A LIFEBOAT FOR THE ROYALTON’S CORRODING CROWN? 
Judging from court filings, there appears to have been some sort of resolution to the lawsuit filed more than 2 years ago by the condominium association of the 253-unit Royalton at River Oaks highrise over the design of the steel grid at the top of the building at 3333 Allen Pkwy. The lawsuit claimed the structure was corroding and was designed in such away that made maintaining it or recoating it impossible — and sought damages from the building’s contractor, architect, and other parties. The condo association dropped its claims against many of those parties late last month. And a reader wonders if the attachment seen hanging below the structure in the recent photo at left, which “almost looks like a hot tub,” is part of some newly devised cleaning solution. [Prime Property] Photo:Â Swamplot inbox
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The builder of my house made some design decisions that I question. Areas that are not very usable or functional, and some that are downright dumb and make cleaning hard
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I wonder if I can go and use the architect. And builder. And maybe the city worker that approved these plans?
I hope they are taking the crown off. It’s really lame.
I do hope they figure something out. I want the Mother Ship to be able to land safely.
I work in the corrosion industry. I like to say we have good job security since we try to combat thermodynamics, but in the end thermodynamics will always win.
NEVER buy on the west side of this building. The glass isn’t insulated/tinted enough to reduce to keep the afternoon sun from heating up west side units.
Take that thing off. It’s hideous and serves no purpose other than to rust.
The long standing urban legend was that it was a helipad. I guess this debunks that notion.
Impossible? No. Expensive? Certainly.
I kinda like the “crown” …. it sets the place apart form all the other boxes
I always heard it was supposed to resemble a martini glass.
James – corrosion is a process that relates more with chemistry and materials science than thermo.
I’ve always referred to that building as the “laundry basket” building because, well, it kind of looks like it has a giant laundry basket on the top. :-)
Tony- agreed in the day to day work but in the end both chemistry and material science base their principals on thermodynamics. Thanks for nitpicking though, I’m sure everyone here thoroughly enjoyed it.
I will always miss the gulf publishing building…………
— “Gulf Publishing was designed to blend in with the pleasure drive ambiance of what was then buffalo Bayou Parkway” taken from an article on the gulf publishing building……1942
“Thermodynamics is a branch of physics concerned with heat and temperature and their relation to energy and work. It defines macroscopic variables, such as internal energy, entropy, and pressure, that partly describe a body of matter or radiation.”
Doesn’t sound/look like a thermodynamics issue to me, either.
This building was due to be JPI’s re-entry in to the Houston market. It was to be named Jefferson on Allen Parkway, but it was sold before construction began after 9-11-2001, as were most of the 2010 roll out projects. JPI has been through many company leaders who all have claimed to have been the origin of the property management REIT and all have taken the holdings over the years in to the sell for profit market against the company’s original vision. The corporate office was once off the Sam Houston Tollway, so don’t believe the BS on the current God loving website. Any mention of God is a direct violation of Fair Housing rules, so to see it on the website as a corporate statement makes me ill. “Building quality for our Customers” that was and always will be JPI. The project on Allen Parkway was to be our long term type of building. It originally had window washing rigs that were housed in the top floor, so the crown was only meant to make the extended launch point “pretty” since the bowed out portion required an extended header for any rig to hang from, the sides could have launched from hidden rigs and slid down the sides of the other portions, but those too were removed to add cheap looking penthouse floor-plans that are obviously not part of the building’s first designs. Also the parking garage was supposed to be pushed towards the Parkway by placing it under the building and having sun deck amenity areas on top of each side of the building on top of the garage part that jetted out from the building footprint.
“Doesn’t sound/look like a thermodynamics issue to me, either.” Sigh. So I guess we just get pure iron straight from the ground? Tell me more googler of facts…
Jefferson, let me assure you that JPI had absolutely nothing to do with 3333 Allen Parkway. Nothing at all. Nor was JPI’s corporate office on Sam Houston Tollway–it was in Irving, TX. Also, the penthouses were not an afterthought on 3333. They were part of the original design. I don’t know where you get your facts from, but they are decidedly incorrect.