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Originally Posted by llamaorama
Harris County is big though, how much of that was in the northwest corner along the Grand Parkway and going up towards Tomball? It's still mostly greenfield sprawl.
What remains to be seen is what happens to areas that are outside the 610 loop but inside the Beltway or at most with Hwy 6/FM 1960. Beyond the core inner loop gentrification areas I am not seeing much evidence of middle ring suburban growth beyond a few specific parts of West Houston.
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I think it could increase in the future. I assume you're thinking mainly of the neighbourhoods from Uptown to Westchase, but there is also some infill happening in Spring Branch, as well as development spill-over from Shady Acres to north of 610. Those areas already add up to a land area almost double that of San Francisco city proper, so I'd say that's pretty significant.
Anyways, I see Houston as a city in transition that hasn't quite reached the tipping point. It used to be that the core was poor and the suburbs were wealthy, and that encourage continued sub urbanization of the professional class (both their homes and workplaces). However, the city has sprawled so much that combined with worsening traffic, it's difficult for the upscale suburbs to function as a cohesive job market. The core has been gentrifying a lot, and the working class has been suburbanizing a lot, like the areas West of Bear Creek Park, around Mission Bend/Four Corners, Katy, Spring Fort Bend/Missouri City and much of the eastern suburbs are pretty economically and socially diverse.
I think we're starting to see the Loop and some west side areas being the preferred location for the professional class and if a few changes start to happen (ex improved public schools) I can see Houston start to change very fast and even the eastern half of the loop and areas like Independence Heights become desirable, and Gulfton start to get more desirable and redeveloped.