Houston19514

Your question is ridiculous and pointless. UT should proceed with the appropriate procedures through Higher Education Coordinating Board. If that leads to a binding agreement of the sort you are proposing, then sure, that's great. (and I already have your answer to my question.)

Who cares? No one has proposed a traditional college campus. UH has not, and is highly unlikely to, propose a campus in Austin, and UT has not proposed a college campus in Houston. There are basically three ways the Houston metro area can get access to more of the PUF: 1) Constitutional amendment 2) UH merges with UT (or, I guess A&M) 3) UT and/or A&M invests money in Houston facilities and programs. For the record, I am neither a Longhorn nor a Cougar, nor connected to either university in any way. Personally, I would not have an issue with the UT system building a full-fledged institution in Houston. We are a major global metropolis and should have more first-tier universities. Sadly they have not proposed that. But they have proposed a very exciting research center, the full details of which remain to be determined. The kind of investment they have proposed and the kind of research that would be done at such a place would be a phenomenal boost for Houston. It is beyond my comprehension that some are actually saying UT should just take their money and invest it in Austin. REALLY?? Has it really escaped their attention that UT has had a rather major presence in the Houston metro area for a very very long time and it has not meant that everyone has become a Longhorn or that UH has not been able to progress?? I can't imagine any other city that would not be salivating at the prospect of such an investment in their future. UH should be embarrassed by the reactions of its supporters and by their own decision to decline participation in the planning.

I am okay with UT proceeding with their planning and getting necessary approvals from the Higher Education Coordinating Board, and I would be okay with UH using the same procedures for any project in Austin. Why do I get the idea you and others in this thread are not OK with that? Oh, maybe because that is what UT is actually doing, only to be met with howls of protest?

Of all the ignorant statements and assumptions in this thread (and there have been a LOT of them), this has to be my favorite. Apparently, only full-fledged university campuses have athletic fields. 1) That premise is ridiculous and patently false (see, eg. Phillips 66's new campus). And someone should probably be alerting the coordinating board that there is a nefarious plan afoot to create a university at Johnson Space Center. 2) If the rendered athletic fields were for a university sports program, wouldn't they have some sort of bleachers? 3) The renderings are obviously very preliminary and may ultimately be meaningless. It's apparently time, once again, for a refresher course: 1) UT has said repeatedly they have no plans to build or operate a full-fledged university or even a campus of one of their existing universities. 2) UT has not built anything; they have not established any programs. They don't even have a fully-formed concept of what this will be. Nothing has been done that would have required coordinating board approval and I'm certain nothing will be done without the required coordinating board approval.

Agree, it's a nice-looking building. But it's a little hard to imagine such a building proposed in Houston getting an overwhelmingly positive reaction here on HAIF. NOTHING in Houston gets an overwhelmingly positive reaction on HAIF.

The original renderings look more like 26 stories (counting the crown). EDIT: Cushman Wakefield is marketing the non-Amegy space. According to their marketing brochure, the building is 23 stories, plus a crown approximately equivalent to another 5 stories.

Get a grip, man. Skanska has the funding to build the tower. It just does not make sense for them to do so if they can't find any tenants. I doubt there is anyone on this board who is not disappointed with the delay of this tower. But, you know, #*$& happens. Perhaps you have noticed a slight decrease in oil prices since this project was started. If you know of a way to perfectly project future commodity prices so that development projects are never overtaken by economic events, I'm sure Skanska and every other developer would love to hear it. Otherwise, put a sock in it, already.

Word from Saks is they will open the new store in late April (I failed to commit the exact date to memory, but I think it is April 28). Simon plans to have the conversion of the current Saks building into two levels of new shops and restaurants done in time for Super Bowl LI. (8 months to complete the project)

So... for the first part, the improved or new freeway reduces congestion on the alternative routes and increases traffic on the new/widened freeway. Yeah, that's pretty much why we build new freeways and widen freeways. Seems like an unalloyed good result. Improved mobility. For the second part, sure, new freeways will alter development patterns compared to if there were no freeways. So what? The same can be said for any infrastructure development. And without economic and population growth, there will not be traffic growth and there will not be congestion on the new/expanded freeways.

How do I have an improper understanding of the induced demand theory? (I disagree that adding rail cars is not a proper comparison, but for argument's sake leave that example aside.)

False. Anyone who says that the widening of the Katy Freeway did not do anything to alleviate congestion, or more to the point, provide improved mobility for thousands of people every day is either flat-out lying or utterly ignorant. It did not become re-congested because thousands of people every day decided, "oh, hey, there's a nice wide freeway out there, let's go for a drive." It became re-congested mostly because we've added another 2 million or more people since the project started. Using the logic of the "induced demand" theory, -- we should not have added additional rail cars to serve the redline when the original cars became overcrowded at certain times of day. If we add more rail cars, more people will just use the rail line and it might become crowded again. Maybe we should remove some cars and force people to take alternative forms of transportation or ride on the bus -- We should not add gates at Bush Intercontinental. In fact, I guess we should eliminate some gates and force people to take alternative forms of transportation. More airport capacity encourages more people to fly, thus zero effect on congestion. -- We should not expand the container port at the port of Houston; that will just encourage more people to ship things and the container facilities will just get congested again.

^^ Yeah, it's been there for about 13 years.

From the Conservancy's website: The first phase of renovations to enhance the Japanese Garden began on November 9 and will be completed in early summer 2016. Portions of the garden will be blocked for safety during construction. Additional renovations are planned to add a new entrance to the garden, an event lawn, a dry stream garden, and more. The Conservancy is actively fundraising for these renovations and is anticipating final completion by the garden’s 25th anniversary in 2017.

LOL Stellar? Seriously? Please stop. You're killin' me. Has it shrunk to only 19 stories?

What a cute little building. But has it shrunk? I thought it was supposed to be 20 stories. This looks like it's only 19 stories.

What do you base that on?

There may be diminishing returns, but that does not mean there are no returns to further widening. I highly doubt that increasing from 26 to 36 lanes would "not help at all."

And...??? If there is increased congestion inside the loop, it's a result of the failure to widen that portion of the freeway.

Yeah, I know it's a fairly well-known theory. That does not reduce its idiocy.

A case can be made that we need to adopt methods for improving mobility beyond widening and adding freeways. But the mayor would bring a lot more credibility to the discussion if he didn't lead with something as idiotic and counter-factual as claiming that widening freeways creates congestion. Again, hopefully, he didn't actually say that.

For real, or is this just the latest marketing spin? (Not that there's anything wrong with that)

For the love of God, please tell me our mayor did not really say he thinks adding roadway capacity causes increased congestion. That's even step beyond the idiocy of induced demand.

The better question is "what are you smoking?", to be taking anything in the Chronicle at face value. As far as I can tell, there is no plan for "six levels of retail."

What is $250-300/sf? Did you forget the decimal point?

There will no doubt be additional official logos, more dressed-up than this very basic, generic one. There will probably be one with elements of NRG Stadium or other representations of Houston incorporated.