The parade will travel down Texas, Fannin, Dallas, La Branch and Rusk streets ending on Crawford.

Parking will be available via paid garages, lots and limited street parking. Please pay attention to parking signs to avoid being towed.

Downtown Houston

The most convincing argument is based on Houston’s history cycle of freeway development expansion. Given the long period between TXDOT feasibility studies and projection completion most freeways are either outdated once completed or soon thereafter. Native Houstonians are very familiar with the results of the "Hail Mary" freeway projects from TXDOT. Suburban growth outpaces freeway expansion and in most cases is triggered by freeway expansion.

The HOV system is a reversible lane that allows High Occupancy Vehicles to avoid the ordinary congestion of the freeway system. Allowing single occupant vehicles into the HOV will nullify the functionality of the HOV system. In essence riders will face the same level of traffic a peak commute times, but without the ability to change lanes. Demand will exceed capacity.

While fees will increase with congestion, one must not forget that we are a service economy where time is money. The question every HOV driver will ask is what is the value of my time worth? But to truly frame the circumstances of a fee based use of the HOV, you need to look at it from an event driven perspective. How much is attending the after-school play worth? "I can’t miss little league photos, even $30 is worth it." Frame it from that perspective and you will find that rich or poor most would pony up $10 or more in the belief they would arrive on time. The problem is they won’t. In a metropolitan area with millions of citizens you will find that a single lane of traffic will find its capacity filled rather quickly. Rest assure Metro will not attach a service level agreement to your trip time. They will however gladly take your money while you sit parked on the HOV.

It’s December 19th and time is ticking for those whose Holiday shopping isn’t complete! The best kept secret in Houston for those last minute shoppers is Macy’s Downtown Houston. Conveniently located at 1110 Main Street, Macy’s Downtown is easy to get to and right off the Main Street Metro rail stop. At the Macy’s Downtown Houston location the crowds are less overwhelming than at the typical shopping mall. Macy’s, keep in mind is a multi-level department store! If you work in the downtown area, you can take advantage of its proximity, as major shopping is possible during the lunch hour. For those visiting Downtown Houston in the evening hours, Macy’s provides you with ample parking in their private garage. One other thing to consider is that if there is a must have item and all other locations are sold out, you may possibly find that the Downtown Houston location has it. Macy’s Downtown Houston has extended their hours over the holiday season to further their customers shopping convenience. One additional bonus about the Downtown Macy’s is that when you are finished with your shopping trip you can look up to enjoy the Holiday skyline of Downtown Houston.

Macy’s Downtown Houston Holiday Store Hours:

December 19th 7am-8pm
December 20th 7am-8pm
December 21st 8am-8pm
December 22nd 8am-8pm
December 23rd 7am-8pm
December 24th 8am-6pm
December 25th CLOSED

Macy’s (713-405-7035)

For more information check out Midtown Houston - Downtown Houston Real Estate Spotlight

The mainstream media can continue to focus on failures, we would like on successes.

Please send examples of the Entrepreneurial spirit to:

katrinahoustonbiz@downtownhouston.com

Downtown Houston

Downtown Houston

Downtown Houston

Pam writes:
"Don't spend millions of dollars to try and change your culture. Corporate culture is a natural thing that cannot be manufactured. No amount of posters, incentive programs, PowerPoint presentations or slogans on websites will affect the hearts and minds of your employees. If you want to see things change immediately, stop acting like an asshole. If you see one of your senior managers acting like an asshole, ask him to stop. If he doesn't stop, fire him. You will be amazed at how fast the culture shifts."

http://www.dontmesswithtexas.org/report_a_litterer.php

Shame on KHOU Houston, the local CBS affiliate for their attempts to create power crises. Their report this morning was filled with highly charged words such as, “rolling blackouts.” In a day and age when citizens are more misguidedly obsessed with kilowatt hours and price per gallon, (instead of rising bank service fees) KHOU is capitalizing on public fear and buzzwords. The state that most of us equate rolling blackouts with is California. There exists no greater and example of polar opposites in energy policy than Texas and California.

California has rolling blackouts due to a variety of situations.

For starters they do not produce enough electricity to meet their needs. One would think that building new capacity would be a wise choice, but the state of California makes it extremely hard to do so. Simply put California exports pollution. Their growing demand for electricity increases pollution in the states they import it from. This is fine with Californians as long as their state is protected.

California has an aging power grid that has not received the maintenance and expansion that is needed to provide reliable power transmission. Environmental, NIMBY, and BANANA factors have played a big time role in this situation.
(BANANA = Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone)

Texas on the other hand is completely self sustaining.

We meet our electrical needs and then some.

We build new power plants when growth warrants them.

We are not afraid of Nuclear Energy and seek diversified sources of power generation.

Texas is a major producer of eco-friendly wind power and will overtake California in wind turbine numbers if the pro-bird, anti-wind activists have their way.

The Texas grid supplies Texas. We do not increase pollution in other states by relying on their generation facilities.

Given the overall reliability of the Texas power grid one should not be alarmed at power outages caused by normal maintenance and peak season preparation.

Chalk this up as another slow news day story.

Chances are we will look back and remember our first encounter with this word as the day Dot-Com 2.0 became a reality for the masses. We now have another company name that will again become both a noun, verb, adjective, and adverb ala Google.

Sure there are already tons of predictions about how Zillow will impact the real estate agents but this is not really the intent of Zillow.

Zillow creates an instantaneous efficient market for comparable values in real estate. For those seeking property info you now longer need to have the bank account of Martha Stewart to obtain housing values in your neighborhood. Zillow is the property information portal every homeowner who protests his taxes has been dieing to have. In the Houston area one has to wonder how this will impact HCAD, City of Houston, and HISD. (That is the Harris Country Appraisal District and the Houston Independent School District for those outside the area)

In the area of property taxes Zillow creates a much needed degree of transparency. While Houston homeowners and home buyers have had much in the way of property information via HCAD’s site, the navigation and “at a glance” features were sorely lacking. From time to time we have heard rumors of wide discrepancies in Houston real estate appraisals by the various taxing districts. With Zillow, the average consumer will have the ability to clearly see appraisal discrepancies in their neighborhoods and surrounding areas.

Downtown Houston Staff