- Harris County Commissioners Court Postpones Demolition of Fire-Damaged Gulf Fwy. Apartment Complex That Would Make Way for Homeless Housing Project [Houston Chronicle]
- First Crane for Generation Park FMC Technologies Campus Construction Pops Up [HKA Texas; previously on Swamplot]
- Amenities at Texas Instruments’ New Sugar Land Office Include a Courtyard, Basketball and Volleyball Courts, Fitness Center [Houston Business Journal]
- Texas Led New Home Sales Over Past Year with 33,177 Transactions, Finds Metrostudy [Prime Property]
- Destination Hotels & Resorts Opening Revolve Kitchen + Bar, the Hotel Derek’s Fifth Restaurant Concept in 12 Years [Culturemap]
- Yellow Rose Distilling Starts Kickstarter Campaign To Fund 10K-SF Distillery Off N. Post Oak Near I-10 [Houston Chronicle]
- M/I Homes Residential Development Planned for Lilac Rd. Lot Illustrates Increasing Lack of Affordable Options in Katy [Community Impact Newspaper]
- Fleet of High-Speed Bullet Trains Could Be Making 68 Trips a Day from Dallas to Houston By 2021 [Houston Business Journal]
- String of Light Rail Collisions With Cars This Week Renews Concerns about Rail Safety [Houston Chronicle]
- Edible Earth Resources Will Sell 10% of Food It Grows on Abandoned Urban Lots to Local Convenience Stores [Eating Our Words]
- Largest Skate Park in North America Opening Aug. 14 in North Houston, Dedicated to Child’s Memory [abc13; previously on Swamplot]
- 1,005-Ft. Lazy River Opens at Forest Oasis Waterscape at The Woodlands Resort and Conference Center
- Houston Ranked 6th Happiest Metro Area in the U.S. [Houston Tomorrow]
- Some of Our Favorite Tweets from the #ImSoHouston Hashtag [Hair Balls]
- Austin Condo Listing Includes Nude Selfie [Gawker; NSFW]
- Remembering the Post, Houston’s Other Daily Paper [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot]
Photo of Biscuit Paint Wall on Biscuit Home at 1435 Westheimer: Bill Barfield via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
The headline about demolishing a fire-damaged apartment complex in Northline is incorrect. The property in question is adjacent to the former Finger’s furniture store in Houston’s East End, across I-45 from the UH main campus.
@artfox: You’re right. Northline is where they’re living now. It’s fixed now. Thanks!
Man…..Dallas to Houston high speed rail. Every time I lose hope for this ever existing someone dangles something like this in front of my face again. I won’t fall for it this time.
That nude selfie is definitely on purpose. People have been pulling that for years with ebay listings. There exists a whole community that gets their jollies from doing this. Just another reminder of how weird the internet is.
No, no, no, no, no. I want Elon Musk’s hyperloop along that route, I want headways of between 30 seconds and two minutes, I want to arrive my destination downtown (meaning, inside of downtown, not slightly north of it) in 25 minues. And I want to pay something more in the neighborhood of $40. (Musk estimated $20, but I would suspect that that’s not enough for a big never-been-tried-before megaproject. On the other hand, he was estimating California prices, and Texas is probably better for a hyperloop for the same reason that it’d be better for Japanese high speed rail.)
If it turns out that there’s significant unused capacity, then I might add that the ticket prices should be subsidized by the State down to the cost of a ticket that could be attributed to operating costs in order to fill the tubes. That would be wholly acceptable to me because what is really up for discussion is merging two regions into one from the middle-out and bringing about all the wonderful things of a mega city, but with the affordability of a third-tier city. It’s a small price to pay, really.
Having taken the high-speed trains in Europe several times, I can say that I would be very pleased with a privately-funded version here in Texas, assuming the service is anywhere near what they’re claiming. As far as the hyperloop, hey, throw that in too, the more options the better.
The train / hyperloop is basically an alternative to airline travel (more so than an alternative to driving yourself). In the context of human history, jet air travel is a true miracle. Yet, we’ve managed to turn it into a pain-in-the-ass experience. I hope we wouldn’t do the same with these other technologies.
Any high-speed rail traversing north-south through Houston ought to terminate inside downtown with a single stop in the Woodlands. The rush hour trips for this bullet train would satisfy the huge demand for commuter rail between the north suburb and downtown.
@ LocalPlanner: Musk speculated that TSA checkpoints would be inevitable but that minimal headways between departure (as opposed to hundreds of people swarming a terminal at the same time for the same scheduled flight), walk-in electronic ticket purchases, and a carry-on-only policy for luggage would be able to limit the extent to which using the service would be perceived as a hassle by a daily commuter.