Mueller to get new HEB in 2013

[paulsjv]

Announced this morning. Here's a blog about it in the Statesman.

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...ind_store.html

H-E-B plans first-of-its-kind store at Mueller
By Gary Dinges | Wednesday, August 31, 2011, 10:45 AM

The wait for an on-site supermarket is almost over for residents of the Mueller development.

H-E-B, the region’s dominant grocery chain, put an end to years of speculation this morning, announcing it will build a first-of-its-kind store at Mueller, part of a 110,000-square-foot shopping center planned for the southeast corner of East 51st Street and Berkman Drive.
Work on the 75,000-square-foot H-E-B will begin late next year, and the store is scheduled to open in 2013. Details on the store’s look and feel, as well as its selection of unique-to-Mueller offerings, are still being worked out, the grocery chain said.

[chancla]

Great news. I used to live in that hood but hated that the closest heb was that congested hancock store.

[KevinFromTexas]

Yeah it really is lame, and the Fiesta Mart isn't even that far away. It's not like there's no shortage of a grocery store near there.

[M1EK]

http://m1ek.dahmus.org/?p=671


Mueller Grocery – Suburban or Urban?


Posted on September 1, 2011 by m1ek




Urban or suburban?


This image is from the 2010 presentation of the Mueller “market district”. The big box in the lower right is the grocery store, which is now apparently going to be an HEB.


But the most important question by far: will it be urban or suburban? Let’s ask our old friend David Sucher of City Comforts:


Urban Starts With The Location Of The Parking Lot


 


As Chris put it,

The parking lot will be much nicer than average, but this makes the development merely suburban chic not urban.

Sadly, par for the course for our supposed ‘new urban showcase’. I’ve covered Mueller irregularly in the past as has Chris. Notice we’re in 2011 now; no sign of the Town Center; relatively little multi-family development; but the single-family homes and strip malls – they are still there and doing fine. Sigh.


As for how green and sustainable this will be, what with energy efficiency, water efficiency, etc.; a wise ass man on twitter once said this:

[paulsjv]

The Mueller community seems to be very aware of this and hopefully they will stay on the ball with it and help make the project a urban success.

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by paulsjv

The Mueller community seems to be very aware of this and hopefully they will stay on the ball with it and help make the project a urban success.

I sure hope so.

[paulsjv]

Originally Posted by ahealy

I sure hope so.

On the Mueller community forum a user posted this, which I find interesting. Hopefully, this is good for going the right direction with the new HEB.

http://vimeo.com/10757073

Here's the thread that the video and other information is in if you'd like to go and read what the community is saying about it. Just be nice.

http://www.citicite.com/index.php?mo...ID=6496&page=1

[M1EK]

Originally Posted by paulsjv

On the Mueller community forum a user posted this, which I find interesting. Hopefully, this is good for going the right direction with the new HEB.

http://vimeo.com/10757073

That's the same video I captured the image out of. The plan is for a suburban crap grocery store. Putting buildings up on some of the parking lots later on is not only never really going to happen, it wouldn't help the real problem anyways - you want an urban grocer to have an entrance on the sidewalk where the pedestrians already are (i.e. Berkman in this case).

This isn't that hard. Hyde Park's Fresh Plus already does it - parking on the side, entrance on the front on the sidewalk of 43rd.

[paulsjv]

Originally Posted by M1EK

That's the same video I captured the image out of. The plan is for a suburban crap grocery store. Putting buildings up on some of the parking lots later on is not only never really going to happen, it wouldn't help the real problem anyways - you want an urban grocer to have an entrance on the sidewalk where the pedestrians already are (i.e. Berkman in this case).

This isn't that hard. Hyde Park's Fresh Plus already does it - parking on the side, entrance on the front on the sidewalk of 43rd.

Well I guess if that's the direction they decide to go with the store then it's a good thing that you don't live there!

[KevinFromTexas]

Mueller is a complete and total disappointment.

By the way, my mom works up at the Petsmart at Mueller. She says there is NOTHING to eat around there. There's a Which Wich and some other place to eat, but no restaurants and even the fast food options are slim to none. I was talking about how they should have placed 4 and 5 story buildings there with retail on the first or 2nd floors topped by office space, residential and hotel space and had restaurants at street level. My mom's usually cold the idea of urbanism, but she did see my point in how badly they used the land they had available to them. Even within that relatively small area (Mueller is ~700 acres), she would have to drive anywhere there to find food, and would likely have to go outside of Mueller. This is because she doesn't have enough time on her lunch break considering how few options there are there. It's nice that an HEB is coming there, but it's more of the same apparently.

My brother on the other hand works for a company in a rented space along 5th Street I believe just east of downtown. He said a few days ago that he had ordered some sandwiches from the Jimmy John's at 6th & Congress. He said they don't deliver to areas east of downtown since their delivery guys ride bicycles. So my brother asked if they would meet him at the Lottery Commission near 5th & Sabine. They agreed, and my brother walked over. In less than 15 minutes he said the guy was already there walking out of the Lottery Commission building thinking that's where he would be. He had 6 sandwiches ready in less than 15 minutes. My brother told me the more time he spends working in and around downtown and enjoying his commutes, the less he enjoys the suburbs.

[electricron]

I'll agree the Mueller development isn't "urban" in any way. As more of it gets built, it's looking more and more like a nest of suburban apartment complexes.

Which brings up this question, why is the city wishing to build urban rail to a suburban nest of apartment complexes? There is or will be little of the promised mixed use buildings for the urban rail line to move passengers to and from all day. Might as well build a suburban commuter rail line with a service aimed for commuters during peaks, cause that's the only time there will be sufficient passengers to sustain any trains in Mueller.

[paulsjv]

I think part of the problem with Mueller is that it is "yet to be seen" as in nothing is built yet to support it's vision of "new ubranism." I would agree that right now there's really not many food options (Jamba Juice, Frozen Yogart, soon to be Greek, Which Which, Starbucks, Chipotle, then there are the 3 food trucks at Mueller central, coffee, sandwiches, mexican).

I do think once it's more built out or all built out that's when judgement could be passed about how "urban" it is. But you have to remember that Mueller is "new urbanism" so I wouldn't expect it to be like downtown and I wouldn't expect it to be like the burbs. I would expect it to be a mix of both, which I think is the direction it's going.

[M1EK]

Not even close. Mueller's final build-out will be more of what's there now - disconnected spots of a few multifamily areas with some medium-density suburban tract homes on small (for Austin) lots. The Town Center may never happen; the other things moving in will be disconnected from each other and from the grid (childrens' museum, etc).

[paulsjv]

Originally Posted by M1EK

Not even close. Mueller's final build-out will be more of what's there now - disconnected spots of a few multifamily areas with some medium-density suburban tract homes on small (for Austin) lots. The Town Center may never happen; the other things moving in will be disconnected from each other and from the grid (childrens' museum, etc).

Not saying you're wrong or right.. but I would say that's their definition of "new urbanism" don't like it, too bad, not much you can do about it.

[migol24]

What is the Town Center? Never heard about it.

[KevinFromTexas]

Mike has a point. Since when are detached single family houses with tiny yards and big box stores around the corner urban? This "new urbanism" phrase - it's like record companies packaging some bubblegum pop singer in place of something original and trying as hard as they can to convince us it's the same.

And I'd be ever so irritated to have to buy a storage shed that would take up space in my tiny yard so that I could store a lawn mower and other lawn equipment to keep up my tiny patch of grass. I wouldn't mind a storage shed, but I'd rather have bicycles in it, or use it for actual storage.

We all kind of forget on the forum that we can pick out what's urban and what's not and we know all the definitions and styles and everything, but for the everyday person who just doesn't care about the subject of urbanity, they'll likely not be as knowledgeable on the subject. So when they hear that Mueller is "new urbanism" and don't like it, they might equate that to what is real urbanism or "old urbanism" if you like.

[M1EK]

Nice sales job, SecretAgentMan.

The parking lots can be lined with buildings all you want - but the streets aren't going anywhere, meaning the buildings that are already there will still not be pedestrian-fronted.

And the density is higher than the surrounding areas because the surrounding areas were developed primarily in the 1950s. Pretty low bar to surpass.

Finally, the Town Center was supposed to happen many years ago. What we've seen in every phase of this project has been a disappointment to me and everybody else without a financial or personal stake in this project - not as compared to downtown or the existing neighborhoods around Mueller, but instead compared to new developments of similar types in other (arguably LESS central) parts of town. The Triangle and The Domain do a better job in most respects. Even East Avenue did a better job with I-35 frontage.

This isn't new urbanism, despite your bullshit. You can dress it up in buzzwords all you want, but it's not urban - and never will be given the huge blind spot the people involved have. Just Saturday I drove over to get a smoothie for my stepson after his wisdom teeth surgery and in addition to the usual sad feeling I get driving down the road noticing almost every office building addressing a parking lot rather than the street, I had an anectdote which was even more depressing - I parked at Jamba Juice closer to the street side hoping a little urbanism would rub off on my 7 year old. Street entrance and parking lot entrance. Good incremental urban strategy! Try to go in the street entrance, notice it's just a long nondescript hallway (i.e. pedestrians get the short end). Door is locked. Sigh. Go back around to the parking lot entrance. Par for the course for Mueller - even when they tried to do something right, they still did it wrong.

[M1EK]

BTW, if you're tempted to believe SAM's implication that I just don't understand the project, please be aware I was being briefed on this thing back in 2000-2005 on the UTC; raising issues even back then about the poor support for bicycling and the lack of integration with the surrounding neighborhoods. Even back then, it was obvious this thing was a loser - a piss-poor use of publically owned land which could be generating a lot more revenue for Austin AND doing something truly urban.

[SecretAgentMan]

New proposed Urban Rail connection to Mueller from Hancock Center



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

Possible interim maintenance facility tucked in behind HEB loading dock



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[wwmiv]

Where'd you pull those from?