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Longhorn Al

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1 hour ago, royiv said:

At some point downtown is going to run out of surface parking lots to build on and building like this will get torn down for redevelopment.

I agree.  But there are so many more infill lots And 1-2 story tear down options than most folks realize that are all in the core CBD.  

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  • 1 month later...

i don't know why exactly, but I find all the capitol view corridor (CVC) stuff fascinating. Developers/Architects maximizing their air space by mere inches in these towers. (see the slice in the building in the above post)

https://austin.towers.net/east-of-the-capitol-symphony-squares-getting-taller-very-carefully/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

Some of the CVCs that originate from East Austin seem pretty outdated. Isn't there a CVC still in place for the old Mueller Airport control tower?

It does make for an interesting downtown scape.

Edited by yoladu
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45 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

That rendering of downtown has to be like 5-6 years old at least.  

 

28 minutes ago, Lobo said:

I can still see hooters.  Is that anything?

Not a rendering. Pretty sure that's taken from Google Earth, which hasn't updated it's aerials of downtown Austin in a long time. The green box thing is what Austin Towers does to show the general outline of a proposed building prior to renderings being released by the developer.

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47 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

That rendering of downtown has to be like 5-6 years old at least.  

The article mentioned that point:

"A massing of the Sixth and Rio Grande tower plan that’s roughly accurate to its stated height and the limitations of the Capitol View Corridor passing through the site, though the real tower could look very different than this cosmetically. You’ll notice that Google Earth’s 3D buildings are pretty out of date — nearby condo towers Fifth & West and the Independent are both under construction here, with other new towers totally missing. Image: James Rambin / Google Maps"

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10 minutes ago, bolverk said:

 

Not a rendering. Pretty sure that's taken from Google Earth, which hasn't updated it's aerials of downtown Austin in a long time. The green box thing is what Austin Towers does to show the general outline of a proposed building prior to renderings being released by the developer.

Wait, there's not a magical green tower really sitting in downtown Austin right now?  Way to ruin Christmas again, asshole! 

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5 minutes ago, Lobo said:

What’s their square footage holding in that tower over on 3rd?

Answer in the last paragraph of the below article.

Meta leases up all office space in Austin's tallest tower in historic deal
Facebook parent co. looking to hire hundreds, will keep other downtown offices

Months of speculation have come to an end as California-based Meta Platforms Inc. — the parent company of Facebook — recently leased the entire commercial half of Sixth and Guadalupe, the 66-story high-rise under construction that will be Austin's tallest building when finished.

Meta confirmed to Austin Business Journal that it leased 589,000 square feet of office space across 33 floors at Sixth and Guadalupe, located downtown at 400 W. Sixth St. The lease was signed Dec. 31.

“We first came to Austin over 10 years ago with just seven employees, now over 2,000 of us are proud to call Austin home. We’re committed to Austin and look forward to growing here together,” Katherine Shappley, head of Meta's Austin office and vice president for commerce customer success, said in a statement.

California-based Meta also announced it is looking to hire 400 more people in Austin. As of last summer, the company had about 2,000 local employees, which ranked No. 25 among the largest private-sector employers in the region. Given the new lease and other Meta offices in Austin, the company could grow significantly beyond that mark in coming years.

The 589,000 square feet of office space in Sixth and Guadalupe is larger than the entire Frost Bank Tower. Only one building has more available office space in the Central Business District: Indeed Tower with 720,000 square feet.

In addition to the office space, Sixth and Guadalupe will have 349 residential units on floors 34 to 66.

This appears to be the second-largest single office lease ever in downtown Austin. Google has leased all of the Block 185 tower under construction at 601 W. Second St., which has about 720,000 rentable square feet.

The lease signing also points toward renewed optimism by large tech employers about the return to the office, despite the recent surge of Covid cases due to the Omicron variant. Meta has announced plans to re-open its U.S. offices at the end of January, although employees could defer their return until June.

Of course, it will be much later than that before Meta begins occupying Sixth and Guadalupe. Construction on the commercial portion topped out late last year, and the building is expected to be completed in 2023.

Rumors about Meta leasing in Sixth and Guadalupe have been rampant for more than a year, back when it was still known as Facebook. Facebook appeared to be on track to lease all 353,000 square feet of 300 Colorado, but those negotiations abruptly ended in March 2021. Sources told ABJ in August a deal at Sixth and Guadalupe was close to happening.

Prior to the Meta lease at Sixth and Guadalupe, the largest office lease in Austin since the start of the pandemic was Cloudflare Inc. (NYSE: NET), a San Francisco-based web infrastructure and security company, eating up 125,000 square feet at 1600 E. Fourth St. in August.

A Meta spokesperson said the new lease is "to help accommodate our growing teams," suggesting the company will hold onto its other downtown office spaces. It leases multiple floors in the 300 West Sixth tower and in 2019 opened a 256,500-square-foot office in the Third + Shoal tower, where it had leased 11 floors. And in North Austin, the company has leased all the office space in the 17-story Domain 12 tower, which is roughly 320,000 square feet.

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Wow, almost 1.2mm square feet across three properties in Austin.  That seems like a lot.  that's got to be the most outside of Menlo Park.  Hard telling the employee blend type but use an industry low end of 150ft/person on a blended A-product.  8,000 employees.  Over half the size of the MP campus.  

8000 employees or 3 of Zuckerberg's egos.  Either way, a sizable real estate play. 

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I know they were behind on their construction payments, but not sure if it was a typical construction loan or if they were waiting on money from the mothership in Clearwater to turn around and pay the GC

.  Most of the time, a GC will renegotiate to get paid something, rather than nothing and finish the job.  But it happened just before pandemic caused shortages of labor and materials.  So I'm guessing they moved on to an actual paying project, of which there are no shortages of in Austin.  Then when Scientology wanted to re-do the loan, even with deep pockets back at the home church---lender told 'em to get bent and get to the back of the line.  They own the land and building in fee simple, but I'm guessing however that goofy church pays its improvement costs on a property...it fell behind at the exact wrong time in a market where crews can name their time/price.  I'm also guessing whoever is in charge of their sources and uses budget in Austin has been down-graded to whatever lower level in their batshit hierarchy is and has to scrub poop decks for a year or something to repent.  

I know UT fucking hates having that thing there, especially the Ransom Center director (it's caddy-corner partner).  Maybe somebody squeezed somebody and a lien gets put on the space.  Damn shame...

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13 minutes ago, Deej said:

I'm sure it's been mentioned, but they tore down the building at 5th and Colorado that housed Lonesome Dove and Chinatown. What's happening there?

Stonelake-5th-and-Colorado-13.jpeg

Stonelake-5th-and-Colorado-9.jpeg

https://austin.towers.net/turning-a-corner-at-415-colorado/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

The project, at the moment known simply by its address at 415 Colorado, will contain approximately 328 apartment units located above 110,000 square feet of office space in a 640-foot tower designed by the Houston-based firm Ziegler Cooper Architects — best known around here for the look of the nearby Austonian condo tower, which features a similar crown.

Edited by bolverk
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And I think Lonesome Dove has already been relocated (in the sense they signed a long-term lease and are moving their shit as we speak).  

They'll be where Italic used to be.  Which is a better location, IMO with more space.  

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On 1/28/2022 at 6:22 PM, Deej said:

I'm sure it's been mentioned, but they tore down the building at 5th and Colorado that housed Lonesome Dove and Chinatown. What's happening there?

5c_corner-scaled.jpg

321w6-scaled.jpg

Notice Anything Different About These Two Corners in Downtown Austin?

https://austin.towers.net/notice-anything-different-about-these-two-corners-in-downtown-austin/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

Edited by DalTxHornFan
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I hate Wal-Mart, but putting a wrecking-ball to it seems a bit harsh given they were only supposed to take out the two restaurants, no?  

It was a cool space inside.  Went to some ribbon-cutting thing there a few years ago when Adler took all the credit for bringing a 30-person tech office to Austin.  It was some douchey night-club before that and of course, before that, original Drafthouse.  the footprint of that new building will be much bigger than I expected then.  I'm sure it'll have a 2-year, $30mm parking garage that will be functionally obsolete in 5 years.

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On 2/9/2022 at 3:43 PM, Lobo said:

I hate Wal-Mart, but putting a wrecking-ball to it seems a bit harsh given they were only supposed to take out the two restaurants, no?  

It was a cool space inside.  Went to some ribbon-cutting thing there a few years ago when Adler took all the credit for bringing a 30-person tech office to Austin.  It was some douchey night-club before that and of course, before that, original Drafthouse.  the footprint of that new building will be much bigger than I expected then.  I'm sure it'll have a 2-year, $30mm parking garage that will be functionally obsolete in 5 years.

This piece about the original Drafthouse location includes a pic of the Wal-Mart tech office.  Neat space.

https://austin.towers.net/pour-out-some-popcorn-for-the-end-of-austins-very-first-alamo-drafthouse/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

409-main-space-scaled.jpeg

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Guessing this would be somewhere in the range of 850 workers, if the 1 per 150 sf standard still applies. Not sure if that's going to be the case post-Covid.

TikTok leases office space at 300 Colorado, sources say

Another social media giant has signed an office lease in downtown Austin, according to sources, further signaling technology companies are still bullish on a return to the office in the near future.

Multiple sources have told Austin Business Journal that TikTok Inc., the video-based social media platform, has leased at 300 Colorado. The lease is believed to be for the top six floors of the 32-story, 353,000-square-foot tower.

Floor plates at 300 Colorado are 21,000 square feet. TikTok eating up the top six floors would mean the social media giant committed to around 126,000 square feet.

The lease would end months of speculation about whether TikTok was taking space inside the relatively new tower, which was completed in 2021. Austin Business Journal reported in June that TikTok was on the market for about 150,000 square feet and considering 300 Colorado. ABJ reported as far as September 2020 that TikTok was looking at Austin for an office. Around the same time, President Donald Trump urged TikTok to set up its headquarters in Texas.

The company already has executives based here, including Blake Chandlee, president of global business solutions.

Multiple attempts to reach TikTok for confirmation of the lease were unsuccessful. CBRE Group Inc. (NYSE: CBRE), which sources said was working with TikTok on the lease, declined to comment.

Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. (NYSE: JLL), which handles the leasing for 300 Colorado, did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

California-based TikTok likely signed a sublease at 300 Colorado. Oil and gas company Parsley Energy Inc. leased almost the entirety of the high-rise in 2018, but shut down its Austin operations after it was acquired by Irving-based Pioneer Natural Resources (NYSE: PXD) in 2021.

TikTok, which is owned by China-based ByteDance Ltd., had 96 job listings posted online for Austin as of Feb. 11.

It is the latest tech company to eat up a chunk of Austin's skyline. California-based Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook, in late December leased all 33 floors of office space at under-construction Sixth and Guadalupe (several months after walking away from possible deal at 300 Colorado).

Google LLC, another California-based company, will be taking up all 720,000 square feet of Block 185, the sail-like building rising at Cesar Chavez and Nueces streets.

300 Colorado was developed by Atlanta-based Cousins Properties Inc., Austin-based Riverside Resources and Ironwood Real Estate, although Cousins bought out Riverside and Ironwood in December for $162.5 million.

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21 hours ago, DalTxHornFan said:

Maybe expanding the definition of "Downtown" a little bit, but thought that this was pretty cool:

Tesla Giga Texas 360-degree drone flyover video

https://insideevs.com/news/567285/giga-texas-360degree-drone-flyover/

 

14 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

Severe lack of solar panels it seems. 

i hope they are also doing something with all the rainwater that roof would capture.

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  • 1 month later...

https://austin.towers.net/321-west-tower-breaks-ground-with-a-new-look-at-sixth-and-guadalupe/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

321 West Tower Breaks Ground at Sixth and Guadalupe - 58 floors / 675-foot tower 

 

....will be 4th tallest in Austin after

  • 6X Guadalupe (875')
  • the Independent (690')
  • the Austonian (683')

two pretty tall buildings happening at the intersection of 6th and Guadalupe.

 

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39 minutes ago, yoladu said:

https://austin.towers.net/321-west-tower-breaks-ground-with-a-new-look-at-sixth-and-guadalupe/?pro=caitlyn@towers.net

321 West Tower Breaks Ground at Sixth and Guadalupe - 58 floors / 675-foot tower 

 

....will be 4th tallest in Austin after

  • 6X Guadalupe (875')
  • the Independent (690')
  • the Austonian (683')

two pretty tall buildings happening at the intersection of 6th and Guadalupe.

 

And it won’t hold the title of 4th tallest for very long once the Conrad Hotel and 98 Red River get underway. Absolutely crazy the number of tall buildings underway in downtown Austin.

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~ 12 years ago, I met with the then developer for the old post office site about plans going forward.  I thought he was crazy because that area just didn't seem feasible, never mind the macro market at the time.  Now it's fucking insane to me that on that whole corner, that's the fucking site sucking money and being lazy.  

That hotel by the convention center (site of that Michelada restaurant or whateverthefuck).  That floorplate on that "Land"...holy shit...we entering the surreal folks.  This skyline is gonna look like a CGI rendering in 5 years.  We're not at the thing.  But we are approaching the thing...that gets us to the thing.  

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36 minutes ago, royiv said:

And it won’t hold the title of 4th tallest for very long once the Conrad Hotel and 98 Red River get underway. Absolutely crazy the number of tall buildings underway in downtown Austin.

i really hope 98 Red River happens.

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