HOUSTON --The team planning a 23-story high-rise at the corner of Ashby and Bissonnet near Rice University say they are considering their options after the Houston City Council rejected their request to move forward with the development.
"We are going to consider our options in short order," said Kevin Kirton of Buckhead Investment Partners. He said the two choices include building a scaled-back version that city traffic engineers have approved, or suing the city.
"We remain committed to the original concept of the building," Kirton said. "We feel that it is what is best for the community and for the city. It sits on the fifth most traveled bus line in the city. This kind of development is exactly what politicians and people say they want, until it's close to where they are," he said.
Kirton said the high-rise tower would be the kind of high-density, inner-city development that city planners have long pushed for in Houston.
A large group of neighbors have opposed the project since plans first emerged in 2007. Yellow signs and bumper stickers in the area dub the project the "Tower of Traffic."
After giving initial, general approval to the development that year, city engineers later determined that it would lead to heavier traffic than a two lane residential street could support. On those grounds, city engineers rejected the developers' request for a driveway permit, meaning that although the tower could be built, cars and delivery vans would not be able to use its parking garage.
This summer, developers requested approval for a scaled-back version of the tower, and city engineers approved it. However, Kirton said he always wanted to build the original design -- so he and his business partner appealed the rejection of the original permit to the City Council.
On Wednesday, the Council rejected it.
Houston Mayor Bill White said that although he supports more residential development inside the Loop, this project is unusual.
"I've been around this place for a while and you don't see people talking about putting major high-density high rises right in the middle of residential neighborhoods," he said. "That's not something you see every day."
