- PM Realty Group Redeveloping Energy Corridor’s ExxonÂMobil Chemical Co. Campus into CityCentre-Like Project [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Hotel ZaZa, Whole Foods Market Will Anchor MetroNational’s Mixed-Use Center at I-10, Bunker Hill Rd. [Culturemap; previously on Swamplot]
- Housing Authority Trying Again To Sell 91-Acre Lake Houston Property Linked to Failed Veterans Housing Project [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- From Downtown to The Woodlands, a Roundup of the Oil and Gas Companies Breaking Ground on New Towers, Campuses [The Architect’s Newspaper]
- Memoir Details How Johnny Carson Came To Invest in Land That Became Willowbrook Plaza, Costco [KHOU]
- Urban Land Institute Ranks Houston No. 2 Real Estate Market To Watch in 2014 [Houston Business Journal]
- The Astrodome and Reliant Stadium Are Both Jinxed, So Bring on the Wrecking Crews [Houstonia]
- Mitsubishi Planning $100M Manufacturing Site in Pearland; First Stage Should Be Completed by November [Houston Business Journal]
- Food Network’s ‘Restaurant Impossible’ Coming To Help Save Gratifi on Fairview Next Week, Looking for Volunteers [Food Chronicles]
- Pair of Bald Eagles Makes Home in Webster Family’s Back Yard [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Conroe Residents Upset Friendswood Development Cleared 50 Acres of Trees To Expand Graystone Hills [abc13]
Photo of the Neil Esperson building, reflected: Jackson Myers via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
I again reiterate my single developer comment about redevelopment along the Washington corridor. Outside the loop, a developer gets a 35 acre parcel and does an urban mixed use development. Inside the loop, four different developers get various portions of a 30+ acre parcel and do strip malls, pencil box apartments and big box suburban stores. Without any planning or zoning, the redevelopment of smaller parcels is inefficient and does not maximize the use of the land the way the redevelopment of a single large parcel does. The redevelopment of the Washington Corridor is basically left to the luck of the draw as to whether a single developer can acquire enough land to do a quality project or whether the parcels to be redeveloped are spread out over several different developers who provide no continuity or synergy between each strip mall and pencil box apartment complex. Hope for the best, expect the worst.
The traffic at that intersection is already terrible. Cars entering the gated apartments across Bunker Hill stop traffic southbound just below the intersection, then the light at Gaylord has no dedicated right or left turn lanes. So people southbound turning left and northbound turning left also stop traffic.
And are they doing anything for flood mitigation? Bunker Hill floods very quickly.
What will this do for property values abutting Bunker HIll in Hedwig Village?
Old school: nothing stopping a Dev from buying that all. If they have a project that can make use of it all, and that’s indeed the highest and best use of the land, then they’ll be able to pay more than anyone else.