strickn Posted October 27, 2012 Share Posted October 27, 2012 Urban form and urban quality are all about connections. However paradoxically, the most vital thing about a neighborhood's character is how it rubs shoulders with the 'hoods on all sides. There is very little street life that can be sustained in isolation. Rice Village is the isolation that proves the rule. I have given a lot of thought to how to make the Medical Center more like Rice Village, since everything that people like about the Village you'll find nowhere @TMC. It is more fun to watch metastasize, perhaps, but it is to healthy placemaking as tumors are to tissue. I've learned quite a bit from studying how that is, exactly. There is too much to say here. Ours is a city by and for engineers, and engineers I suspect have to learn the hard way to value 'soft' skills and qualities. TMC will lose talent to less banal work environments, but maybe not much. At ground level, human-scale improvements will be overridden by the pressure to do otherwise, and it will continue to lack connection, whether to its own blockfronts or to surrounding neighborhoods. The development patterns for the district's southern frontier (after the Methodist Hospital builds its new Kohn Pedersen Fox-designed inpatient block between Wilkins and Freeman, there will be few blocks left north of the bayou) are dour and unpromising. No neighborhood is brewing. It will be better for everybody if the Medical Center becomes an attractive place, not just a necessary one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister X Posted October 27, 2012 Share Posted October 27, 2012 No. Houston is perfect exactly the way it is. No improvements are possible or necessary. ...and no faux urban twilight zone is more banal, unattractive or disconnected than uptown dallas. My God, there is a CVS strip center and Albertson's giant parking lot right in the middle of it. McKinney is walkable to some extent if you don't mind dodging drunk drivers, but the rest of it is just as gap ridden as Houston's uptown. Here are some attractive buildings... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strickn Posted November 12, 2012 Share Posted November 12, 2012 So that we may learn something, where should the discussion go from here? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strickn Posted November 19, 2012 Share Posted November 19, 2012 How about:If a place were approaching perfection, we would be able to say that there is something characteristically Texan about its urban form. Such places will be neighborly without being nosy; dignified without being presentable; have a sense of spaciousness, density notwithstanding; what else will they be? What other qualities of Texans can we interpret and express, make tangible? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TxDave Posted December 1, 2012 Share Posted December 1, 2012 This is an inappropriate comparison TMC is a major business center with only a few residents or neighborhood amenities. On the other hand, uptown Dallas is a mixed area adjacent to CBD - many residents, retail, and offices. The Dallas equivalent to TMC is the Medical/Market District NW of downtown. In this comparison, Houston is much more advanced with TMC's size & density. On the other hand, the Houston comparison to Uptown Dallas is really Midtown, which hasn't come as far yet. As far as what to learn from here, comparisons can be interesting and informative when truly objective - each city has lessons and examples to learn from the other Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swtsig Posted December 1, 2012 Share Posted December 1, 2012 This thread is asinine... As TxDave said, these are hardly apt comparisons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister X Posted December 2, 2012 Share Posted December 2, 2012 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luciaphile Posted December 3, 2012 Share Posted December 3, 2012 How about:If a place were approaching perfection, we would be able to say that there is something characteristically Texan about its urban form.Such places will be neighborly without being nosy; dignified without being presentable; have a sense of spaciousness, density notwithstanding; what else will they be? What other qualities of Texans can we interpret and express, make tangible? Replying in "Way Off Topic." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strickn Posted December 7, 2012 Share Posted December 7, 2012 It's not off-topic from the original poster; these two most dense (and both brand-new, leading to their natural comparison on each count) sections of our state are not coming along well in terms of true urbanity or true Texanness. It's just off-topic from what people want to make this thread. It could be a thread that people learned from and thought about. Instead it became what it is. We could restart it now from a more thoughtful angle. Let's do so.tierwestah said,"...speaking of Uptown Dallas developments and how it's coming along as far as urbanity. A certain member pointed out in another thread that Houston's TMC has similar developments as Uptown Dallas urbanly speaking. For one thing, the light rail runs right through..."Now, how could we both make this a thoughtful dialogue AND make Tex/urbanity more thoughtful than Sunbelt development + 'Bigger Is Better', which is what it is right now? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
totheskies Posted January 24, 2013 Share Posted January 24, 2013 Yeah, the comparison of Uptown in Dallas to the TMC is completely off. But uptown Dallas to midtown Houston is a much closer comparison. In terms of actual residents , I think midtown Houston has just about caught up to uptown Dallas. What we're still a little lacking in is mixed use retail, or a more predictable pattern of retail throughout the area. We're still letting far too many developers come in and just build whatever they want. More is about to come on line, so that will help. I'd say the two areas are about the same size now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scarface Posted January 25, 2013 Share Posted January 25, 2013 Yeah, the comparison of Uptown in Dallas to the TMC is completely off. But uptown Dallas to midtown Houston is a much closer comparison. In terms of actual residents , I think midtown Houston has just about caught up to uptown Dallas. What we're still a little lacking in is mixed use retail, or a more predictable pattern of retail throughout the area. We're still letting far too many developers come in and just build whatever they want. More is about to come on line, so that will help. I'd say the two areas are about the same size now. You think midtown has caught Uptown DallasIn terms of population? What about density? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jt16 Posted July 14, 2013 Share Posted July 14, 2013 Yeah, the comparison of Uptown in Dallas to the TMC is completely off. But uptown Dallas to midtown Houston is a much closer comparison. In terms of actual residents , I think midtown Houston has just about caught up to uptown Dallas. What we're still a little lacking in is mixed use retail, or a more predictable pattern of retail throughout the area. We're still letting far too many developers come in and just build whatever they want. More is about to come on line, so that will help. I'd say the two areas are about the same size now.Midtown Houston vs uptown Dallas seem like odd comparisons Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nativehoustonion Posted November 6, 2013 Share Posted November 6, 2013 Yes right, The TMC is larger than downtown Dallas so who keeps bringing this up? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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