Parkside Residences: 43-Story Residential High-Rise At 808 Crawford St.

[Yoda]

12 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I think generally our downtown is better, their neighborhoods around downtown are better.

 

 

Yeah, I think Downtown Houston is more impressive. My apartment the last year I was in Dallas faced into Downtown and I had a great view of the skyline. The buildings that lit up, Bank of America Plaza and The Omni Hotel, were always fun to watch at night. I wish Houston had more impressive light up features Downtown. It's interesting to see that the more recent residential high rises in Midtown have light up features. Hope that's a trend that continues. Maybe Block 98 will have some subtle light up features.

[Luminare]

Do we know the general contractor for this one?

[Paco Jones]

2 hours ago, Luminare said:

Do we know the general contractor for this one?

It is Andres Construction.  @hindesky posted it a few replies up 

[hindesky]

Walker St was closed so they could bring in a crawler crane. It's going to drill the pilings. I asked a worker where the tower crane would be placed and he said in the middle of the project. He said it would be done this Monday and Tuesday but that seems unlikely since there is no rebar foundation for the crane yet.

[Highrise Tower]

 

[hindesky]

Ready to drill some pilings.

[Bassclef]

Cool

Edited August 22, 2020 by Bassclef

[hindesky]

The crane is a crawler drilling the deep piles, an assist crawler for moving equipment around and a pile driver.

[Highrise Tower]

 

[hindesky]

[Highrise Tower]

 

 

[hindesky]

[hindesky]

[Highrise Tower]

 

[Highrise Tower]

 

 

[hindesky]

[Highrise Tower]

 

[Nate99]

[ArtNsf]

It just fascinates me how a very tall 42 story building can exist on such a narrow footprint and remain stable.  I often wonder how deep down (hopefully into bedrock) they have to drill for the support structure to carry the weight and keep it from toppling over, and if they have to have a counter balance structure at the top to mitigate high winds and swaying ?  I know this is done in many places now, especially NYC where they just finished a 98 story tower on a similar footprint.  Incredible engineering and technology no doubt.

[tangledwoods]

So what your are looking at here are Auger Cast Piles.  In Houston these typically go deep (60 - 120+ feet deep) and rely largely on skin friction with the soil.  We do NOT "go to bedrock" in Houston, it is simply too far down to get to.

 

Fun fact: Many of the tall building foundations downtown are VERY shallow.  They use a mat slab which is anywhere between 8-15 feet thick across the entire footprint of the building. 

[Highrise Tower]

 

 

[mls1202]

That last photo of the drill made me think to ask the question--how deep is the bedrock layer here in the Houston area?  I know we have a lot of clay , but I imagine drilling into the bedrock to build your supports can't be that deep.  I have no doubt we have some first hand knowledge on this board.

[thatguysly]

46 minutes ago, mls1202 said:

That last photo of the drill made me think to ask the question--how deep is the bedrock layer here in the Houston area?  I know we have a lot of clay , but I imagine drilling into the bedrock to build your supports can't be that deep.  I have no doubt we have some first hand knowledge on this board.

 

Tangledwood has all your answers. See the last post on the previous page.

[Paco Jones]

4 hours ago, mls1202 said:

That last photo of the drill made me think to ask the question--how deep is the bedrock layer here in the Houston area?  I know we have a lot of clay , but I imagine drilling into the bedrock to build your supports can't be that deep.  I have no doubt we have some first hand knowledge on this board.

I don't know the answer to your question, but soil boring goes from 100' down to 150'.  Even at 150' there  is still just reddish-brown clay.  

 

This is from a geotechnical report that was done for a project inside the loop.

 

 

[Ross]

5 hours ago, mls1202 said:

That last photo of the drill made me think to ask the question--how deep is the bedrock layer here in the Houston area?  I know we have a lot of clay , but I imagine drilling into the bedrock to build your supports can't be that deep.  I have no doubt we have some first hand knowledge on this board.

Somewhere around 30,000 feet. There are sedimentary rocks at shallower depths, but no bedrock as is known in other parts of the country.

[Twinsanity02]

3 minutes ago, Paco Jones said:

I don't know the answer to your question, but soil boring goes from 100' down to 150'.  Even at 150' there  is still just reddish-brown clay.  

 

This is from a geotechnical report that was done for a project inside the loop.

 

 

Let me understand this. There are 33 ft of clay followed by 37 feet of sand? Which is then followed by 25 feet of clay, 25 feet of sand, and finally 30 feet of clay.

Amazing. Here in Houston I thought it was clay to the Earth's core.

[hindesky]

The tower crane's base is installed in what will be the sidewalk and a lane of traffic, so its temporary and will be removed. The tower crane operator says the rest of it will be erected next weekend. Sewer tie-in has steel plates covering the street.

 

 

[tangledwoods]

Quote

Let me understand this. There are 33 ft of clay followed by 37 feet of sand? Which is then followed by 25 feet of clay, 25 feet of sand, and finally 30 feet of clay.

Amazing. Here in Houston I thought it was clay to the Earth's core.

 

We have very naughty layers to our soil.  Clay is not great and sand is not great but neither are of any particular concern, you just design a foundation system that jives with that soil.  The problem we run into a lot is layering like Paco showed from his geotech.  We actually have a decent amount of "underground streams" or sandy layers which really screw with your foundations.  You either have to keep it high and tight (spread footings / mat foundation) OR you have to get past the sand into a bearing layer (drilled piers / ACP / etc).

 

TLDR: dirt aka "soil" is extremely complicated / important and also hella boring.  BUT it is a huge part of a project cost and the developer receives virtually no ROI to your foundation of choosing.  Which is why we spend a lot of time during design arguing about and pricing options for different foundation designs.

[ArtNsf]

On 9/25/2020 at 11:17 AM, tangledwoods said:

So what your are looking at here are Auger Cast Piles.  In Houston these typically go deep (60 - 120+ feet deep) and rely largely on skin friction with the soil.  We do NOT "go to bedrock" in Houston, it is simply too far down to get to.

 

Fun fact: Many of the tall building foundations downtown are VERY shallow.  They use a mat slab which is anywhere between 8-15 feet thick across the entire footprint of the building. 

 

Thank you tangledwoods very much for helping me to understand these factors about the foundations of tall structures in our own unique Houston coastal soil and ground structure !  I had also wondered all these years if we had any bedrock within striking range so to speak of the sand and gumbo clay of east and se Houston all the way to the coast.  It seems as though we do, but it's just too far down below the surface to be economically feasible to use it.

 

Which leads me to my next comment and curiosity (or my ongoing "someday dream") for downtown. And, that is the hope of another but much higher supertall tower like one approaching or exceeding 100 stories and how they would be able to support this super structure from below.  I do know that it's going to happen ONE DAY in the future and I also believe we Houstonians want something that is the tallest and most gorgeous supertall in the U.S. for our own Houston and Texas pride.  All which would be well worth the cost of building such an iconic building or buildings.  Now, if we could only find dedicated funding from both federal and local municipal funds to help out some awesome developer along with a very generous proud Houstonian philanthropist with plenty of financial resources to make it happen in our lifetimes.  Hmmm......  😀

Edited September 28, 2020 by ArtNsf

[H-Town Man]

35 minutes ago, tangledwoods said:

 

We have very naughty layers to our soil.  Clay is not great and sand is not great but neither are of any particular concern, you just design a foundation system that jives with that soil.  The problem we run into a lot is layering like Paco showed from his geotech.  We actually have a decent amount of "underground streams" or sandy layers which really screw with your foundations.  You either have to keep it high and tight (spread footings / mat foundation) OR you have to get past the sand into a bearing layer (drilled piers / ACP / etc).

 

TLDR: dirt aka "soil" is extremely complicated / important and also hella boring.  BUT it is a huge part of a project cost and the developer receives virtually no ROI to your foundation of choosing.  Which is why we spend a lot of time during design arguing about and pricing options for different foundation designs.

 

So how long can any of these buildings last if they're not on rock?