AUSTIN | Third + Shoal | 389 FEET | 29 FLOORS | U/C | Complete

[_Matt]

Originally Posted by hereinaustin

Is there some sort of local ordinance, lending issue, construction cost issue, or something else that keeps so many of our buildings around 400'? In other words, why are developers finding it unprofitable to go taller in our market?

My guess is it has something do with land cost being relatively cheap, lenders and city ordinances requiring parking minimums and FAR ratios, and perhaps not enough demand for density from consumers.

According to Kevin Burns, there is a fire code regulation that significantly increases expenses when the building goes above that height. This is through one of my coworkers when he made the remark about similar height buildings (this was pre-Independent).

I would be interested if others had insight into the fire code for these taller structures.

[The ATX]

Originally Posted by _Matt

According to Kevin Burns, there is a fire code regulation that significantly increases expenses when the building goes above that height. This is through one of my coworkers when he made the remark about similar height buildings (this was pre-Independent).

I would be interested if others had insight into the fire code for these taller structures.

Someone commented a while back that construction costs - like pumping cement - go up significantly higher than ~400'.

[Jdawgboy]

Okay if all those things are such an issue when building towers over 400 feet then most cities in this country would be 400 foot flat plateaus. It may be a factor but in all honesty I don't think it's that much of a deal to actually make sure a building doesn't go above 400 feet. If it can be done in other cities it can be done here. These companies are just too damn cheap to invest in a real quality tower in Austin for some reason.

Also I don't buy the whole Houston is on another level so they can have taller towers. There are cities smaller than Austin with 700-800 foot office towers. Yes having a large company HQs helps but it makes no difference. Whether or not 5 or 10 companies take up a 30 floor tower or 50 floor tower they will rent the space regardless.

You know wwmiv makes a good point but it's kinda ironic that in this day and age where everything can be done through cloud servers, people don't really have to leave their workspace other than for breaks and lunch. Even communication can be done by live video feed. So large floor plates should be an obsolete concept right?.. Of course despite all that, the idea of a paperless society just never materialized and it's just as well considering the cyber crime, hacking and identity theft that is so prevalent. So in the end larger floorplates will continue to be favored by most companies.

[AusTxDevelopment]

One thing I think you all are overlooking is why developers build towers. It's the same reason they build anything...to make a profit. Office space in New York towers rents for 8 to 10 times what an Austin building can expect to get in rent. Developers in Austin will only build as high as their profit margin will allow. Taller towers cost more due to all the reasons mentioned in this thread, but the rent that building owners can charge an office tenant in Austin does not go up in direct relation to the height of the tower. Unless its for vanity reasons, businesses won't pay enough for better views to justify spending the extra money to go taller.

Also, many large tenants (the ones developers want for their buildings) don't want to be on the highest floors due to the elevator waits. You would be surprised how big of a deal this is. For tall towers, it's not practical to have one set of elevators serving every floor. Tall towers almost always switch elevators at a certain floor - in other words, one set of elevators serves floors 1-20, and the other one serves floors 1, 21-50 (skipping 2-20), etc. just to try to speed up the elevator wait times. And if you are not on the 1st floor, you go up to the highest floor of one elevator bank, then you have to get off of that elevator and get on the next one to go higher up. Otherwise the elevators would take forever to go from top to bottom. Frost Bank has split elevators. So does Colorado Tower. It's such a concern for some tenants that in new buildings, the first floor to lease is almost always the highest floor the first elevator bank goes to, so that tenant doesn't have to switch elevators or take the slower one that has to bypass the lower floors first.

[ILUVSAT]

Originally Posted by AusTxDevelopment

Office space in New York towers rents for 8 to 10 times what an Austin building can expect to get in rent.

FYI...Average Class-A office in Austin's CBD are around $40/SF. Class-A office space in Manhattan average almost $80/SF (newer properties are asking in the $100-$110/SF range..average). Where are you getting the 8-10 times rate that of Austin?

[ILUVSAT]

Originally Posted by _Matt

According to Kevin Burns, there is a fire code regulation that significantly increases expenses when the building goes above that height. This is through one of my coworkers when he made the remark about similar height buildings (this was pre-Independent).

I would be interested if others had insight into the fire code for these taller structures.

Define "significantly..."

[hereinaustin]

Originally Posted by paul78701

I think the density bonus program is a bit backwards. Instead of making developers pay what seems like a penalty TO build taller, why they don't offer incentives FOR building taller?

Along with the fire code comments, I agree that the density bonus program is pretty whack. With all other things we incentivize what we want and penalize what we don't want: Ex: charge a higher rate for people who use more water to discourage excess water use, charge a toll to discourage road use, etc.

My hope is that the city will either 1) incentivize density, or 2) stop trying to prevent density. As Paul said, charging someone to build more density is the same as discouraging density. I know the city has been trying to force developers to pay into this or that fund, but it would be much better to grow the tax base instead.

Why do we obsess over density anyway? Because it makes our communities more diverse (more people!), it allows us to be healthier (i.e. walk/bike to work), and it makes it easier for city services, businesses, etc to know where to provide resources.

[paul78701]

Originally Posted by paul78701

Some good perspective:


Chad's Take: Why you shouldn't freak out about Austin Music Hall
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/bl...ut-austin.html

As we may lose AMH and some other music venues, new ones are still being created. Here's an ABJ story on All ATX Music Factory:
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/bl...ess+Journal%29

[The ATX]

A site plan was filed for this thing today. But there is no building info attached to it yet.

https://www.austintexas.gov/devrevie...erRSN=11395235

[Urbannizer]

As well as the site plan, soil samples were taken today.

[HighGuy]

Originally Posted by _Matt

Just to note: that rendering is just a massing of the property and isn't the likely build. There is a max height of 60 feet along the creek and so the building will likely have Proper-style cutbacks.

Source

Originally Posted by GoldenBoot

Correct me if I am wrong, should there be a required setback on the Shoal Creek side of this building?

Hope you're both right. I'm really curious to see how the design plays out.

[KevinFromTexas]

They posted the site plan to the city's FTP site today. The building elevations start on page 21. The building is 387 feet 4 inches to the mechanical screen with 29 floors. That makes it 6 feet taller than what Austin Proper will be. This also shows one of the renderings of the building.

ftp://ftp.ci.austin.tx.us/ATD_AULCC/...reet_PLANS.pdf

[futures]

Welp....it's a building.

It's good infill, but sure is boring.

[Mopacs]

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

They posted the site plan to the city's FTP site today. The building elevations start on page 21. The building is 387 feet 4 inches to the mechanical screen with 28 floors. That makes it 6 feet taller than what Austin Proper will be. This also shows one of the renderings of the building.

ftp://ftp.ci.austin.tx.us/ATD_AULCC/...reet_PLANS.pdf

Here's a capture of the rendering in the linked document

[The ATX]

It reminds me of the Colorado tower, but a better rendering in color is needed. The setbacks on creek side will look interesting along with the setbacks on Austin Proper.

[drummer]

Yeah, color might make it look pretty good, actually. There are several "boxes" that don't look half bad - Colorado being one of them. They spiced it up with a couple of neat features. This one could change a couple of things. I think the creekside may be the best angle...wish they had renderings from the west and south.

[lzppjb]

I think it looks pretty cool. Not groundbreaking or anything. But not bad.

[resansom]

I assume that's the other greenwater building and the Austin Proper building in the background - and you can just see the Google building, on the left. Nice density, but that sure looks like very little variation in height, among the four of them - and the first greenwater building (Northshore) isn't much taller. Can anyone say "plateau?"

[Jdawgboy]

Originally Posted by resansom

I assume that's the other greenwater building and the Austin Proper building in the background - and you can just see the Google building, on the left. Nice density, but that sure looks like very little variation in height, among the four of them - and the first greenwater building (Northshore) isn't much taller. Can anyone say "plateau?"

Agreed. What will stand out about this area won't be the height but the density. A tiny taste of NYC on a couple of blocks.

How far apart will this building be to Austin Proper? From that angle it looks like they are almost right up against eachother. Office workers could stand at the windows and wave at the people in the hotel. Lol

[The ATX]

Originally Posted by Jdawgboy

Agreed. What will stand out about this area won't be the height but the density. A tiny taste of NYC on a couple of blocks.

How far apart will this building be to Austin Proper? From that angle it looks like they are almost right up against eachother. Office workers could stand at the windows and wave at the people in the hotel. Lol

There won't be much space between the two. It'll be like the Ashton and the office building next door.