Houston19514

And speaking of ridiculous ... and pointless...

Under its contract with Continental, ExpressJet is not allowed to serve Houston except in its Continental Express operation.

Here are a couple of websites to get you started... http://spacetaker.org/ Fresh Arts

Only if I see a picture of it. If I saw a picture of piers being poured on the entire site, I would believe it right now. I'm not a difficult person to convince. All it takes is a wee bit of evidence.

Look guys. All I'm saying is, we've seen posts on this board and the DFW forum starting in March 2006 telling us that construction had started on Victory Tower. Clearly, most of those were mistaken. In addition, as I have noted earlier, despite the repeated posts announcing construction of the tower, such construction has never shown up in any pictures posted on the forums, nor in any media reports (other than a clearly mistaken statement last year by the DMN's real estate reporter), nor on Victory's website (despite their having a pretty up-to-date timeline which has shown all of their major groundbreakings. In addition to all of that, there was the post on the DFW forum stating that, indeed, the tower was not under construction, but only the parking structure had begun. Furthermore, there are no office leases (at least none have been announced, and you will notice they announced a major office lease for 1 Victory Park before or at the same time as they started construction), and they have not even started marketing the condos yet, at least as far as I can find. It seems difficult not to be skeptical given all of that. I will be happy to be shown to be wrong on this; but so far, I have seen no credible evidence that construction on the tower is underway. It is just that simple. No one is bashing Victory Place, Victory Tower, or Dallas. I really didn't mean to step on anyone's toes when I started this discussion.

You seem to be backtracking a bit. One post you tell us that they are putting in piers on the entire site, tower and parking. Now you are telling us that there is a portion of the site they are not working on... Hmmmmm, could that portion perhaps be on the north end where the TOWER will be???? Yea, I'm quite aware that the total construction cost for office space and condos and hotels includes finishes, elevators, mechanical systems etc. That's why I said it's laughable to suggest the cost per square foot to build a parking garage is higher. I'm not just pulling stuff out of my hat here. I have worked on some construction projects and just to check myself did a quick search for the costs on some projects I'm familiar with and could get appoximate cost figures. In short, parking garages do not cost anywhere near as much to build as an office tower (and nobody that I know builds office towers or hotels without including elevators, interior finishes, etc. Perhaps your experience is different ;-) If you were talking about just the cost of the superstructure, then perhaps that is what you should have said.

I agree new construction may not be far off. But, when construction was started on the four towers (1500 Louisiana, 1000 Main, Calpine, and 5 Houston Center), the vacancy rate was nowhere near 20%. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was in the single digits, certainly for Class A space. Then 9/11 and Enron happened (mostly Enron).

Let me make sure I understand you correctly. You would now have us believe that they are constructing a 45 story building while parking cars (valet parking, no less) on the construction site?? You cannot be serious. Do you suppose Hillwood's liability insurance carrier is aware of this? As someone working in the building industry, have you EVER seen anything like that happen before? As to the free-standing parking garage, from what I've read, on this board, on the DFW board and in other places, parking is a pretty big issue in the Victory development, what with all the night life and booming retail development. Are you saying that is not true? And FWIW, free-standing parking garages with first floor retail can absolutely be money-generating structures. And the idea that a parking structure is more expensive per square foot to build than a mixed-use very high-end 45-story tower is laughable. Keep digging, man. You're shredding your credibility, but eventually you might find some piers for the Victory Tower construction. ;-)

That may be true, but they are prepared to make the changes when a carrier lets them know they plan to fly an A380 in to IAH. That would presumably take very little time. But agreed with the earlier post that the Dubai flight would probably not have the traffic for an A380 anyway. I would think the potential customers would much prefer greater frequency of flights over a giant aircraft with low flight frequency.

Interesting, but not entirely convincing. The problem with your story is that the Victory Tower is not designed with a tower over a parking garage. It is a tower next door to a parking garage, I would presume essentilly two separate structures. I'm a little surprised that someone working in the building industry in Dallas would not know that. Are you maybe confusing Victory Tower with One Victory Place? If there are indeed piers going in on the entire site, all the way north to Olive Street, so be it, I shall stand corrected. But, no offense, I'm not willing to take your word for it, since you rather shot your credibility by your lack of knowledge of the building design. AND, I would point out... I have seen many many pictures of that hole in the ground starting in March '06. Not a single one of them has shown the north end of the site, where the tower will be. Strikes me as unusual to say the least, that every single person going down there to take pictures of the construction site has focused on the south end, rather than the north end. Maybe it's just a coincidence, I don't know. In any event, we shall see soon enough. If they have truly been pouring piers for the tower, it should be popping up above ground level well before fall. And even before then, surely SOMEone will take a picture of the north end of the site. In the meantime, calm down, Dallas!! I have neither insulted nor criticized. Just asked a simple question. I had no idea that questioning whether a building was under construction would so cut to the core of your souls. ;-)

Do you have a problem reading and comprehending? I am in no way being critical of Victory Tower, nor have I said that it will never happen. And I live in a dream world???? My goodness, what a thin-skinned group of folks you are. All I have said is that it does not appear as if the Tower is under construction, YET, and you guys respond as though I'd called your mothers whores. Don't take yourselves so seriously... We've been hearing from Dallasite here and on the DFW board since last March that Victory Tower was under construction, and yet, there has been scant or no evidence of that being true, even to this day.

They probably could have gone to JPMorgan Chase, for a lot more expense, probably a higher interest rate, and a lot more time to do the transaction. I believe the loan is secured by liens on revenue streams and on the practice field properties, so there is little reason that JPMorganChase would not have been interested. And worst case scenario (if the sports authority does default as you so confidently predict) the Turnpike Authority gets a very valuable chunk of real estate; one that gets more valuable with each passing year.

Whatever, boi. Even if you had seen other information stating that the building was NOT under construction. Even if there had been utterly no news or announcement about construction on the tallest building built in [Houston] in 20 years or more? Even if the website for the development (which shows dates for every major groundbreaking in the development, and has been kept pretty well up-to-date) had nothing about the groundbreaking or construction? Well, what can I say? I'm glad I'm not that gullible. If you are happy living in your little dream world, and accepting whatever is thrown at you by anonymous posters on a website, so be it. I guess you Dallasites are just different that way. Trust me, I have no problem with the building being built. The renderings look beautiful (but sadly, the finished structures at Victory are not tending to turn out to be nearly as beautiful as the renderings). I know that if I was skeptical about a building going up in Houston (partly because I'd seen statements that it was in fact not under construction) and a Houstonian answered me with a photo that showed construction near (very near) the site, but not on the actual site, I would not just accept the picture as proof of construction unless I had a problem accepting the fact that the tower is notunder construction. Face it, Dallasboi, I know it's hard for you to accept, but your hallowed much-anticipated Victory Tower is NOT yet under construction. I'm sorry it's so painful for you. I'm sure there's 12-step program out there for you. ;-)

And I responded to tell you that you are wrong. Wrong as can be. Again, the money from the Turnpike Authority is a LOAN, it WILL be paid back, with interest. (If the Sports Authority had borrowed the money from, oh, say JP Morgan Chase, we would not be saying that JP Morgan Chase was paying for the stadium, let alone that JP Morgan Chase depositors were paying for the stadium. It is equally fallacious to say that Turnpike toll-payers are paying for the stadium.) It merely replaced a loan that was originally in place from the owner of the Texans. End of story. The only "public" or tax money that will in the end pay for those stadia is indeed car, hotel and ticket taxes. Is there some imaginable scenario under which the Sports Authority will be unable to pay the loan? I suppose you could dream one up, but it is highly unlikely and not worth worrying about. If the Turnpike Authority had not loaned the money to the Sports Authority, presumably that money would be sitting in an account earning interest or be loaned to some other entity in the form of bonds. It would be just as easy to imagine scenarios that would cause those investments to go bad. (Plus, it is my understanding that they are earning a higher rate of interest from the Sports Authority than they were previously earning; pretty much a win-win. The issuer of taxpayer funding of a soccer stadium is certainly a fair topic for this thread, but the Turnpike Authority loan to the Sports Authority has nothing to do with taxpayer-funded stadia.

Ditto! In fact, after reading this whole thread, I think the title should be changed from "Downtown's new problem" to "Downtown's new opportunity." Maybe we should find a way to encourage more of the big clubs to move. I could never quite see how they thought they could continue to have the massive crowds on Main Street, even just for special events, when it stops the rail service. You can't be shutting down the central spine of your rail system every time you have a big party.

Great news! I think Air India is a pretty good possibility fairly soon as well.

I guess I haven't been out that way for a while. Where is there a Hyatt? Are possibly confusing the Hilton Nassau Bay?

What about that statement has you down in the dumps? ;-) If it's the stated failure rate of retail at Denver Pavilions, well, I'm not sure what FirstnGoal's source or credentials are for that statement... but the Denver Pavilions shows very few vacant spaces on any level. Casualties in the restaurant field, gosh, what a surprise. ;-) In any event, Wolfgang Puck's just closed last January, after Seven years in Denver Pavilions, and it's closure had more to do with Wolfgang Puck's divorce than with Denver Pavilions. If your concern is the statement "if the developer can't make residential work at the Pavilions, it probably can't work elsewhere downtown, ignores the rest of the information we've gotten about the residential element, to-wit: the problem was the underground parking, which was making it too expensive to stay within the market prices for apartments. Very simple. Apparently, others (including especially Marv Finger) are still seeing a market. Also, Firstngoal stated that Denver is 10 years ahead of Houston in residential development; therefore Denver Pavilions didn't need a residential portion, but Houston's does. But Denver Pavilions opened 9 years ago, so that puts Houston in relatively the same place that Denver was when Denver Pavilions opened. (In fact, we'll be in a better place than Denver was, since Houston Pavilions won't open until nearly 11 years after Denver Pavilions did; so if we're only 10 years behind in residential development... well, you can do the math. ;-)

Been there, done that. Went again at your suggestion and I don't find any new information there about Victory Tower, at all, accurate or otherwise. (Perhaps I overlooked it, if it was not in the victory thread). I did find that Dallasmetropolis.com is where I earlier saw the statement that only the parking garage was currently under construction (which I referenced above), and that particular post went on to say the tower would not start construction until fall. I suspect that is little more than speculation, or a "target" construction date, at best. (and of course I have no idea of the credibility or sources of that particular poster.) Sorry to have interrupted your cozy little dreams with a simple request for information. It is beyond me why that sort of thing gets people so stirred up. If this were, say Houston Pavilions, and construction appeared to have started, but there was no news, no announcement... I would be curious and start to ask questions. If I then heard that it was only the parking that was under construction, with the rest of the development to come at a later date, I would be interested to know that. I guess you Dallasites are just different that way. ;-)

Well, you just holler at me when the sports authority defaults on the loan. In fact, if I thought there would be a way to collect from you, I would put money on the loan being repaid to the Turnpike Authority. In the meantime, I don't really feel like re-hashing this whole non-issue. If you want to review, go to this thread (you too, Musicman): http://www.houstonarchitecture.info/haif/i...?showtopic=8018

(1) There is actually no proposal on the table for money of any kind. The word tax just appeared in a list of possible funding sources along with private donations and money from the team. As such we have no idea what city funding might pay for... By all means, contact your city councilperson, mayor and county commissioner and let them hear your concerns. (2) Toll road funds are not being used to cover shortfalls on Reliant bonds, at least not in a way that costs toll road users any money. The toll road authority has merely loaned money to the Sports authority so they can make payments on the Reliant bonds. Impact on tolls and cost to toll road drivers: ZERO.

Nobody is getting bent out of shape about inaccurate information. I'm quite used to that, including, yes, in the Houston Pavilions thread. The only ones getting bent out of shape here (see eg., Rantanamo, Dallasboi) are doing so in response to my attempt to get accurate information. I guess some just prefer to live in a fantasy world...No incisive questions allowed... And speaking of Houston Pavilions, if you go to that thread, you will see that I did some research to find accurate information on that project as well. I'm all about accurate information ;-)

Any updates, Bacchus?

Well, the plan is to build a multi-field soccer complex for public use, so it would seem entirely appropriate for some public funding to be involved. (and as to getting screwed by privately owned sports teams, can we give that tired line a rest? (1) the arrangements for MMP, Toyota Center, and Reliant Stadium were all approved by the voters and (2) Unless you rent a car, stay in a hotel, or attend an event at one of the stadia, you are not providing any of the funding for them, let alone getting "screwed.")

Note to self (and others interested in self-preservation): Don't ask H-Town Man any questions, Ever!