AUSTIN | Projects & Construction II - Page 97

Strayone · #**1921** Posted **Nov 22, 2007, 1:06 AM**

If you commute to New Braunfels you will probably drive on I35 and will not like it. Everything else is real cool down here. I know there has been forum meets I have yet to make it one, hopefully the next. You should enjoy this thread as well as the Austin update thread and others devoted to our fair city.

Nashvegas06 · #**1922** Posted **Nov 22, 2007, 1:30 AM**

I agree about the I-35 drive, that is why we want to live south of downtown. In the long run however we want to live downtown. The only issue is that if I still need to travel to New Braunfels, I don't feel that living downtown helps anything other than my quest to live in the city.
Although as I love Nashville, I do feel that Austin has a great street level vibe. I had wish Nashville had the same and do believe they will, but at the same time I think Austin's skyline is moving forward nicely.

austin242 · #**1923** Posted **Nov 22, 2007, 4:35 AM**

If you travel south from south austin in the morning you will have no problems there is no traffic, and in the afternoon on the way back there is still no traffic so you should have no problem with work traffic.

Trae · #**1924** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 5:21 AM**

Any renderings on the 501 Congress tower?

austin242 · #**1925** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 5:35 PM**

I think that 360 isn't a particular building you want to be the tallest in your city. I wish that all our buildings being developed where as pretty and grand as frost.

Wattleigh · #**1926** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 6:15 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trae

Any renderings on the 501 Congress tower?

Check out this page with a rendering and more info. It's one of my favorites at the moment and I hope it gets built.

hookem · #**1927** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 7:37 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by austin242

I think that 360 isn't a particular building you want to be the tallest in your city. I wish that all our buildings being developed where as pretty and grand as frost.

It shouldn't be the tallest for very long. Frankly, I'd be a little dissappointed if any residential building was the tallest downtown, but that looks like what it's gonna be (with Austonian and 501 Congress).. somehow, that doesn't seem right. What does that say about your downtown? Not that it's the center of a city thriving with business, more like it's a city that is a playground for wealthy people. Like coastal FL and all their super tall residential.

JGFrisco · #**1928** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 9:24 PM**

501 is a LONG way from a reality. Stacy's website doesn't make mention of it, and there's no indication of work going to demo the site.

Keep this in mind - unusually shaped buildings like this are very expensive to build, compared with conventional ones. Having a wider top puts a lot of load on the columns below, and they have to be really beefy...which increases non-leaseable or sellable space, construction cost, etc.

I would be very, very surprised to see this building go up as drawn. It could happen, I guess, but with the real estate and lending markets the way they are, I just don't see it.

MichaelB · #**1929** Posted **Nov 25, 2007, 10:14 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by JGFrisco

501 is a LONG way from a reality. Stacy's website doesn't make mention of it, and there's no indication of work going to demo the site.

Keep this in mind - unusually shaped buildings like this are very expensive to build, compared with conventional ones. Having a wider top puts a lot of load on the columns below, and they have to be really beefy...which increases non-leaseable or sellable space, construction cost, etc.

I would be very, very surprised to see this building go up as drawn. It could happen, I guess, but with the real estate and lending markets the way they are, I just don't see it.

I know this is not a business savey thought... but, I would prefer to not see this building be built rather than have the generic version of it. New buildings for the sake of new buildings could leave us with a untinteresting skyline. I am a fan of many styles of architecture.... I just ask it have more than just height!

JGFrisco · #**1930** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 1:33 AM**

I hear you. But you know, you CAN come up with some interesting, unique architecture and still keep a general box shape.

arbeiter · #**1931** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 1:43 AM**

I wish we'd have more mid-rises - I think the first AMLI building is the amount of density we need in the neighborhoods outside of downtown but nearby. I am still waiting for East Riverside to be specially rezoned for that level of development. I think it will happen - those 60's apartments are nothing but waiting to be bulldozed.

StoOgE · #**1932** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 1:18 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by hookem

It shouldn't be the tallest for very long. Frankly, I'd be a little dissappointed if any residential building was the tallest downtown, but that looks like what it's gonna be (with Austonian and 501 Congress).. somehow, that doesn't seem right. What does that say about your downtown? Not that it's the center of a city thriving with business, more like it's a city that is a playground for wealthy people. Like coastal FL and all their super tall residential.

actually, what it says is that the city has very few giant companies, which is very true of Austin. Austin has tons of smaller (200-300 people) companies that are worth alot of money, but dont have the manpower to require downtown office space. The smaller office buildings on 360 and elsewhere are more than enough for them, traffic isnt as bad and its cheaper to rent them. So, blame city council for allowing these eyesores to pop up all over town instead of driving developers downtown into larger projects.

JGFrisco · #**1933** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 2:24 PM**

That fact that Austin's tallest buildings are residential means none of that.

What it means is that until the last few years, the city had a very restrictive height ordinance, and the city actively discouraged tall buildings. Didn't want them - might make the place look like a "city" or something.

It took the nasty increase in traffic to make city fathers decide that since the place IS a city, it might as well have a downtown area with density.

Even now, a lot of folks complain about the buildings, especially old-timers.

jgouger · #**1934** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 3:25 PM**

I agree StoOgE's comment. The fact is that Austin's economy is not built on oil or finance like Houston and Dallas's are, rather it is built on government and .com companies. I'm not really sure of the reasoning behind this, but it almost seems like .com companies keep things very humble while financial and oil companies commission giant phallic structures as a means of showing off their enormous wealth and power.

Austin's skyline would have had a lot more commercial buildings in downtown had the .com bust not happened. Vingette was about to build a downtown campus of 3-5 30+ towers on the river front. Then the bust happened and the plans were scrapped.

However though, I think that there is enough of pent-up demand for a major commercial class-a office project in downtown. Companies realize that they can attract the top talent by being in downtown, and they are willing to pay a premium for it. The word has gotten out to corporate America and it only a matter of time before a company has a major relocation to Austin.

ATXboom · #**1935** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 3:52 PM**

501 will be primarily office if built. There may not be any residential as by the time this would hit the market 2011 earliest there would easily be that much pent up office demand. I would not consider Stacey a "residential" builder... his exerptise is in the office market.

I also agree the first AMLI building is ideal density for the zoned urban corridors... east riverside, sout lamar, east 11th, etc.

M1EK · #**1936** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 4:34 PM**

More office downtown is wishful thinking until some additional commuting capacity into downtown is provided (rail would have been a nice way to do it - but commuter rail won't manage, and shared-lane streetcar wouldn't help either).

priller · #**1937** Posted **Nov 26, 2007, 4:34 PM**

I would like to point out again -- based on conversations with my company's owners who wanted to move downtown -- that the lack of parking and/or viable mass transit is a major factor keeping businesses from locating downtown. Adding another $250 or so a month for each employee for parking is a big added expense, and that's if you can even find enough spots. We have about 100 employees so that's an additional $25K/month expense we don't have right now in our current location. And then the office rent is higher downtown, too. So for us, at least, those were big factors against the move.

JGFrisco · #**1938** Posted **Nov 27, 2007, 3:49 AM**

I might point out that there's really no viable mass transit to downtown Houston, and there's certainly no more parking there.

There could have been taller office buildings in Austin, but the city squashed them. Here's the thing - office towers are cyclical. Many went up in the '80's all over the state...very, very few since. In fact, with the exception of Frost, there were no ohter office buildings over 450 feet tall started in Texas 1985 and 2005. Not one.

It's not just Austin - very few center-city office buildings have been built, because the economics aren't very good. People want offices in the suburbs - they don't want to commute downtown.

Things are changing a bit. There is a renewed push for downtown living in many cities, due to increased traffic and the high cost of gas. Most high-rise construction now is residential.

During the boom in the 80's, the city rigorously opposed height. Now they do not...but there isn't a demand for office space downtown.

Wattleigh · #**1939** Posted **Nov 27, 2007, 8:08 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by JGFrisco

In fact, with the exception of Frost, there were no ohter office buildings over 450 feet tall started in Texas 1985 and 2005. Not one.

There have been at least 3 that I can think of that were started within that timeframe and fit the criteria in Houston alone. I'm sure there may have been a few in Dallas as well during that time.

*1500 Lousiana (Chevron) 1999-2002 600 Ft
*Reliant Energy Plaza 2001-2003 518 Ft
*717 Texas (Calpine Center) 2001-2003 453 Ft

Close to 450 was Memorial Hermann Medical Plaza, which topped out at 430 Ft and was built between 2004 & 2006.

As for the mass transit options, the bulk of it at the moment is a number of bus routes which pass through the district and METRO's offices and terminal located in the downtown core. This is tied in with the light rail's existing Red Line (which passes through the center of the downtown core) should connect with two other light rail lines which will begin/end in DT and run to the East End and UH/Southeast Houston respectively. Those two should be completed within the next 5 years. 3 other lines running west would be several stops south in nearby Midtown.

JGFrisco · #**1940** Posted **Nov 27, 2007, 1:54 PM**

I pulled out my almanac to say that, and I missed those in Houston. I live in Dallas, and there definitely have NOT been any started here, or in Fort Worth.

I obviously missed those in Houston.

But the point remains. In the entire state, 3 office buildings over 500 feet tall were started between 1987 and 2005. Compare that to the number that were completed in the 80's...3 in Fort Worth, 11 in Dallas, and 16 in Houston.

The reason that there are few tall office buildings in Austin is that during the period in which most of the tallest in the state were built, the city was busy telling developers "no", don't do it.