Notes on a green park at NRG Park

Continuing my responses to bullet points in Astrodome Conservancy fact sheets...

Bullet point: "There is interest in 'greening' NRG Park to create a park-like setting along main pedestrian pathways within its footprint."

My response: Adding park-like landscaping along main pedestrian pathways is the bare minimum that should be done, and that effort can and should be started with or without a new architectural renovation plan for the building. If the building is to succeed, though, it's not enough. There's also lots of support for creating an actual public county park, and these Conservancy materials should report that interest.

An unpublished, internal HCSCC master plan from January 2014 proposed a green park for most of the area between Kirby and Fannin, including the southwest corner of Blue Lot that I had been informally but firmly advised could not be considered for park conversion.

The Astrodome Tomorrow team and I have been recommending property-wide conversion to a green park since 2012. A big part of our purpose for advocating park conversion is a desire to see almost 100 acres of impermeable hard parking surface restored to permeable ground, allowing rainwater to drain down instead of out to city culverts, and reducing the existing heat-island effect. Also, #trees.

The smaller footprint of the green park I'm now recommending reflects recognition of some NRG Park realities. Namely, creating a bigger park doesn't make sense without relocating the old NRG Arena and its attached exhibition halls. That's a huge project that's not on the near horizon, though it should be. No one who uses that building is satisfied with its functionality, and it's in a poor location within the property.

The beauty of putting a Discovery Green-sized park between the Dome and Fannin is that there are no structures there now.