AUSTIN | Projects & Construction III

[lzppjb]

That lot is really nice.

And I take back what I said about behind IHOP being 3 acres. Google is way off, I think.

[ROCrot]

Seems too good to be true. The cynic in me days out won't happen, then.


Proposed project: 3 downtown towers, one up to 65 stories
http://www.statesman.com/news/busine...o-65-st/nXdk3/

[Syndic]

This is amazing. But can 3 towers really fit on that lot south of Willow Street? What's going to be done with all of those lots between Willow Street and Cesar Chavez? Aside from Chain Drive, it's all a bunch of blight. Maybe they know something we don't know?

[lzppjb]

I'm assuming that small lot south of Willow would only be one of the projects. That site is not even an acre, is it? I think that entire area (behind IHOP, SW corner of Chavez & RR, and the lot south of Willow) will be part of this.

[Syndic]

The Statesman article said that Sutton released some renderings to the Statesman. But they didn't publish them for some reason. How lame. Could y'all not read the whole article? It's letting me have a free preview of all their "premium content" until May 11. Speaking of lame, it's going to suck not having access to Statesman articles and I don't think I want to pay for it.

[KevinFromTexas]

^Yeah, it sucks. I would caution against posting the "paid for content" after that, but there's nothing illegal about rewording the information and posting it here. That's probably what I'll do [if] we get the paid subscription. There's really no point in reading half of an article, and I think they're really making a mistake here and stand to lose a lot of readers.

I don't see any renderings either.

[Syndic]

This was posted by cvillehorn on the Update Thread. I have no idea where s/he found it, but it's beautiful.

[LoneStarMike]

Originally Posted by Syndic

This was posted by cvillehorn on the Update Thread. I have no idea where s/he found it, but it's beautiful.

I was just fixing to post the same thing. If you go to statesman.com and scroll down to the business stories there's a teeny-tiny little rendering. 82x82 pixels. I saved it and enlarged it, too.

So it looks like the project would be on both sides of Willow Street (bye-bye Chain Drive). In the lower left hand corner, you can see the convention center. The mid-rise building across Cesar Chavez is the Lakeside Apartments, and that two-story complex south of the tallest tower is the Villas of Town Lake.

On the south side of Cesar Chavez (between the convention center & the Lakeside Apartments) isn't that where they're supposed to build that other project called Trinity Place? Or is that further west down Cesar Chavez?

[JoninATX]

Originally Posted by LoneStarMike

I was just fixing to post the same thing. If you go to statesman.com and scroll down to the business stories there's a teeny-tiny little rendering. 82x82 pixels. I saved it and enlarged it, too.

So it looks like the project would be on both sides of Willow Street (bye-bye Chain Drive). In the lower left hand corner, you can see the convention center. The mid-rise building across Cesar Chavez is the Lakeside Apartments, and that two-story complex south of the tallest tower is the Villas of Town Lake.

On the south side of Cesar Chavez (between the convention center & the Lakeside Apartments) isn't that where they're supposed to build that other project called Trinity Place? Or is that further west down Cesar Chavez?

Your correct, Trinity Place will be built right in front of Lakeside Apartments.

[KevinFromTexas]

Originally Posted by Syndic

This was posted by cvillehorn on the Update Thread. I have no idea where s/he found it, but it's beautiful.

So it looks to me like they included The Shore there in the background south of the tallest tower.

[lzppjb]

So, this does not include the lot behind IHOP. That piece of land could have another tower on it in the future. What a dense cluster of awesome that could end up being.

[NYC_Longhorn]

You heard it hear first!

Cluster of Awesome height is right! GAME CHANGERS!

[cvillehorn]

If this comes to fruition, it looks like they are adopting the architecture of the Austonian to create a uniquely "Austinist" design asthetic. We really haven't had any signature buildings (save the Capitol and maybe Frost) since the Austonian, so perhaps this will become the defacto skyline highlight of our beloved city. In conjunction with our other beauties, I think this style will fit very well. I'm not sure if its a homerun but I'm definitely leaning towards thinking yes.

[cvillehorn]

Also, if this baby contains a 65 story tower, you're talking about 800+ ft right there as a gateway to Austin coming up 35. That's pretty substantial, especially for that area. Once you factor in The Grand Hotel on Waller, and some of the other designs in the area, this could be the densest, most vertical portion of the city for years to come. Who would have thought they'd end up there? Either way, I like it.

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by cvillehorn

Also, if this baby contains a 65 story tower, you're talking about 800+ ft right there as a gateway to Austin coming up 35. That's pretty substantial, especially for that area. Once you factor in The Grand Hotel on Waller, and some of the other designs in the area, this could be the densest, most vertical portion of the city for years to come. Who would have thought they'd end up there? Either way, I like it.

Yeah, I was at G'raj mahal tonight and forgot how dense rainey is. Even skyhouse seems super packed in there. I love it.

[lzppjb]

This Waller/Rainey district combined with the Shoal Creek/Power Plant area are really blowing up. We will need wider angled lenses.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by East7thStreet

I thought the Sutton guys just downsized their twin 50 story tower proposal to one eight story building? And now they are proposing three towers, one 65 stories, on a lot close by? O.k.... i'll bite.... how tall would a 65 story hotel/condo building be? 780ft -800ft ish?

This might be why they downsized the other project. A big project like this works better in this location, whereas it didn't so much in the old where the downscaled project is moving forward.

[wwmiv]

One note, though: I really hate matching towers. If they're going to do this, I really hope they use very different designs for each tower.

[LoneStarMike]

Originally Posted by East7thStreet

I thought the Sutton guys just downsized their twin 50 story tower proposal to one eight story building?

Originally Posted by wwmiv

This might be why they downsized the other project.

The other project was downsized because Sutton sold the land to another developer called The Dinerstein Companies.

If you look at Dinerstein's website they build apartments & student housing - none of which are tall - or even mid-rise.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by LoneStarMike

The other project was downsized because Sutton sold the land to another developer called The Dinerstein Companies.

If you look at Dinerstein's website they build apartments & student housing - none of which are tall - or even mid-rise.

Yes, I know, but this doesn't undercut my point at all. You're misplacing causal direction here.

You're positing that "selling" ---> "downsize", but the reality is more likely that "downsize" ---> "selling". The first would hurt me, but the latter actually is entirely consistent with the idea that the project was downsized because they had better opportunities elsewhere and, thus, sold part of their land.

Unless what you're telling me is that an entirely new developer (if they sold the entire tracts of land instead of just what I took this to mean as partial selling) is now doing this project, in which case I'd only be partially right (they sold the land entirely because they had a better opportunity nearby, but the downsizing was caused by the selling to another developer... which would actually make us both right I guess).