Texas Medical Center Retail Market

[Highrise Tower]

When the news broke about a proposed NRG Park Mixed-Use Development, reporters took note the given area surrounding NRG Park.  The reporters noticed the immediate area is littered with the standard, one-story basic retail strip centers. 

How could we improve the general retail in the southern Main Street corridor? I have noticed the independent owned restaurants can't survive so the national corporations come in to replace.

The former Shell Technology Center located at 1500 Old Spanish Trail could become a vibrant, class-a retail district. Maybe that could be the starting point?  I believe the TMC took control of the land from New Quest? So probably not.

Given the area around the world-class Texas Medical Center, it would be a good idea to build better retail and restaurants.  Thought I would create a thread about the retail market surround the TMC and NRG Park areas.

[Highrise Tower]

There's actually an organization that keeps progress of the South Main area.  The company is called South Main Alliance.  Not exactly a TIRZ per se. Maybe you can call it a Management District?

https://www.southmainalliance.org/

The South Main Alliance (SMA) is a 501(c)(3) corporation formed in 1976 based on recommendations in a National Endowment for the Arts funded study conducted by Rice University titled Options for a Unique Texas Place, that urged the creating of a framework for collaboration to protect and enhance a special area with great diversity and quality of life. The South Main area is unique in Houston for its concentration of educational, cultural, health care, innovation and entertainment parks, campuses and institutions. Supported by memberships, SMA's Board of Directors holds joint meetings with the Main Street Coalition. 

The South Main Alliance seeks to elevate the quality of life experience of the South Main area for those who live, work and visit here. South Main Alliance engages area stakeholders to pursue those common goals that can best be accomplished working together.

[Houston19514]

16 hours ago, Highrise Tower said:

There's actually an organization that keeps progress of the South Main area.  The company is called South Main Alliance.  Not exactly a TIRZ per se. Maybe you can call it a Management District?

https://www.southmainalliance.org/

The South Main Alliance (SMA) is a 501(c)(3) corporation formed in 1976 based on recommendations in a National Endowment for the Arts funded study conducted by Rice University titled Options for a Unique Texas Place, that urged the creating of a framework for collaboration to protect and enhance a special area with great diversity and quality of life. The South Main area is unique in Houston for its concentration of educational, cultural, health care, innovation and entertainment parks, campuses and institutions. Supported by memberships, SMA's Board of Directors holds joint meetings with the Main Street Coalition. 

The South Main Alliance seeks to elevate the quality of life experience of the South Main area for those who live, work and visit here. South Main Alliance engages area stakeholders to pursue those common goals that can best be accomplished working together.

They seem rather inactive.  The only events shown on their “events” page were in 2021.

[editor]

On 7/28/2023 at 10:01 PM, Highrise Tower said:

How could we improve the general retail in the southern Main Street corridor? I have noticed the independent owned restaurants can't survive so the national corporations come in to replace.

While it's far improved over what it was 20 years ago, the whole area is uninviting. It's like a bedroom suburb inside the Loop.  The vast stretches of baking asphalt just make the whole place seem like a wasteland, unless you're inside one of the nice apartment complexes.  If someone has to get in their car to drive to retail, they'd might as well drive a few minutes to an established retail zone.