AUSTIN | Projects & Construction III

[BevoLJ]

That is what they said in the email. I also went to one of their monthly events they have at House Wine on Barton Springs and they said the same thing. They also said they would like to add a restaurant level and observation level at the top so it might be higher than the 655 they said, but that they weren't sure if they would be able to add it or not.

If anyone is interested they have a social gathering at House Wine in South Austin on the last Wednesdays of every month. When I went it was pretty cool. Lots of interesting science talk and other fun and interesting discussions if you enjoy itching your inner geek occasionally like I do. Also House Wine donates 10% of the night to the planetarium.

Also up in North Austin on the second Tuesdays of every month they have their monthly fundraisers at Opal Divine. I haven't been to that one as that far north may as well be Canada for me.

[Syndic]

I didn't like the Planetarium tower at first, but now that I look at it again it looks like the side of the tower isn't concrete after all but instead windows. If that's the case, I think it could look pretty cool (at night, especially). I just hope there's some more development in the capitol district to help even things out in terms of the skyline.

[AusTxDevelopment]

Originally Posted by Hill Country

That building is not ugly. It is awesome!

Sorry - I didn't mean to offend. Maybe it's just an ugly rendering. From the rendering it looks like the side of the building is either a metal or stone skin, or possibly concrete. That is not a smart design because if you are going to go that tall - especially with a residential tower - views are EVERYTHING! However, Syndic thinks that might be grey glass windows, which means the tower will look significantly different (and better) in real life. Finished buildings always look different than their renderings, so I'm optomistic.

Btw, there's a good article on super-tall residential towers in today's Wall Street Journal online, and it includes a slide show.

WSJ.com
Living The High Life
Developers are erecting super-skyscrapers for the very wealthy, selling apartments with helicopter views for massive price tags. Why everyone's looking up; plus, the realities of life on the 90th floor.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...232347238.html

Here is one of the graphics from the WSJ.com article:

[BevoLJ]

Originally Posted by AusTxDevelopment

Sorry - I didn't mean to offend. Maybe it's just an ugly rendering. From the rendering it looks like the side of the building is either a metal or stone skin, or possibly concrete. That is not a smart design because if you are going to go that tall - especially with a residential tower - views are EVERYTHING! However, Syndic thinks that might be grey glass windows, which means the tower will look significantly different (and better) in real life. Finished buildings always look different than their renderings, so I'm optomistic.

Btw, there's a good article on super-tall residential towers in today's Wall Street Journal online, and it includes a slide show.

WSJ.com
Living The High Life
Developers are erecting super-skyscrapers for the very wealthy, selling apartments with helicopter views for massive price tags. Why everyone's looking up; plus, the realities of life on the 90th floor.

The windows are set in a foot or two kind of like Perry-Castañeda.


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...800px-PCL3.JPG

But unlike the Perry-Castañeda the Planaterium town isn't using the grid for its windown, but more of a whopperjawed random pattern that is more popular today. So they won't line up from one floor to the next, but will be a bit random on each floor.

It would be crazy to not have windown looking south or north. That would give them no views of UT to the north or the Capitol Building and Downtown Austin to the south. lol.

[AusTxDevelopment]

Remember this?



T. Stacy & Walton Street just put the land & existing buildings on the market for sale today. So this won't happen - at least not in this form. Hopefully a developer will buy it and build something cool there. It's one of the closest sites to the Capitol that can have a supertall building on it. They are referring to it as a 1.6M square foot development opportunity. For the record that's 2.8 Frost Bank Towers, which has 560,674 square feet.

Below shows you what is for sale. It includes Bank of America Tower, the BOA Annex, a parking lot and a couple of garages including the Littlefield garage. HFF has the sale listing. This image is from their emailer. You have to sign a confidentiality agreement, prove you are a licensed real estate broker AND name your buyer if you want to get a copy the sales package. They don't give those out to very many people.

[AusTxDevelopment]

Originally Posted by BevoLJ

The windows are set in a foot or two kind of like Perry-Castañeda.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...800px-PCL3.JPG

But unlike the Perry-Castañeda the Planaterium town isn't using the grid for its windown, but more of a whopperjawed random pattern that is more popular today. So they won't line up from one floor to the next, but will be a bit random on each floor.

It would be crazy to not have windown looking south or north. That would give them no views of UT to the north or the Capitol Building and Downtown Austin to the south. lol.

Hmm. That doesn't make sense. The PCL was built that way to limit the amount of sunlight that comes in through the windows, both to protect the books and to limit distractions for students. Why would you do that in a residential tower? The views are what people are paying for. And whopperjawed (my new favorite word) random patterns might look groovy from the outside, but your interior floors and walls are still a grid - so the floors and walls will be cutting across windows? Weird. I guess I'd need to see more detailed elevations or renderings to understand. Maybe I'll go to one of those wine do-dahs. Thanks for sharing.

[migol24]

Originally Posted by AusTxDevelopment

Remember this?



T. Stacy & Walton Street just put the land & existing buildings on the market for sale today. So this won't happen - at least not in this form. Hopefully a developer will buy it and build something cool there. It's one of the closest sites to the Capitol that can have a supertall building on it. They are referring to it as a 1.6M square foot development opportunity. For the record that's 2.8 Frost Bank Towers, which has 560,674 square feet.

Below shows you what is for sale. It includes Bank of America Tower, the BOA Annex, a parking lot and a couple of garages including the Littlefield garage. HFF has the sale listing. This image is from their emailer. You have to sign a confidentiality agreement, prove you are a licensed real estate broker AND name your buyer if you want to get a copy the sales package. They don't give those out to very many people.

Well, at the very least we can hope some other experienced developer will buy and put some sic eye candy on the Austin skyline.

[JoninATX]

I wonder if T. Stacy backed out because of the new office tower proposed on 3rd & Colorado?

[JoninATX]

Originally Posted by Syndic

WTF is this? It looks rather lame, misguided, and ridiculous; a total monoculture. Mixed-use isn't much good if you cut it off from the rest of the city and surround it with a bunch of parking lots and green space. Le sigh...

Also, the rendering looks like a bunch of monopoly houses and that website is just atrocious. Don't mean to sound completely negative, but wow.

Progress I would say, but I see where ur coming from.

[BevoLJ]

Lol, guess I was a week early in moving the JW from approved to U/C list.

Work starts next week on JW Marriott downtown convention hotel
By Shonda Novak

Construction is set to start next week on the downtown JW Marriott convention hotel, after the developer recently received final approval of the project's building plans from the city of Austin.

The $300 million hotel will rise 33 stories on the east side of Congress Avenue and Second Street. It will have 1,012 keys, making it the world's largest JW Marriott in room count when it opens in early 2015. Crews have been working on the site, relocating underground utilities. Late next week, construction is expected to begin on the project itself, with the first phase being a three-story underground parking garage with 458 spaces. The garage will take nine to 10 months to build, followed by construction of the hotel.

More than 40,000 room reservations have already been sold, said the hotel's developer, Indiana-based White Lodging Services Corp.

"We are incredibly excited about delivering this signature project for Austin," Deno Yiankes, White Lodging's president and CEO of investments and development, said in a statement to the American-Statesman. "This hotel will be a game-changer for the city's tourism industry, and I believe that is already being confirmed by the number of rooms we have pre-sold. A convention hotel of this size and quality will take Austin to the next level in recruiting national conventions and events."

Mayor Lee Leffingwell said the project represents "the single largest investment in downtown Austin to date and will offer significant economic benefits to the city, including tax revenue and job creation.

...

Read More: http://www.statesman.com/business/wo...e=rss_business

[The ATX]

It will be a while before we see this go vertical - 10 months to dig/build the underground parking garage.

[migol24]

Originally Posted by Hill Country

It will be a while before we see this go vertical - 10 months to dig/build the underground parking garage.

Yep, i remember how long it took for the Ashton and W, both similar height to start rising. It's gonna be awhile.

[KevinFromTexas]

The height doesn't have too much to do with it, but they are planning under ground parking. And that will. And while the parking garage is only 3 floors deep, while Ashton's was 6 levels deep, this will likely cover most of the block, and it's a big block - 275x335 feet. It's at least 3 times the size of the lot where Ashton is. It'll be the largest construction site in downtown since the Frost Bank Tower. Once they reach street level and get done with the podium, the tower will rise pretty quick.

[migol24]

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

The height doesn't have too much to do with it, but they are planning under ground parking. And that will. And while the parking garage is only 3 floors deep, while Ashton's was 6 levels deep, this will likely cover most of the block, and it's a big block - 275x335 feet. It's at least 3 times the size of the lot where Ashton is. It'll be the largest construction site in downtown since the Frost Bank Tower. Once they reach street level and get done with the podium, the tower will rise pretty quick.

Yeah, you're right. That's what I meant to say. It's the bottom level that takes the longest and I remember how long the other projects took to start rising.

[jowens]

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

The tower will be residential, most likely condominiums. BevoLJ, I remember you had emailed them and gotten the height for the tower. 655 feet. That would be our 2nd tallest, 3rd tallest if and when the Fairmont Hotel gets built.

However it would appear to be the tallest or close to it because of the higher elevation.

[priller]

Yeah, the W took forever to get above ground. Still, exciting project! Great to see something major getting started (and another surface lot extinguished).

[KevinFromTexas]

Originally Posted by jowens

However it would appear to be the tallest or close to it because of the higher elevation.

On the horizon it probably will appear taller than The Austonian.

The Austonian is at 476 feet above sea level.

The Planetarium/Residential Tower's block elevation is 520 to 532 feet, with the higher elevation on the west side. So the mid range of that is 526 which is 50 feet higher than The Austonian block. So on the horizon this building will appear to be 705 feet tall compared to The Austonian. But that's only when you are viewing the skyline from either east or west when you have The Austonian to compare it to.

The numbers below are combining the buildings' heights plus their sea level elevations at street level. So this is the elevation above sea level that your feet would be at. So whatever your height is add that to these numbers.

Planetarium Residential Tower - 1,181 feet (this is at 526 feet).
Fairmont Austin Hotel - 1,160 (spire height) - 1,041 (roof height)
The Austonian - 1,159 feet.
ACC Pinnacle Campus - 1,159 feet (sea level elevation at 1,005 feet)
Palisades West - 1,126 feet (sea level elevation at 1,009 feet)
Tower of the Hills - 1,084 feet
360 Condominums - 1,041 feet (spire height)
Frost Bank Tower - 1,000 feet (crown height)
W Hotel & Residences - 946
UT Tower - 901 feet
Spring - 893 feet
Texas Capitol - 856 feet

So the Planetarium Residential Tower will have the highest sea level height at the roof in Austin. The highest sea level elevation at street level in Austin is Palisades West at 1,009 feet above sea level.

The tallest of the tv towers in West Austin likely has an elevation at the top of 2,150 feet above sea level.

[priller]

Alright, it's been a long time since I've tried this, very rusty at the ol' SketchUp, but I decided to try working on some models of new projects.

This first one is the Fairmont Hotel next to the convention center. This is just a bare-bones model, no textures and not too much detail. Just wanted to get an idea what it would look like on the skyline, using Google Earth.

The model is sized based on Kevin's info in the Fairmont thread, 554' to the main roof, 600' to the top. Just guessed on the spire.

This is from I-35 and Riverside, going north:



From Congress bridge:



From S. Congress:



From Lamar pedestrian bridge:



From 11th and I-35:



From east side (Progress Coffee):



View from top of Omni hotel:

[shanny]

awesome

[migol24]

ummm... wow! The Fairmont is gonna look pretty impressive heading north on I-35. Someone said earlier that the planetarium would be one of the best towers in Texas if built. I think the Fairmont might be an even more impressive building. If the Spire is set at 600' I think it was actually going to reach 700' or so... not sure.