Trebly Park At 1515 Fannin St.

[cspwal]

Goodyear seems unaware that they're going to become a park, or misheard - they just resealed the parking lot.

 

 

[bobruss]

Pave paradise, and put up a parking lot !

don't it always seem to go.

[mollusk]

Once there were parking lots, now it's a peaceful oasis.  I can't get used to this lifestyle.

[mkultra25]

15 hours ago, bobruss said:

Pave paradise, and put up a parking lot !

don't it always seem to go.

 

The Houston-specific version is "they unpaved paradise, and took away my parking lot". 

 

It's funny to see Joni's timeless "Big Yellow Taxi" lyric popping up here, as that song has been an earworm for me all week long. I thought I knew all of the best "mondegreens" (aka "misheard lyrics"), until a few days ago I ran across someone who swore they had always heard it as "a gay pair of guys put up a parking lot".

 

I am now unable to get the butchered lyric out of my head, and many questions have arisen, such as "why a parking lot? Shouldn't they be restoring a neglected Craftsman bungalow or mid-century mod and canvassing estate sales to outfit each room with the perfect mix of vintage furniture instead?" 

[bobruss]

We covered several Joni Mitchell songs including Paradise. One of my favorites was She Comes For Conversation, which we played on Austin City Limits the first year it was on in 1975.

I purposefully put the lyrics backwards because your right it is backwards.

[UtterlyUrban]

3 hours ago, mkultra25 said:

 

. I thought I knew all of the best "mondegreens" (aka "misheard lyrics"), until a few days ago I ran across someone who swore they had always heard it as "a gay pair of guys put up a parking lot".

 

 

“A Gay Pair of guys
put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot”

 

I mean, who else, in the box of stereotypes that was 1970, would build this?

 

 

[samagon]

On 3/21/2018 at 7:17 PM, bobruss said:

We covered several Joni Mitchell songs including Paradise. One of my favorites was She Comes For Conversation, which we played on Austin City Limits the first year it was on in 1975.

I purposefully put the lyrics backwards because your right it is backwards.

I do the same thing to Guns and Roses, Paradise City.

 

Take me down to the paradise city, where the girls are green and the grass is pretty.

 

it works much better than the other way around.

[Nate99]

That Goodyear was a handy place to have downtown when you had a screw in your tire and you are down to 12 psi before the slog back home.  

 

With respect to Ms. Mitchell's lamentations, in a city where folks are putting up a swimming pool/night (day?) club next to a cement plant,  I think we have proven that paradise and pavement can coexist. 

 

 

[cspwal]

So they had the planning meetings this Thursday and Saturday, and I went to both.  It is very much still in the planning stages; the Saturday session was a full on brainstorming session with the 21 people who showed up.

 

A few details that I learned:

• They were only able to acquire a 30 year lease on the good year property and the parking lot at the corner of Leeland and San Jacinto.  The land is owned by a trust that won't let them sell it but they can do a lease.
• The Southern Texas College of Law didn't want to give up their parking lot to let this be a full block park - the current plan is a fence between it and the park.
• The project is already fully funded by the Downtown Redevelopment Authority
• Goodyear's lease is up in March, and they expect construction on the park to start in April.
• They're targeting a Summer 2020 opening date.

Here are the boards from the happy hour with the categories they're looking at.  I couldn't figure out how this broken forum software could let me embed the photos.

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/928/29833049758_609bf90afd_k.jpg 

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/934/29833051638_dd53b58186_k.jpg 

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/857/43656374522_78fddc6f41_k.jpg 

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/859/29833051348_756790e647_k.jpg 

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/862/43656371632_d549f53e73_k.jpg 

 

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/860/29833050268_82c6d5236d_k.jpg 

[Avossos]

Don’t bother putting a Park here when in 30 years it will be demolished..

[Houston19514]

10 hours ago, cspwal said:

So they had the planning meetings this Thursday and Saturday, and I went to both.  It is very much still in the planning stages; the Saturday session was a full on brainstorming session with the 21 people who showed up.

 

A few details that I learned:

• They were only able to acquire a 30 year lease on the good year property and the parking lot at the corner of Leeland and San Jacinto.  The land is owned by a trust that won't let them sell it but they can do a lease.
• The Southern Texas College of Law didn't want to give up their parking lot to let this be a full block park - the current plan is a fence between it and the park.
• The project is already fully funded by the Downtown Redevelopment Authority
• Goodyear's lease is up in March, and they expect construction on the park to start in April.
• They're targeting a Summer 2020 opening date.

 

Thanks for the report.  When it was first announced, it was reported they had a ground lease with option(s) to renew.  Do you know if the 30 years is just the initial term?

[cspwal]

They didn't get into the terms.  I'm sure they'll have an option to extend the lease

[Alec]

A new public space to replace the Goodyear Tire at Fannin and Leeland is in the design phase. The City will be renting this land for at least 30 years.

 

http://swamplot.com/downtowns-upcoming-rental-park-should-be-around-as-long-as-the-tire-shop-building-its-replacing-but-no-guarantees/2018-10-10/

[Urbannizer]

Existing thread (I’m unable to merge at the moment):

 

https://www.houstonarchitecture.com/haif/topic/29469-new-park-for-the-southern-area-of-downtown/

[Twinsanity02]

That comes out to a total of approximately 12,100,000 dollars in total payments. The year 30 rent is around 450,000. To my poor self sounds like a lot of dough. What would it cost if it were bought outright ( if he were willing to sell)?

[HNathoo]

I think the market is ~$100psf (~$4M) for a partial block in this part of downtown (full block gets higher premium), but there are plenty of owners who wouldn't sell no matter what price you offered them.

[cspwal]

21 minutes ago, Twinsanity02 said:

That comes out to a total of approximately 12,100,000 dollars in total payments. The year 30 rent is around 450,000. To my poor self sounds like a lot of dough. What would it cost if it were bought outright ( if he were willing to sell)?

At the meeting a few weeks ago, the downtown management people said that the land is owned by a trust that is forbidden from selling the land

[Houston19514]

3 hours ago, cspwal said:

At the meeting a few weeks ago, the downtown management people said that the land is owned by a trust that is forbidden from selling the land

 

That seems like it might be an unenforceable restraint on alienation.

[j_cuevas713]

What in the world? So what does the city do with this lot then? 

[H-Town Man]

21 hours ago, Twinsanity02 said:

That comes out to a total of approximately 12,100,000 dollars in total payments. The year 30 rent is around 450,000. To my poor self sounds like a lot of dough. What would it cost if it were bought outright ( if he were willing to sell)?

 

Umm, don't forget the taxes. If this is privately owned, there will be taxes to pay, and usually on ground leases the taxes are passed through to the tenant. So the downtown management district is on the hook for quite a bit more than $12 million.

 

[cspwal]

The taxes could be part of those lease payment numbers quoted

[H-Town Man]

23 minutes ago, cspwal said:

The taxes could be part of those lease payment numbers quoted

 

The article quoted "$355,992 in annual rent," so it sounds like that's the base rent, not including taxes. Unless it is a gross rent, which would be unusual for a ground lease.

 

[Houston19514]

2 hours ago, H-Town Man said:

 

The article quoted "$355,992 in annual rent," so it sounds like that's the base rent, not including taxes. Unless it is a gross rent, which would be unusual for a ground lease.

 

 

Since this is being leased by an arm of the City to be made into a public park, it will surely be tax exempt.

Edited October 12, 2018 by Houston19514

[H-Town Man]

7 minutes ago, Houston19514 said:

 

Since this is being leased by an arm of the City to be made into a public park, it will surely be tax exempt.

 

I'm not familiar with how it works. So even though a private owner is making money off this land, they don't owe any real estate tax?

 

[Houston19514]

10 minutes ago, H-Town Man said:

 

I'm not familiar with how it works. So even though a private owner is making money off this land, they don't owe any real estate tax?

 

 

I'm not sure.  It just seems there must be a way for the city to not pay property taxes on public park land.

[H-Town Man]

48 minutes ago, Houston19514 said:

 

I'm not sure.  It just seems there must be a way for the city to not pay property taxes on public park land.

 

It's kind of like, if the city leases space in a shopping center (as often happens in smaller cities), the landlord is paying normal taxes on the shopping center, and the city pays reimbursements if that is the lease structure. Same thing here but with land.

 

[Urbannizer]

Demo to begin soon - see "Other Business"

 

http://www.downtowntirz.com/downtownhouston/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/190205-Zone-Minutes-SIGNED.pdf

[Alec]

Dumpsters on site. 

 

[cspwal]

They've already closed and moved to Pearland (which seems a bit far to move from downtown - I guess they didn't want to stay in the city)

[cspwal]

There's a public meeting on 4/30 to present the park design.  Starts at 5:30 pm on the 9th floor of Houston House; the renderings presented there will be up at http://www.downtowntirz.com/projects/ on May 1st

 

Of course I misread it and tried to go both last Tuesday and yesterday.  Yesterday made it to the 9th floor before realizing it was next week