- Commerce Street Studios East of Downtown To Be Restored as Art Spaces [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Slideshow: At Least 8 Real Estate Projects Planned for Downtown Houston [Prime Property]
- Finger Furniture Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy, Begins Liquidating Assets [Houston Business Journal; more info]
- Three Brothers Bakery Opens Third Houston Location, on Washington Ave, Today at 10 am [Culturemap; previously on Swamplot]
- Pondicheri Confirms It Will Add an Upstairs Bakery, To-Go Space at West Ave Restaurant This Summer [Culturemap]
- How Panamax, Coal Expert Terminals, the Keystone Pipeline, and Petrochemical Plant Expansions Could Compromise Houston Air Quality [OffCite]
- Metro Selling Off Land To Allow Westpark Tollway To Extend to Fulshear [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Discussing Bike Infrastructure Possibilities for Houston, Including a ‘Bike Freeway’ Through Midtown [Pedestrian Pete]
- Officials at Odds Over a Potential Return of Galveston Trolleys [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Illegal ‘No Parking’ Signs Going Up in Some Houston Neighborhoods [Click2Houston]
- Texans Asked To Conserve Electricity as Cold Wave Moves Through the State [Fuel Fix]
Photo of Fifth Ward house: David Elizondo via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
That is great news for Pondicheri, especially about the take out space. I’ve called a few times before asking for take out and I’ve been rebuffed because they were too busy with in-house guests.
Let’s see if I got this right…
Metro paid $71.8m in 1992 for 58 miles of land. They sold off part of it (presumably 18 miles for the existing Westpark Tollway) for $22.3m, leaving $49.5m invested. They also invested an unknown amount of money in removing the tracks. But now, they are selling the remaining 40 miles for only $13.8m plus use of the land by buses.
This just doesn’t add up. Either Metro is valuing the access for buses at an extraordinary amount or they got a terrible ROI on the land after 22 years. I would have expected the land to go up in value over that time, not down.
It says Metro can buy back some of the land for commuter rail in the future, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they have to pay more than $13.8m when that happens…
Hines 609 Main is the most likely the only one of those “projects” that will actually get built–it’s actually has “financing”–a little inconvenience one annoyingly must have to actually, oh I don’t Linus, build! a building. Chevron delayed their building and has refused to actually say when they will build it. Though they gave very plausible explanations as to why they chose to delay, it still gives pause to the notion that this building was a done deal. Does anyone know who currently owns the lot across from One Shell, where the Bank of the Southwest Tower was to be built in the 80’s. I had great hopes that during this current boom that some massive skyscraper would be built on the best lot in the city, but have heard nothing about the lot in years.
*6 Houston Center will be built as well.
*Could compromise vs. *Will bring jobs, $, energy security, fulcrum status in american/regional/world trade, oh and more $$$$$$$$$.
The world needs hydrocarbons. That is a fact. If they don’t get made here, they’re going to be made someone else with greater environmental harm and with no financial benefit for us.
Instead of having an Occupy Keystone party in front of Obama’s house, why don”t we get organized and lobby for more stringent rules on refining here. With raw materials cheap and plant expansions in the works, NOW is the time to implement greater regulation of these facilities while the economics are favorable for building/extracting here at home. And also lets lobby for industry and the city to buy out the people who live in Manchester. They have no business living in an area that is literally surrounded by industry.
[steps off soap box]
Well, there goes commuter rail to the Westside for another decade or two.
Yes, I do see that METRO will retain some right of way along the corridor. But it’s also stated that they want to spend more time and money on their bus and light rail projects, and don’t have the inclination to bother with a plan to move thousands of people into the city from the suburbs in an efficient manner that would slow the growth of congestion in our ever-growing metropolis.
ShadyHeighster, at least look on the bright side and that they didn’t have to shut down or re-jigger any current mass transit access you had just to pay for these toy trains. regardless, the most efficient means of mass transportation(economically and enivronmentally) will always be by bus, not rail, and hopefully we never have rail extending out to the west side…aside from the fact we’d never be able to afford it.
Great news that Pondicherri will focus a little more on their bakery/ It has what I think is the best bakery in town.
The sale price does seem a little light on the face of it, but hopefully it was the buyback provision and a promise for free use by P&R buses that was included in the price. If they can run buses on it and there’s effective congestion pricing, then its just as good as ready-built commuter rail.
Well that was certainly a worthless report by Pedestrian Pete. Not any meat there.