COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE ASTRODOME MOTHBALL SAVINGS PLAN “There was a Chronicle article a while back that estimated the cost of demolition at $30 million, as compared to something like $600,000 per year just to keep it in mothballs. I ran it through an NPV analysis, and it actually was not cost effective to tear it down. It’s better fiscal policy to keep it, even if we never use it for any purpose ever again. I’m not much of a sentimentalist, but this is the kind of historical preservation I can get behind. Anything to save a buck.” [TheNiche, commenting on County Judge Foresees New Use for Astrodome: Giant Enclosed Space, Shielded from Weather]
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^TheNiche: Yes, if it ain’t broke, let’s not throw money at it! (excuse the mixed metaphors)
I feel the issue of the ‘Dome’s future is critical to Houston. We can be a leader in adaptive re-use…
Yes marmer, the Astrodome is meaningless *wink* even though our kids could pronounce its name before they could manage, ‘Thank You.’
Yes Matt, I am similarly dated and less desirable than any animal, vegetable or mineral, much less building.
Yes Angeli, it’s better to be safe than sorry when contemplating ‘throwing the baby out with the bathwater!’
Yes EMME! It’s ugly! Hallejulah Modern World!
Yes Jerome, sometimes the Default position – doing nothing – really is best:
BECAUSE: what a cool environmental study to see how long, and in what ways, nature completely takes the place over.
I’d guess 25 years & it would be identifiable only to those who already know it – a full generation who would have never seen it in the first place.
The roof would fall in and woody plants would find niches underneath it, long before the big doughnut of a parking lot would disappear.
Grade-schoolers could take field-trips there & High School science projects would follow the Astrodome’s demise: How many years before nesting birds arrive? Does concrete break down faster than steel? Do cigarette butts ever decompose?
Just sayin’… (I still can’t believe AstroWorld is gone)
Actually The Discovery Channel has a program, “5000 Years After People” where Houston in general and the Astrodome specifically are addressed. According to their computer models, within 25 years, the interior would become a humid subtropical “terrarium” with swamp like conditions overtaking the astroturf, muck and algea overtaking the interior the floor, and small birds and insects populating the rest. They place the actual implosion at 200 years after people when the steel is corroded through giving way to the lucite panels above. The surrounding shape would remain for another 100 years until the surrounding jungle of growth overtakes the remaining structure.
Alas, the rest of the city devolves back into the swamp from which it came….
I have heard of the show, but didn’t realize it had addressed Houston! cool.
June 27, 2009
Hello Believer
My name is Nona Lang and I am a Prophetess. I received my calling in the summer of 2004. However I have been in the Ministry far longer than that. Yahweh our Creator has told me to contact you that you would know what to do. The Almighty Creator Himself mandates me request use of the Astrodome, for a worldwide event, which is to take place on August 1-8, 2009. Our Creator, whom I call Yahweh, has given me a message that I have to deliver. Susan our very lives depend on it. I received this assignment on May 22, 2009 about 4 pm while in Meditation and Prayer and since then I have been trying to get in contact with you. I need to come into your office or discuss this by phone further with you, please.
Contact number 713-633-8051
satdocndm@aol.com
Thank you, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Sincerely,
Prophetess Nona Lang
The Creator gave Houston the Dome now He wants to be honor in it.