IronTiger

Was the House of Pies on Kirby originally anything else? Seems kind of that way...

The pink mustaches are pretty stupid, but there just seems to be too much of a liability issue--like what if someone threw up in the back of your Lyft/Über car?

While Dallas isn't #1 (and that angle is pretty weak), Hong Kong isn't necessarily good either, because you're basically going "quantity over quality" with a bunch of bland similar-looking towers (seriously, there almost appears to be pairs every one). Frankly, any skyline with an ugly, er, erection like that needs to be knocked down several notches.

I agree, but "alternative modes of transportation" doesn't necessarily mean mass transit. A great example to that would be why the West Loop backs up...because they completely lack a good north-south arterial (chalk that one up to poor 1960s freeway planning). Freeways aren't meant to carry local traffic like the West Loop does, and when they eventually expand out Kirby to Pearland (if ever), that will also be terrible because the Kirby extensions have been built as subdivision collectors, not main arterials.

On the way back, I had to tap my brakes just once sometime in 290 (and I hit the rumble strips in Navasota, but I corrected safely and easily), but I was able to tell when traffic got worse. Some notes that I took on my way in that the traffic slowly ramped up: Highway 6 South (Brazos County) was of course easy (open, clear sights, very little traffic) was easy, south of Navasota was a little iffier (lots of hills at high speeds), then 290 it increased more. I stayed 55 mph that whole way it was signed, knowing that my friend had gotten pulled over a state trooper going over the speed limit in that area (but didn't get a ticket). He's the guy in the "abandoned fast food" pictures. I could tell two places where traffic started scaling up: when 290 started to run parallel to the railroad, then the Cypress-Rosehill/Spring-Rosehill interchanges (that's where construction also started). I had thought I had avoided problems by going to Hempstead Road, but after waiting at the longest lights in recent memory at Jones Road (exited too early), then forced down a narrow, concrete barrier-lined frontage road with absolutely no clearance on either side to get to Hempstead Road, and then having to make a quick dodge to the outer lane to avoid a truck stopped in the inner lane to turn...but other than that, it was a decent drive. I explored around Northwest Mall to reach the Burger King on the other end, then continued down Post Oak. During all this time, I was surprised to see that there was no activity on the NW corridor in my drive--prior to 2009, there'd usually be a train seen, but nope, only some switching cars (a stay at the Comfort Inn in 2008 at Washington and 290 had many, many trains go by into the night). I jumped onto 610 sometime in Uptown, which would've been a mistake, except because traffic was running slowly (35 mph), it was a snap. After a while it sped up and I got to 288, and eventually, my destination south of Pearland. I enjoyed the trip greatly, and also got to see some of the downtown views better, especially at night (had I seen downtown at night, ever? I don't believe I had), and I also noticed four things about Midtown and Downtown. - "Wow, downtown looks GREAT at night! Wait, have I ever seen downtown at night before, this close? I don't believe I have!" - "Man, that elevated highway DOES look kind of spooky. Of course, I'm not familiar with this area at all, and it's night too." - "Wow! That former Days Inn in Midtown had balconies that close to the freeway! Dude, I can't be more than 20 feet away from that door!" - "Oooh. The Midtown Fiesta sign has this sparkly marquee effect! Wow! Who knew?" Note that the four observations were seen when I WASN'T driving. I couldn't see I thing when I was.

Here's a photo taken from the inside of my car, when I entered Uptown. According to some HAIFers, I should be close to the gates of Hell right now. (From my first solo trip to Houston, 9/14)

I still have a Power Card too. I use to read the Chron archives, mostly.

Looks like the bridge near the Houston Police Officers Memorial.

So I've been looking at some 1960s freeway planning literature and while I understand that there's obvious changes between 1960s and current lines of thinking in terms of freeways, one thing that popped out to me that isn't being followed is truck routes to take them off the freeways. As we know, trucks do the most damage to freeways and also make the most noise, as well as posing a hazard on the road (sight lines blocked, slower acceleration/deceleration speeds). But as far as I know, there's no dedicated truck routes in Houston. Does anyone know why truck routes, in Houston and others, never caught on as an option separate from freeways? I think this is a neat topic that we could discuss as long as we don't get in the same arguments as we do before...

I made another post, detailing Induced Stupidity. It describes the corruption of the induced demand theory (it doesn't "induce development", at least no more than any other infrastructure investment) and what it does mean, as well as the importance of arterials (why 610 West backs up). Leave comments/questions there if you have them...

Aww, Webster isn't all that bad. First off, it's tiny (only about 10k--that's just twice the population of any tiny "Brookshire Bros. and Wal-Mart" town) and seems to have a disproportionate amount of commercial establishments, including a decent Mediterranean place (at least back in early 2012), Fry's Electronics, a large shopping center that used to be the indoor gardens Fiesta, and lots more. If Webster is the armpit of Houston, then the rest of the city must be impeccably groomed, or if nothing else Houston has a great under-arm deodorant.

At least of those are more tourist-style cities. While downtown could use more moderately-priced hotels, the last thing downtown needs is a bunch of fleabag hotels. Leave Palace Inn and its ilk along the freeways. Is Aloft a particularly upscale hotel? I'm in a low-rent house paying <$500 for a room and an Aloft is going up less than a mile away. By bike.

I don't know, I remember that the Bryan H-E-B, even though it wasn't in a particularly ratty area had one of the highest rates of shrinkage in the chain (which could partially be spoiled food, that calculates in), and they had to basically invent a new way to prevent shoplifting against the main company policy. Regarding food deserts, I've written a blog post about it entitled "A Manufactured Crisis Regarding Manufactured Foods" (if you want to comment/disagree on it, do it there, not here, please).

Probably the worst I've seen was 610 Loop West when President George Bush came to town in August 2003. Problem is with evacuations, if you think there might be a problem, do it ASAP before everyone else does, because there will be more trouble on the roads than the highway. It also shows you that super-wide freeways do have a purpose. If you open up the shoulders and leave maybe 2 lanes for inbound traffic, you'll get almost 30 lanes heading out.

Rita was absolutely nuts everywhere, you weren't able to find peanut butter, bread, or bottled water in almost any store in College Station-Bryan for a while. When I worked at Village Foods (formerly AppleTree, which rebranded in late 2008), one of the managers told me how they had to bring out an entire huge palette of ice (4x4x6, if I recall correctly) that sold out before the ice melted.

I remember when I went with my dad to take one of the Ship Channel tours (don't ask why). We had to drive through some sketchy neighborhoods, be sent down a long road (Clinton) that looked like it hadn't really been maintained for at least a decade or so, bump across a few unguarded tracks, and then sent down a lonely stretch of road that paralleled one of the mainlines to get to the overlook. The air was thick and humid as the ship trudged through the murky lifeless water.

Well, Bellaire is becoming eight lanes like Westheimer doesn't mean it will become ugly. If Westheimer went under construction to make it look better and bury those lines, hope you don't mind greatly reduced traffic capacity (Bellaire went from 3 lanes each direction + turn lanes to 2 lanes each direction, no turn lanes) and construction for months (years?) on end.

That's the one, thanks!

I know which one you mean...the strip centers are old and ugly, over head power lines, usually panhandlers, ground level ozone...but there really isn't anything inherently wrong with a street 9 lanes wide, personally

What's the name of that skyscraper that's just a bit smaller than the JPMorgan Chase Tower...blue with a whitish top...used to be Editor's avatar for the longest time...it's driving me nuts!

If I had to guess, the Weingarten opened in '64 or '65, because the Fiesta's lease was supposed to expire in 2014, which would give the grocery store a full 50 years lease. HCAD (link) says the shopping center was built in 1962 (the Wilshire Village Shopping Center, that is, which is what was built and the Susanne replaced), and the "Economic Obsolescence" being "Very Poor". However, that may or may not be the date Weingarten opened. Maybe '63.

I think they mean "liked", not actually done with a shovel.

Kleberg. That's the street that was completely razed.

Wilshire Village was an apartment complex built in 1940 and torn down in 2009. H-E-B didn't actually buy it until around mid-2010, and the whole transfer went down in some shady real estate shenanigans, which can be read on Swamplot by digging deeper into the past (2010, 2009). The new H-E-B opened in fall 2011. As far as I know, the grocery store at Dunlavy opened in the mid-1960s as a Weingarten, became Safeway in 1984 when the then-owners of Weingarten, Grand Union, dumped the chain (one carried on a few more years as an independent, but that's irrelevant), that became AppleTree in 1989 after Safeway spun off the Texas stores, and finally in 1994 AppleTree shut down and it was converted to Fiesta. And you know the rest...

I believe Safeway was there 1984-1989.