster. i was coming out of goose's acre just as some guy held his camera over the construction fence and snapped a shot. were you wearing a blue shirt ( i think)? it's funny, i started to walk up to the guy and ask if he was an architecture buff. could it have been you?

[Issa]

That was my goofy ass.

[Boris]

I mean it was me. I created Issa so I can post photos without having to wait for any responses. But, yeah it was me, you should have said hi, we could have had a drink.

Adios

[moni]

Anyway Boris, they are great pictures, thanks for posting.

[tomv]

Great pictures. Looks like a lot of fun up there in the Woodlands. Question: how is business in the mall? Why would you want to be cooped up inside there when you have an area like this to enjoy. I guess the weather has a lot to do with it.

[Boris]

Who knows about the mall, we didn't even consider going there. The market street area seems to be the happening place in the Woodlands.

What freaked me out is that those new "brownstones" start at $600 k. WTF?

[bachanon]

I mean it was me. I created Issa so I can post photos without having to wait for any responses. But, yeah it was me, you should have said hi, we could have had a drink.

Adios

small world. maybe next time. again, great pics. also, the outdoor extension of the mall is cool. what's nice about market street is that people go there just to hang out and visit, let the kids play. it's a relaxing atmosphere.

[SecondTour]

So THAT'S where all the white folks went!

My thoughts exactly. It's a sterile, white utopia.

No thanks, I'll stay in the real world.

[telwink]

Hey Boris, I just wanted to say, I really enjoy looking through these photo collections you do. Thanks for posting them!

[Captain Impossible]

So THAT'S where all the white folks went!

I know, right? Ugh. Mayonnaise sandwiches for everyone!

[Boris]

Thx Bengiann,

As for the white comments, I'm not white, but if I was, I would find those comments offensive.

In any case, there were Pakistanis, hispanics and African Americans there. I really don't understand the above comments.

Adios.

[memebag]

In any case, there were Pakistanis, hispanics and African Americans there. I really don't understand the above comments.

Explanation:

There are a lot of white people in those photos. Far more than I see in my neighborhood, or any other place I go in Houston. I was making a little joke about The Woodlands being the place they all went to.

[infinite_jim]

Looks nice, much like the Sugarland downtown. I guess I'll go window shopping up there sometime soon & bring a measuring tape with me, gotta appreciate those curb/setback proportions

Are the suburban teenagers ever a problem in terms of loitering or just plain being teenagers of lore? I would imagine that you would want some type of buffer between them, the younger children, and of course the adults are gonna avoid them.

[strickn]

Thx Bengiann,

As for the white comments, I'm not white, but if I was, I would find those comments offensive.

In any case, there were Pakistanis, hispanics and African Americans there. I really don't understand the above comments.

Adios.

Since, ideals of 'real' world notwithstanding, around 80% of America is white, it stands to reason that many annoying things will be associated primarily with white people; getting called on it as though it is particularly telling is simply the flip side of the "favor the underdog" coin -

same as it is not unheard of for someone to say "whites have no culture" as a consequence of 1. European ethnic groups having, after many generations, eventually set aside more of their distinctive differences in the course of assimilating to American life, comprising the bulk of the population - not yet a widespread option for those who were more distinctly marginalized or have arrived only very recently, 2. the African-American demographic being not far closer to their Ebo, Akan, etc. practices than whites to their deliberate heritages: but, being smaller, being more easily self-identified as unitary than if they were a large part of society, with the psychology attendant to that, and 3. a significant proportion of white ethnic groups socially being less typically effusive and charismatic than the more equatorial people groups -

while to point out the wild American profusion of German, Polish, Scottish, Icelandic, Iberian, Acadian, and related heritages of which bits and pieces have been passed down today, and to claim them as 'white' compared to "blacks' culture" would be taken as at worst a threatening hegemonic supremacist sentiment and at best an uncharitable, unacceptable case of "rubbing the underdog's nose in it."

These pictures do have the feel of a place in which every crease has been ironed for the most representative common denominator, and the real world that I wonder about is the one in which Texas has always been singularly, scruffily, marvelously unpresentable by comparison with the plusher states east or grandeur west. It has not always been but is now the case that urban Texas, and one accustomed to its focus-grouped environments like the Woodlands, is rapidly getting less and less in common with what the state itself is like, and less and less conversant in the concerns and the language of the Texans they would meet out there in Moulton, Comanche, Pampa, if they even had or took the time to go. The middle class is by definition mobile compared to the poor or the rich, who may respectively migrate with work opportunities or jet-set with business and pleasure but are each more rooted and less abstract in their social identity compared to their professional position than your average knowledge-economy worker is. It's a sizeable chunk of middle-class America that is living in a region of the country it does not have long roots laid in - who may identify more with Pittsburgh or Ohio or New England or the Carolinas or California and not even have much interest in seeking out what Texas has been like, surrendering their norms to it and embracing that. Local culture has less and less reinforcement in our day. I hate to see the built landscape driving home the unidentifiability. If you are reading this and agree with me, do you have any ideas as to what can counteract such a trend? While we can't go overboard on the philosophy of it, since nice things seem to be what people desire and most of the modern and historic rural things I love were built by people who would have had the Woodlands if they could;ve, must it yet be the case that the bulk of the population of "the real America" goes on and gets just as out of touch with Texas' non-urban counties as New York is clueless about flyover country?

Edited November 17, 2007 by strickn

[webdude]

Why is it when the place is really clean and orderly and pleasant, it would be consider not 'real world', Why do we lower our standards and consider a place 'real' only if there were some homeless hanging around, trash everywhere, broken sidewalks, overgrown grass, deteriorating conditions?

If anything, being walkable is an accomplishment itself, considering how unwalkable most of our other areas are.

Edited November 17, 2007 by webdude

[memebag]

Why is it when the place is really clean and orderly and pleasant, it would be consider not 'real world'...

Because dirt and chaos are big parts of the real world. It's only our abstractions and imitations of real things that are kept really clean and orderly. This isn't a real main street, it's an amusement park:

[SecondTour]

I hate to see the built landscape driving home the unidentifiability. If you are reading this and agree with me, do you have any ideas as to what can counteract such a trend?

Unfortunately, I don't. There's so much available (and cheap) land down here that building new seems easier than worrying about old. There's also a different mindset here about what is old. Look how many topics are on this board about tearing down old buildings built way back in the 50s. Part of that could be perception due to the age of the city itself. In a city as young as Houston, 50-year old buildings really do seem old and 100-year old buildings are nearly non-existant.

In answer to your query - I don't see the trend of cookie cutter designed\planned residential and retail areas slowing down any time soon. There's a huge percentage of the city's population that seems to have no interest in it's history.

...."the real America" goes on and gets just as out of touch with Texas' non-urban counties as New York is clueless about flyover country?

Strickn, not all New Yorkers (current or former) are as clueless about the fly-over states as you may think. In case you haven't noticed, I'm currently living in a fly-over state.

[SecondTour]

Why is it when the place is really clean and orderly and pleasant, it would be consider not 'real world'

Because dirt and chaos are big parts of the real world. It's only our abstractions and imitations of real things that are kept really clean and orderly.

Exactly. Look at the number of things in those pictures that are imitations and abstractions. Imitation trolley cars, brick streets (only where they give retail areas the look the design group originally planned), building facades made to look like 1920s construction, brownstones made to look like they were built separately, restaurants and fountains built with distressed bricks - to give it an old, worn, used feel. Even the people, mostly kids, with their distressed t-shirts and pre-tattered caps for that same used, old feel

[KatieDidIt]

I don't know why, but when we lived in TW, I avoided Market Street. I think maybe we went less than 8 times in 3 years. Maybe it was the new/fake feel, the number of cheesie furnishing stores, the lack of energy or the annoying parking situation....not to mention the stupid parking meters. In contrast, I am always at Town & Country. Its an open concept also, has some of the same stores (less cheesie furniture stores), but its not trying to be anything but a a clean, upscale, open concept with easy parking. Also, its packed all the time and makes you feel that you are "shoppin'." Market Street was a virtual ghost town on weekdays.

My biggest hope is that this new City Centre doesn't go for the fake hometown gimmick. ( I say fake becasue real homes towns just don't spring from the earth, fully landscaped, in under two years, play musak and don't allow teens to walk around alone. And due to the TW population, its not anyones hometown for more than 5 years) City Centre plans seem to display a walkable concept, but something much more slick and truely urban. I guess what product they put on the buildings will set the tone. And even if they try to hometown it, the location will keep it urban.

Edited November 17, 2007 by KatieDidIt

[Jax]

Artificial or not, it's nice to see people outside walking around.

Somebody once told me that these types of developments where you have to walk around outside between stores and restaurants will never exist in Texas because of the heat/humidity/mosquitos. If that is the case, then what are all these people doing outside?

[bachanon]

I don't know why, but when we lived in TW, I avoided Market Street. I think maybe we went less than 8 times in 3 years. Maybe it was the new/fake feel, the number of cheesie furnishing stores, the lack of energy or the annoying parking situation....not to mention the stupid parking meters. In contrast, I am always at Town & Country. Its an open concept also, has some of the same stores (less cheesie furniture stores), but its not trying to be anything but a a clean, upscale, open concept with easy parking. Also, its packed all the time and makes you feel that you are "shoppin'." Market Street was a virtual ghost town on weekdays.

My biggest hope is that this new City Centre doesn't go for the fake hometown gimmick. ( I say fake becasue real homes towns just don't spring from the earth, fully landscaped, in under two years, play musak and don't allow teens to walk around alone. And due to the TW population, its not anyones hometown for more than 5 years) City Centre plans seem to display a walkable concept, but something much more slick and truely urban. I guess what product they put on the buildings will set the tone. And even if they try to hometown it, the location will keep it urban.

uhhhh city centre is springing from the earth, fully landscaped, in under two years.

i know families that have been in the woodlands since its inception; started in a starter home, moved up as the family grew and sized down after the kids were gone and retired here. it may be true that there is a transient wealthy element here, but in grogan's mill, panther creek and cochran's crossing, many families have been here for more than twenty years.

Artificial or not, it's nice to see people outside walking around.

Somebody once told me that these types of developments where you have to walk around outside between stores and restaurants will never exist in Texas because of the heat/humidity/mosquitos. If that is the case, then what are all these people doing outside?

i remember the naysayers saying that very thing about market street. most of the market street stores are doing exceedingly well.

[KatieDidIt]

uhhhh city centre is springing from the earth, fully landscaped, in under two years.

Bach, City Centre isn't pluging itself as a Hometown/Downtown. The Woodlands decided it needed a Downtown after 30 years, so it created one. Houston already has a Downtown,Uptown,Midtown, Med Center, Rice Village etc. Yes, this project will spring to life, in a city full massive projects, in under two years with landscaping...but its merely a project, not a created city and its just a blip on the radar of Houston. Currently it seems not to be trying to present itself as anything but an urban lifestyle center within an urban area. But as implied above, I am cautious about the project, as ones in the burbs have that produced, trying to be Mayberry feeling to them. Hopefully, they got a good read on the area and surrounding neighborhoods and aren't going to go that wayof a 1950's town movie set. Time will tell.

BTW, it wasn't my intention to make my first post City Centre v. Market Street. They can't be compared anyway. One is a town area developed by one development company, the other just an urban project in a huge city. I was just merely stating that to me it doesn't matter what the place looks like, if it doesn't have a really good parking, good shops and a general energy to it during the day, I won't use it. Perfect or imperfect. And I have no clue how City Centre will flesh out.

Edited November 17, 2007 by KatieDidIt