The Problem with the convention district is the convention center itself. It, along with the freeway, cuts off access to the rest of the city and creates really bad dead zones which will choke development of retail. the Convention Center along is a huge space with a single use that becomes an albatross when empty.

While the discovery Green is an Improvement over the sea of Parking in the past; I think how the whole downtown is designed is going to hold back development in the future.

Houston is not alone in this problem. The area around McCormick Place is dead because of the same issues. Even the Javits Center in Manhattan makes it's surroundings suffer the same fate as the rest of them; proving that almost no concentration of density and land values can salvage the dead zones the crop up around convention centers.

New downtown tower could take shape

A new skyscraper in downtown Houston could be announced this year, a sign of strength in the local property market, real estate executives said Thursday.

via the Houston Barnacle...


http://www.chron.com/business/articl...pe-2444724.php

^
I also read in that article that the Houston Club building next to the Chase tower had been sold and possibly demoed. Houston has no respect for its older stock of buildings. Hopefully they dont do that and just restore it, but thats doubtful.

Gray: Prudential building scheduled for implosion Sunday

By Lisa Gray, HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Updated 05:53 a.m., Friday, January 6, 2012

http://www.chron.com/life/gray/artic...on-2444072.php

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3189/2...22d8d06857.jpg
Freelance by RJarrin, on Flickr

Why doesn't Hines propose a mixed use office/ residential building for the Texas/ Main site? It is a very historic intersection, it would continue he residential presence of the Rice Hotel, and I believe Hines have these type of projects in their portfolio.

I really Hines considers thinking outside of the box for this project. They talk a big game about caring about Houston's urban future but continue to give us pedestal skyscrapers. While Mai9n Place was an improvement (from the street level) let's hope they take it to the next level.

I hate articles like that. When you read through it, you find out there are no announcements, just a vague speculation that "downtown is ripe for new skyscrapers". Disappointing. Will wait for some real news.

What a shame. That is a beautiful building.

Here are some photos of my recent excursion downtown on my bike to grab lunch at the Phoenicia market at the bottom of One Park Place. OPP place isn't too bike friendly, I had to park my bike in DiscoGreen and walk.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7152/6...8111a11264.jpg
DiscoGreenBuildings by dv1033

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7168/6...9cc37f8e8c.jpg
One Park Place by dv1033

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7031/6...60738d2124.jpg
HessDiscoGreen by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7175/6...7382810559.jpg
Phoenicia by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7155/6...1c22b7b60c.jpg
PhoeniciaLine by dv1033, on Flickr

Some of BG Group Place (Main Place)

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7022/6...b3160a3f80.jpg
MainPlace by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7020/6...48e3365404.jpg
MainPlaceTrio by dv1033, on Flickr

So did all or most of Discovery Green's trees survive the drought so far? I was in Houston recently and was shocked to see that Memorial Park has very few living trees remaining. I'm hoping that the trees in Discovery Green were watered.

Discovery Green wasn't really effected by the drought I believe. Btw anyone have any recent news of 5 Allen Center?

Yea the trees in Discovery Green were watered. Hermann Park was hit pretty bad as well, but Memorial Park is definitely the worst.

Update:

Went on a bike ride through Hermann Park and they've cut down the dead trees...

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7171/6...ec6ba5aa6f.jpg
HermannParkDrought by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7156/6...d309de816c.jpg
HermannParkDrought2 by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7166/6...565f111d3d.jpg
HermannParkTheatre by dv1033, on Flickr

Took some pictures yesterday of new stuff going up.

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...erland/co3.jpg
The Dynamo Stadium.

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...erland/co4.jpg
The new lightrail line expansion of the east end line and the southeast line. I asked a guy when they are laying track and they said in June, so well see how that pans out. They are just expanding the streets and doing wiring work right now. On the north red line expansion there is going to be an elevated station, didnt know that. Heres a link to metrorails page on lightrail updates if you are interested.

http://www.ridemetro.org/CurrentProj...Expansion.aspx

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...erland/co2.jpg
The 22 story BBVA Bank building being built near the Galleria, it will be completed in 2014.

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...herland/co.jpg
Same building

If anyone forget or never saw it, heres the render for the building.

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...ndering280.jpg
http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&s...1t:429,r:0,s:0

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...erland/co7.jpg
This has been completed for a little bit, but never saw any pictures of it, the new M.D. Anderson Cancer Research Center in the medical center.

Here are just some extra photos I took downtown last night.
http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c.../h5beforrw.jpg

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...3beforrw-1.jpg
Oh and Im going downtown to watch them blow up that building in the medical center, cant miss that. I dont know if there are any plans to replace it, but I hope it becomes something more than another parking lot.

Also rode by the Natural Science Museum Expansion. If you didn't know, they are building ~115,000 sf of new exhibit (mostly dinosaur exhibits) and classroom space, which is set to open late 2012:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7153/6...f5647c37fd.jpg
NewMuseum by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7012/6...c179ae6bcc.jpg
NewMuseumCorner by dv1033, on Flickr

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7172/6...c05bba0cb8.jpg
NewMuseumWidth by dv1033, on Flickr

All in all, at two stories it is a pretty modest expansion with not much flare.

^
I just drove by that last night, its a pretty boring exterior and not very inviting, oh well.

Personally, I wouldn't go that far, although it is pretty conservative. It fits nicely with the current museum exterior in my opinion, but could have used some more glass.

I believe they have said 3-10 years until they develop something on that land. There were two more buildings from a ten year old master plan that included the Mays Clinic and the Cancer Prevention buildings to the East and South of the Prudential building. Those buildings would have gone on the lot that contains the Prudential building. Of course, since then they have done the Alkek expansion and recently started on the Khalifa building. They also built the new Administrative building (to replace Prudential), and a new Faculty Center tower.

So while they have still been doing tons of construction, it's hard to say when they will get to this site.

It's really sad about the trees at Hermann and Memorial Parks. I hope this damn drought is over soon, and the trees are replaced as soon as possible.

I realize that Memorial Park was too large and too dense with forest to prevent the damage from a practical standpoint, but it seems like Hermann Park trees could have been saved. I keep wondering why the huge corporations in Houston couldn't have paid for the water to save those trees. It would have only taken periodic watering of each tree to keep them alive. They wouldn't have looked great but could have survived.

On my last visit, I also noticed that the younger trees along the medians all over Houston didn't survive in many places. Again, couldn't the corporations have paid for some water? The cost of replacement, if it ever occurs, will be much greater. From what I've read, the East Texas lakes supplying water to Houston received pretty good amounts of rainfall, so were not dangerously low like those near Austin. If there was enough water to allow residents in Houston to water their lawns once or twice per week, then it seems that there was enough water to keep the trees in public areas alive.

Since I don't live there, I may not have entirely correct information. Houstonians please correct me if any of my assumptions are incorrect.

With fog and low cloud cover the implosion tomorrow should break almost every window around it.

they blew up the old Prudential Building at 11:15... I watched the streaming video of it :)