Results tagged “urbandevelopment”

Transportation for America has ranked Austin-Round Rock as the 19th most dangerous metro area for pedestrians among the 52 largest metro areas in the United States. They calculated that walking in Austin was slightly less dangerous than walking in Texas as a whole, but substantially more dangerous than walking in the rest of the nation as a whole. Texas spends approximately 1% of its federal transportation funds on pedestrian projects, compared to 1.5% nationwide.

Some local modern design geeks recently launched Hotel Metrohouse, a nifty alternative to hotels or couch surfing that allows people to rent out super modern, furnished houses.

How about a brief quiz to start things off, shall we? 1. Which would cause drivers to be more careful and drive conservatively when passing through an area with a substantial deer population? a. A high-tech flashing sign with animated deer. b. A deer carcass on the side of the road. 2. Which of the following is more effective at causing drivers to slow down as they pass through a neighborhood with lots of children? a. A sign stating ‘Children Playing’. b. A child’s bicycle left on a sidewalk. 3. What bad conduct did a former mayor of Bogota, Colombia successfully modify through the use of behavior mocking mimes in his formerly lawless city? a. Narco-terrorism. b. Traffic violations. 4. Which is more effective at getting you to slow down? a. A ‘Speed Zone’ or ‘Traffic Monitored By Radar’ sign. b. A cop sitting on the side of the road with a radar gun.

How about slower traffic, less accidents, safer streets for children and wait for it, No more text messaging while driving? That’s right, in a never ending quest to make our streets safer and more predictable, we may have actually made them more dangerous and so mind numbingly easy to drive that we enable bad behaviors such as texting while driving. Let me reiterate that: The design of our streets may be partially to blame for drivers text messaging.

The Austonian is a residential skyscraper currently under construction in Austin at the corner of Congress Avenue and Second Street. It is already the tallest building in Austin and upon completion in 2009 will be 683 feet tall with 56 floors.

Let's see, you could spend five minutes looking at the most recent inane quizzes your friends have taken on Facebook or you could spend that same time do something that might inspire legions of people to get involved in creating an even better tomorrow for Austin. What d'ya think?

This year's AIA Austin Homes Tour will be held on Saturday and Sunday October 10-11, 2009 from 12-6 p.m each day. Tickets are $25 in advance and $30 the weekend of the event. Tickets may be purchased at Cissi’s Market, Zinger Hardware or directly from AIA Austin. Additional information is available from AIA Austin (512.452.4332) or aiaaustin.org. The 24th Annual AIA Austin Homes Tour is a showcase of great design by local architects. This self-guided tour encompasses 14 homes from Central Austin to Lakeway and includes new construction, renovation and preservation projects with traditional and contemporary designs.

Buildings and cities get grouped together in our collective perspective. Planners and architects are often educated in the same school and it is not uncommon for architects to take on the role of planners at some level. But indeed they are very different. Author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig, wrote in his later book, LILA, something to the effect that cities are not for people…people are for cities. He observed that people were literally consumed by cities. In a city, there is a dearth of opportunity for people to subsist…and living requires economic engagement. Cities and Economy are essential components of the Human paradigm.

Real estate is always unpredictable, but houses are sitting on the market a lot longer now than they were last year and sellers must be nervous. Negotiate like a Pawn Star: offer low and go up slow. Sellers (and your broker and their broker) may not like it, but most will come back somewhere in the middle. None will throw away your number. Today's Hot Real Estate Listings post is on Burnet between 45th and 2222. Good access to a lot of interesting retail (e.g., great restaurants without a wait for a table (e.g., Maru)). Parts of Brentwood, Allandale and Rosedale. It's like living in a Billy Joel's dream, but hotter.

This afternoon, City Council will consider a proposal for a 30 acre planned unit development (PUD) between Riverside Drive and Lakeshore Boulevard in southeast Austin. The development would replace 600 apartments now on the site with 1,200 apartments and 97,000 square feet of street-level retail space. Developers are seeking the right to build up to 90 feet high, but the tallest building in the current plan is only 75 feet tall. The recently enacted waterfront overlay ordinance imposes a height limit of 60 feet in the area, but the ordinance does not apply to PUDs.

Lets face it, language is important. Sure, the title ‘Comprehensive Plan’ is accurate but it doesn’t exactly foster an atmosphere of possibility, imagination or openness. In fact, it rather suggests something ‘definite’, something to be fought over and battled around instead of ‘Let’s think how we want our city to look, feel and function for the next couple of decades’ . Unless I am mistaken it is actually a framework and a series of goals, right? So why not change the name or modify it. Austin Tomorrow, the previous plan’s name is more interesting but in my opinion it’s not action oriented or suggestive of the distance that we should be looking in the future. How about Imagine Austin or Envision Austin or Re-Envision Austin or Austin 2040 or my personal creation that is admittedly dead in the water, Make Austin Weirder. Seriously though, if you want imagine and talk about the future, you’ve got to set the stage for it. No better way to get the ball rolling than to re-brand the entire affair. Have a City-wide competition to name it as well as raise awareness of the process. Someone out there can do a heck of a lot better than my, Envision Austin.

The concept of sustainability has become a hot button issue in the design field within the last few years. So much so that “green” architecture has found its way into the mainstream. Clients are now requesting, if not demanding, LEED certified projects. The general public seems to have begun linking sustainability to architecture. I believe that this trend will continue and eventually the concept of sustainability will be codified both the theory and practice of architecture. But for now, the problem is that most people have a limited view of what it means to be “green.” They have equated sustainability solely with material choices and energy savings/efficiency.

The W Austin Hotel & Residences project downtown, which is the planned to be the future home to Austin City Limits tapings, needs new financing. Corus Bank was signed up to provide a $165 million construction loan, but has been hit hard by the economic downturn and assigned the loan to a subsidiary of the developer, Stratus Properties, in exchange for a $250,000 reduction in the outstanding balance. According to Stratus, they are "aggressively pursuing other options for financing the future construction costs," including additional equity contributions by the current developers, a new loan, new equity partners, or a combination. If they can't come up with the money, construction may be delayed.

Back-to-School, an event annually hosted by Manos de Cristo, will take place in a former Chair King warehouse, offering the first glimpse of an impromptu collaboration between Travis County, Ridgetop Neighborhood Association, and AIA Design Voice. Holding this event in this empty big box began as a “what if” posed by motivated and altruistic citizens, but rapidly revealed a rich and exemplary beacon of hope for all of Austin.

Join Shawn Shillington, our Urban Development Editor, along with Council Member Chris Riley, Jeb Boyt of the Waller Creek Citizen's Advisory Committee and Austin Metro Trails & Greenways, Jana McCann of ROMA Design Group and James Moody of The Mohawk and the Austin Live Music Task Force, for a thrilling bike tour of the soon-to-be-redeveloped Waller Creek. The tour will start at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday August 1 at the Mexican American Cultural Center Plaza.

If you only knew them as dots on a map, you might expect Austin and San Antonio to be very similar. With downtowns a mere 70 miles apart, you would be correct in assuming they share similar geographies and climates. Studying the map further you would note both cities are bisected by rivers and, depending on how detailed the map, you might also see that while Austin has lined its river with hike and bike trails, San Antonio has surrounded its water feature with restaurants and bars. While this would seem to imply San Antonio is the hipper, cooler place, you do not need me to tell you it is not. MTV has yet to shoot a season of “The Real World” in a pimped-out mansion on the Riverwalk. There is no “San Antonioist” blog. Indeed, for all of its layered history and cultures, San Antonio as it exists today is a much less compelling place than its younger sibling to the north.

The Austonian is a residential skyscraper currently under construction in Austin at the corner of Congress Avenue and Second Street. It is already the tallest building in Austin and upon completion in 2009 will be 683 feet tall with 56 floors. When these photographs were taken, construction was up to the 52rd floor. The shots were taken on the 51st floor.

A city’s downtown comprises the heart of the community, and its streets form the primary public arena for interchange and commerce. Downtown Austin belongs to all of the city’s residents, and its streets serve as the primary public place. Although it has always represented the community culturally, economically, and politically, downtown Austin has traditionally lacked the vibrancy engendered by numerous pedestrian-dominant and multi-functional commercial corridors that define other cities.

I have plenty of time to think about the progress of Austin as I pass exit-after-exit during my shorter-than-average commute from Northwest Austin to South Austin. Sometimes I wonder where the “cool” part of Austin stops and the “sprawling” part of Austin begins, or why I would never, ever walk (or bike) from my neighborhood to the two large grocery stores near my home, even though I would have happily walked over a mile to the market during my six-month stay in Munich.

Cooper, Robertson presented two proposals today for the future development of the Brackenridge Tract. The most controversial point is that both plans include the elimination of Lions Municipal Golf Course. The main difference between the plans is that one also eliminates the Field Lab, while the other merely shrinks it. Both plans keep the West Austin Youth Association, although one plan moves it slightly southward.

It looks like Unplugged at the Grove may be saved from the Zombie Noise Ordinance by Mike Martinez's boomstick an emergency amendment. The plan is that the amendment will keep the Zombie Noise Ordinance at bay until Shady Grove can get their Outdoor Music Permit renewed and get rezoned as a cocktail lounge.

Cooper, Robertson will present two conceptual master plans for the Brackenridge Tract to the U. T. System Board of Regents at around 1pm on Thursday, June 18 in Ashbel Smith Hall 9th Floor, 201 West Seventh Street.

The noise ordinance that rose from the grave to kill live music at Freddie's has claimed another south Austin victim. Sahara Smith was opening for Jimmy LaFave last night at Shady Grove as part of KGSR's Unplugged at the Grove series, when police responding to a noise complaint showed up with a decibel meter to shut it down. The Unplugged at the Grove series had been running for sixteen years.

Tomorrow night (Wednesday, May 20th, 2009), cyclists all over the world will participate in the 7th annual Ride of Silence in honor and in memory of fellow cyclists that have been injured or killed while cycling on public roadways. In Austin TX, we will start an eight-mile ride originating and ending on the Pfluger Bridge. Dedications and announcements start at 6:15pm. The ride starts at 7pm and will last approximately one hour.

The Waller Creek Citizen Advisory Committee invites members of the community to attend a Master Plan Workshop on Wednesday, May 13, 2009 from 6-9 p.m. It will be held at the Austin Convention Center in Ballroom C.

If you parked at a meter downtown this weekend, you may have gotten a "Violation" like the one shown here, saying that Lee Leffingwell wants you to pay to park on nights and weekends. The violation flyers were distributed by a group called BrewsterNation.com, which has posted Leffingwell's unedited response on YouTube. The question, which was asked by the author of this post at the Austin Super Forum, was "Should the city start generating more revenue from street parking by charging people to park at night and on the weekends?"

Brewster McCracken posted a YouTube video trashing St. Louis. It may not be a masterpiece of comic timing, but it has become one of the more widely covered moments of the current mayoral campaign. St. Louis does have some problems, but picking a fight with another city seems feisty.

The last agenda item at tomorrow's city council meeting is the proposed ordinance based on the recommendations by the Waterfront Overlay Task Force. The ordinance will set up a new Waterfront Planning Advisory Board to "assist in promoting excellence" in the waterfront overlay district, which covers most of the area near Lady Bird Lake on both sides. In addition to the existing requirements for reviews by the Land Use Commission and the Parks and Recreation Department, the ordinance requires the new board to review site plans and zoning or rezoning applications in the district.

According to Fred Nelson of Freddie's, prior noise complaints resulting in APD visits had found them to be in compliance with the 85db limit, but a visit on Saturday, April 10, 2009 found them around 80db and not in compliance with the new 70db limit. APD issued a warning and indicated that subsequent visits would result in a fine and arrests. Fred stopped the band and cancelled 83 shows already booked for 2009, representing over 200 Austin area musicians who no longer have a gig at Freddie's.

The western portion of the Lance Armstrong Bikeway (from Austin High to Shoal Creek) appears to be open. The ambience of car-choked Cesar Chavez can't compete with lovely Lady Bird Lake, but there is something nice about zipping along clear concrete instead of dodging the ladies who lope. The several shrimpy stop signs lead the lone biker to wonder "Are you small so they could make more of you? Does your dinkiness diminish my obligation to obey?"