Houston featured nationally, gondola transit, rankings, and more
Before I get to some smaller misc items, I wanted to mention Joel Kotkin's new book, "The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050
". Houston features prominently in it, and he actually launched the book at an event here. NPR has a review here (scroll down), with an audio interview here (also scroll down; hat tip to Peter). Have a read and let me know what you think.Moving on to the smaller misc items:
- Another reason why it's a good thing Houston never got the Olympics.
- A Miami Herald feature on the arts in Houston. Hat tip to Jessie.
- A compelling case for gondolas/cable-cars as transit solutions. Could this work in Houston, especially in areas with severe right-of-way limitations?
- A new link that I've added to the blogroll: a list of all the recent features on Houston in the national press.
- Continuing the entrepreneurship theme from last month, here's a great article on how Brigham Young aggressively uses tech transfer to create startups, something Rice, UH, TAMU, BCM, and other local universities could learn a lot from.
- The people of Orange County, CA are moving to Texas, plus home affordability stats. Hat tip to Hugh.
- The NY Times thinks something very interesting is going on in Houston's restaurant scene, and the Chronicle's Alison Cook strongly agrees.
- Interesting thread over at HAIF on items that might make Houston 'better'. I don't necessarily agree with all of the suggestions, but it's still interesting reading.
- Ft. Bend County (i.e. around Sugar Land) is Forbes' best place to get ahead, Texas has the largest 10-year growth in private sector jobs among all states, and also leads the country in high-growth cities according to Business Week. Hat tip(s) to Jessie.
Labels: development, dining, economy, entrepreneurship, home affordability, mobility strategies, perspectives, quality of place, rankings, transit
posted by Tory Gattis @ 4:09 PM
7 Comments:
Tory,
Regarding the "how to make Houston better" thread, there is some political competition out there as to what to do. The engineers, along with the Flood and Drainage constituency have some big plans for putting big money into flood control and not sidewalks. I'd be on the lookout for a bond referendum in an upcoming election on the issue.
Neal
How to make Houston better.
Make our train more useful.
I just found out that Metro is not extending service hours for the Rodeo. I am going with a friend who lives right off a station, but will not be able to use the train because we are planning on staying for the last show at the hideout that ends at midnight. The last train leaves Fannin P&R at 11. I mean giving the train longer hours to make parking in downtown or midtown or at hermann park feasible would get rid of alot of the parking issues associated with the rodeo.
This has also been a problem for me when I want to go out to midtown or downtown on the weekends. Why would you make the last train leave Fannin at 1:40(UH downtown at 2:20), run at least one more train so people don't have to rush to the station right at last call.
I'm Dallas for an interview this week. The explorer side of me might be heading down to Houston for one day to check it out and get a feel for the city.
Maybe the gondola could be used over 59 in the below-grade portion near downtown. I wonder if the cost of suspending it there would be much less than constructing a rail line over the freeway. I suspect that it would.
Another place I would like to see it is along Post Oak. They could spruce it up and even make it an attraction that brings people DIRECTLY into the middle of the Galleria. A train could never do that! I wonder if the shopowners and owners of the mall and surrounding businesses would support something like this ...
They might be able to even have a Gondola on Post Oak instead of the Uptown LRT. The Galleria area already suffers from congestion because everything is at-grade and there are few good arterial streets. LRT will compound those problems. Gondolas might decrease these problems.
I avoid the Galleria like the plague right now because there is really no other way to get there without having to deal with traffic. I maybe go twice a year. Once the light rail is running, I'll be taking it every time and will go more often.
BTW, took Metro to the rodeo last night. Packed and very efficient. Best part was that I could have a couple of beers and not have worry about driving home!
Tory, I must say that I found Houston incredibly interesting. You definitely have the makings of America's Fourth City down there. Who knows what the future holds, but I'm very optimistic. I much prefer it to Dallas.
In fact, I don't even know why Dallasites love trashing the city, it's nothing like they say it is. The only thing Houstonians have said about Dallas is that it's boring, and that's true compared to Houston.
Not that I can take any credit for the city, but thanks for the kind words, RC. I'm optimistic too.
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