yeah, I was there earlier... It's very impressive. I was with my friend from SF who said we have the best parklet she's ever seen. I hope Congress Ave businesses create more of them.

Yeah, I hope so.

Visa USA plans to build Austin computer center, add 794 jobs

http://www.statesman.com/news/busine...ter-add/nTCnh/

11/19
 

SkyHouse Austin - 264 feet - 23 floors

http://i.imgur.com/tRbvv.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Kkecz.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/LQFxE.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Q8565.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/1Ycxr.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/PDWR2.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/CS6z5.jpg

Callaway House - 205 feet - 17 floors

http://i.imgur.com/Pe73X.jpg

2400 Nueces - 181 feet - 16 floors

http://i.imgur.com/vabBJ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/tUj0G.jpg

The project in the foreground is a midrise apartment building in the East Avenue/University Park development.

http://i.imgur.com/MhEl7.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/diERV.jpg

http://i527.photobucket.com/albums/c...2F83B80A08.jpg

Crappy iPhone photo of that new development across from the pedestrian walkway over lake Austin. I don't remember the name of it exactly but I'm sure you guys will. I was just in Austin yesterday and it's crazy how much construction is going on everywhere in Austin. Exciting times for the city for sure.

That's the Gables Apartment Tower. It's 223 feet with 18 floors. It should be just a bit taller than its crane. Right now we have 10 highrises under construction. The tallest is the 408 foot JW Marriott on Congress.

I just can't see that gondola system being efficient enough. They'd be a combination of a) too slow, b) too small (too few people in each car) to really be any good as a public transit system. Maybe just as a connector from downtown to Zilker/Barton Springs, sure.
Plus, there will be breakdowns. You can count on that with any mechanical device. You can get off a train, bus, etc. You're stuck up there on a gondola.
Again, it seems cool, but I just can't see it working well enough.

another seaholm shot
 

so...this giant truck was spotted at seaholm today from my window. Anyone have any info on what this is? Are they starting soon??????
http://i1342.photobucket.com/albums/...y/photo-91.jpg

Walked by the courthouse this past weekend. Actually starting to look good at ground level.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8479/8...b46371b6_c.jpg

......

I hope the Rainey Street development will prevail...
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/bl...op-future.html

KVUE had a story with video on that project.

Two downtown parking spots become Austin's first street patio
by Heather Kovar / KVUE News and photojournalist David Gardner
November 20, 2012

Looks nice. Hope it lasts after the one-year trial period.

Yeah, I hope so to.

Mueller Town Center has an official name now called " Aldrich Street".

http://muellersilentmarket.com/wp-co...Aldrich-St.jpg

http://muellersilentmarket.com/2012/...t-town-center/

The amount of thought going into attempting to create a neighborhood with character and authenticity at Mueller is inspiring. Let's hope it comes off that way once executed.

Sidenote: I thoroughly appreciate the use of normal-sounding street names in this development and I feel that will assist in it feeling like a been-there-forever district. Aldrich Street, Simond Avenue, McCloskey Street, even Zach Scott Street, etc. ...these all sound way more real to me than the stupid shit mass homebuilders peddle like Soft Seafoam Drive, Inspiring Dew Lane, Lone Stallion Chase, Via Rosa Rojo, blah blah blah. (FYI, I totally made that whole second batch up :P).

Very very nice!

I love spending time on the Austin forum because there's so much more going on! I wish some of yall's downtown momentum would rub off on downtown San Antonio :/ lol

My sister lives on a Nijmegen Drive in "one of those neighborhoods". The street is named after the Dutch city. It's pronounced Ny-meg-gan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nijmegen

All the streets in my neighborhood are named after deserts. Libyan, Mojave, Sahara, Gobi, etc.

I'd rather street names be named after historical figures or places (local or not) than some cheesy name like Oak Glen or Whispering Pines.

One of my "favorites" is Piedras Blanco Dr. near William Cannon and McKinney Falls Pkwy.

On a somewhat similar note of infelicitous names, I've always wondered what the reasoning was behind the Bastrop subdivision with all the Hawaiian names (e.g., Keanahalululu Lane).

I must confess that I live in one of "those neighborhoods" at the moment. All of the streets in my area are named after influential authors; Orwell, Zola, Fitzgerald, Tolstoy, Kafka, Huxley, etc. Then there's some really bad, stereotypical names; Chinati Mountain Trail, Limpia Creek Drive, Candelaria Mesa Drive, Quitman Mountain Way. It's really awful. The authors thing is kind of cool, but what's with these other names? It seems like a mix of branding strategy and laziness.

......

Those other names are mountains and other geological features in West Texas. Candelaria is a small town in Presidio County.

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/ne...in-worlds.html
-

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/pr...-not-much.html

I love themed street names for neighborhoods. A famous artists and a famous composers one would be cool.

Mozart
Beethoven
Bach
Strauss
Brahms
Holst
Mahler
Verdi
Wagner
Copland
Gershwin
Sibelius
Liszt

those could all be cool names. Then you have

Cezanne
Monet
Matisse
Braque
Mondrian
Rubens
O'Keeffe
Whistler
Da Vinci
Picasso
Renoir
Bernini
Degas
Klimt

and so on

Yea, Piedras Blanco is great, really, what dumbass came up with that.....anybody who has the slightest clue about Spanish knows those 2 words go together like that. Piedras Blancas would have been correct. However, hands down the best street name in town is Cockburn. hahahaha

After having lunch today at Hecho en Mexico, which is at the intersection of William Cannon and Escarpment, I headed east on William Cannon and saw a street called Hitching Post and another called Fence Line. These streets are in a beautiful neighborhood and the street names don't even begin to match the neighborhood. Really silly names.

Best street name I've ever come across was in Hilton Head, SC. Check this out:

Ghost Crab Way

Hands down, the greatest concentration of stupid street names I've ever seen is browsing the exurb subdivisions of Las Vegas on Google Earth. The developers there clearly didn't try to pretend they weren't fresh out of normal names after a point.

Real examples: Remembrance Hill Street, Raindrop Canyon Avenue, Pewter Pheasant Avenue and Antique Sterling Court (both in the same subd.), Homerun Champ Drive (among a subd. full of baseball themed streets), Rustic Galleon Street, Briney Deep Avenue, Spindrift Cove Street....these developers should stop building houses in Vegas no one is buying and start writing fantasy novels.

Sorry for derailing this thread for a minute there :P Who's got a photo update of something!

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/ne...th-beyond.html
PDF file of slide presentation:
http://assets.bizjournals.com/austin...h%20Summit.pdf

Graph images:
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/ne...=image_gallery

Conversely, wish we had Pearl and Museum Reach, and a Tobin Center, Western Art Museum thang happening. The historic re-use in SA is simply brilliant! It is the only large Texas city that hasn't bulldozed most traces of the past. And I hope it keeps what's left.

Soon any address bordering the Broadway neighborhood will be a very urban one, as desirable as any further north. Am loving watching the changes on google maps, and of course right here.

I think your "height phase" is about to hit downtown too. It's all about to connect up (only my opinion). Texas 2 cool cities. Cheers! :)

Wanna hear a strange street name? Try Jinx Ave. The street I live on...

If only Austin had done the same thing.

Marriott: Looks like they've reached the bottom in parts, rebar for large columns are on site, appear to be drilling.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8065/8...103bff48_b.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8487/8...a6a4497a_c.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8205/8...e59a8bcd_b.jpg


Federal Courthouse: All the fences around it have been removed; walked by the other night you could see office furniture inside. Looks like it's close to being done. This one has grown on me over time, but the big plastic walls on top ruin the whole thing.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8488/8...02d2e4e4_b.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8199/8...a2dab07f_b.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8207/8...d28305e3_c.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8204/8...da48a601_c.jpg

The courthouse turned out way better than expected.

Yeah, I'm liking the texture of the facade. It's interesting, and it reminds me of the limestone cut-outs along Loop 360.

My understanding is that the original developer was enchanted with all things Hawaiian. Unfortunately the Lost Pines area of Bastrop does not have a damn thing about it that is remotely Hawaiian. I always thought the that the neighborhood suffered in terms of property values because of the cheesy Hawaiian theme. It is (or was before the fire) an area of nice hills and dense pine forest adjacent to the Colorado River. It always reminded me of areas outside of Atlanta or somewhere in the deep South.

Unfortunately, though, the courthouse is like a nice little gem surrounded by a giant turd - the building is absolutely hideous when you are walking by on the south side of 5th Street. I actually really like the design of the main building, and the pavilion in front of Republic Square park is very nice. However, walking past the building on 5th Street all you can see are those giant, barren concrete slabs - it looks like something out of Iraq. The walls are so tall that near the west end of 5th street you can't actually see the building at all. During construction I thought those "holes" in the wall (you can see them in priller's last picture) would serve some purpose, like having panels installed or something. When they took down the construction fences and those walls were left like completely bare like they are, I got really sad. It looks like unfinished construction on that side.

I could be wrong but I believe the walls are a safety barrier. One reason why San Antonio Street stops at the courthouse is regulations since 9/11 in protecting federal courthouses from a terrorist attack. I would assume those walls are designed to deflect anything from the 5th street side.

I personally love the finished courthouse a ton. I've been using the San Antonio portion as a coffee spot. I recommend it.

I think this is right, except I'm pretty sure the regulations came after the Federal building was bombed in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh.

Stream Realty joins Seaholm leasing team
 

The company that is redeveloping the Seaholm Power Plant into a mixed-use project has tapped Stream Realty Partners to handle retail and office leasing.

Stream Realty brokers Matt Frizzell, Brad Philp, Kevin Granger, Bryan Dabbs and Edvin Beasely will join forces with John Rosato and Danny Roth. Rosato and Roth are executives with Southwest Strategies Group, the managing partner of Seaholm Power LLC. http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/bl...d-seaholm.html

IBC Bank Tower
 

I noticed that the western end of the parking lot at 5th and Nueces recently vacated by the little shoal creek relocation project was been patched with asphalt and power washed today. I wonder if the construction that was supposed to start this month has been delayed. You wouldn't think they would patch something that was going to be ripped up soon.

That sounds a lot like a shameless plug. :rolleyes:

I do apologize if it appears that I am, however, I am quite the opposite :cool:

the fence has gone up around half the Lamar plaza and the drive through thundercloud is being torn down good bye thundercloud that location always got my order wrong >.< and that Mexican restaurant not sad to see it go to be honest

aren't all thundercloud employees always high, anyways?

Well for sure the way I tip them! LOL!

....I love my Thundercloud! ( Lavaca)

I once applied to the one on 12th st (?) the location a block away from ACC Rio Grande and this was literally the question they asked me as if it was a prerequisite. The guy asked me if I smoked... and I said no then he said that I probably won't get the job. I don't know if he was being facetious or not, but all I know is that I didn't get the job.

Quick pano of the Marriott site this morning:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8204/8...7ae07338_b.jpg

I agree - I think the pavilion, and the main building itself, are really nice. That's why I think the "blast walls" are so unfortunate. And yeah, I understand they're there for security reasons. I just wish they could have done something nicer with them architecturally/design-wise, instead of leaving them as bare slabs of unfinished concrete.