Contrasts between Houston and Dallas (apples to oranges)

[Mister Nifty]

The first thing to know when contrasting Houston with Dallas is that the larger of the two cities has lots of petrochemical plants. I can't find the exact amount but I've been told they number about a hundred. So, in bulk imports, a lot of what the Port of Houston serves goes to energy companies that store lots of product in round tanks which number in the thousands about the area. Most of these refineries are located along the Port of Houston.
Like refineries, there are huge numbers of pipe yards in the Houston area.
Because of convenience, the Houston area also stores product in containers within container yards until a company needs it. Buy low and store it, so to speak, and when you need the product it can be loaded onto ships or trains and hauled to just about any where.
Also, just as convenient, the Houston area will tend to have the types of warehouses that can store product for lengthy periods of time (beans and grains like coffee and rice). Buy low and sell it high, in this case.
In contrast, the Dallas Fort Worth area doesn't have many refineries located within its vicinity (I know of one in Corsicana). However, the area around Tarrant County is home to one of the largest gas fields in North America. Strangely, the Dallas Fort Worth area also has the minerals necessary for the production of a high grade concrete (there are numerous concrete factories around the area).
The distribution in the Dallas Fort Worth area is at a crossroads and is quite major as it is on the local, state, regional, and nation levels with major corporations sometimes having numerous warehouses for each level. There are two major railroad container terminals with one located in north Tarrant county and the other in southeast Dallas county.
People have a difficult time understanding how the Dallas Fort Worth area serves as a larger market than the Houston area. The reason it has become so isn't because of the population differences within each area, but because of the populations existing around them. When that is taken into consideration, the market of the Dallas Fort Worth area grows substantially in comparison to the Houston area. Just consider Smith county in East Texas, with the city of Tyler serving at its base, and how there are over a half million people living within it and the counties surrounding it. Likewise, there are a half million people living in and around Shreveport.
From my own personal experience growing up in the Dallas area, my aunt and uncle living up in Kansas would drive twice a year to either the cities of Dallas or to Chicago to do their shopping for things they couldn't find in Kansas City.
In the future, I would like to add other major differences between the Dallas Fort Worth area and the Houston area as, contrary to popular opinion, they contrast much more than they compare.

05/09/2011
Another contrast between the Dallas - Fort Worth and the Houston areas are made by their differing elevations. While most of the streets in Dallas - Fort Worth must have buried drain pipes fed by gutters, Houston contrasts as it has to utilize drainage ditches for better efficiency. As the Dallas - Fort Worth area is more hilly, a deluge of rain would cause torrential floods if that city relied on drainage ditches. In Houston, having ditches is more efficient as it is a flat area and they will hold more water during hurricanes and tropical storms.
While there have been numerous lakes built around the DFW area, the Houston area contrasts in that its elevation isn't high enough to support such lakes in terms of flood control. So, in Houston, reservoirs have been built in West Houston that can be completely emptied out so that they will hold back more water during storms to prevent floods. There are a few lakes in East Houston which serve as a source of drinking water with these being Lake Houston and Sheldon Lake.

[desertpunk]

In the interest of avoiding the obvious City Vs City implications, let me just say that not very long ago, most people outside Texas might have lumped all the big Texas cities together under the old "cattle, cotton and oil" tag and left it at that. Nowadays, cities like Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin have all developed a much more distinct character and dare I say? personality. Dallas is increasingly diverse in its business and growing tech economies while Houston has energy and big medicine to its many credits. San Antonio is proving itself to be a major gateway to Latin America and not just a big military retiree mecca with a riverwalk. And Austin, as usual, just keeps on keepin' it weird.(with a massive dose of tech innovation too! )

The more you look, the more complexity, diversity, and individuality you find in Texas. It really is a 'whole other country'!

[LSyd]

Dallas-Fort Worth - more midwestern big business; the "Chicago of Texas"
Houston - business centered but with gulf coast/southern charm
San Antonio - more Latin-American feeling than the other cities with big historic feel (the Alamo is downtown)
Austin - hipster and educated elite trendiness

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[JJG]

Originally Posted by LSyd

Dallas-Fort Worth - more midwestern big business; the "Chicago of Texas"
Houston - business centered but with gulf coast/southern charm
San Antonio - more Latin-American feeling than the other cities with big historic feel (the Alamo is downtown)
Austin - hipster and educated elite trendiness

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You know, we have our OWN culture and image.....

[LSyd]

Originally Posted by JJG

You know, we have our OWN culture and image.....

that's right.

Dallas - businessmen thinking they're also cowboys
Fort Worth - businessmen who used to be cowboys/still are cowboys for a hobby



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[simms3]

Yea Texas does have more personality. And interesting points that you're right, we never think about.

Texas is really still booming, which is amazing. The only question I have is when is high-rise living going to become popular in Texas outside of Austin? I suppose developers in Dallas and Houston are happy that they didn't feed their egos with monster residential projects like those in Atlanta did, but sooner or later there will be demand.

[ardamir]

There are a few high-rise condos going up in SA and Houston but nothing like Austin.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by desertpunk

In the interest of avoiding the obvious City Vs City implications, let me just say that not very long ago, most people outside Texas might have lumped all the big Texas cities together under the old "cattle, cotton and oil" tag and left it at that. Nowadays, cities like Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin have all developed a much more distinct character and dare I say? personality. Dallas is increasingly diverse in its business and growing tech economies while Houston has energy and big medicine to its many credits. San Antonio is proving itself to be a major gateway to Latin America and not just a big military retiree mecca with a riverwalk. And Austin, as usual, just keeps on keepin' it weird.(with a massive dose of tech innovation too! )

The more you look, the more complexity, diversity, and individuality you find in Texas. It really is a 'whole other country'!

To understand Houston better, one has to drive the 333 miles between it and New Orleans. Literally, if Houston could have been built in New Orleans, it would have. The geography between Houston and New Orleans is mostly swamps with every area that rises above sea level having people living there. It isn't until one gets to Houston that an area rises up enough to finally allow a large population of people to live.
In contrast to Houston, the city of New Orleans is more of a break down port where imported products are taken off of larger ships and loaded onto smaller ones for transport up the Mississippi River and vice versa.
While, in the past, there was a tendency to think of the Dallas - Fort Worth area as an inland city, in regards to its infrastruct, the fact that the city of Houston is so close to the coast and only fifty-two feet above sea level has pushed a lot of business northward in that direction. Because of improved technology in hauling freight in containers, southern Dallas county and the city of Ennis located further south of there are well positioned for a one day turn around for truck drivers in the hauling containers to and from the Port of Houston, with this being under the legal time of ten hours a truck driver is allowed to drive before having to rest.
In other words, while the Dallas - Fort Worth metroplex is inland, it isn't as much so it was once considered to be.
Parks are another way in which Dallas - Fort Worth and Houston contrast. Rather ominous in their presence, water moccasins frequent the rivers and lakes around Dallas - Fort Worth while alligators frequent the bayous and lakes in and around the Houston area.
With two parks connecting them, Houston has three urban areas within the southwest quadrant of its loop 610 area making up about sixteen square miles in area. This area makes up an L shape as downtown Houston connects to the west to Uptown and the Heights area by way of Buffalo and White Oak Bayous and Memorial Park and it connects to The Texas Medical Center by way of Herman Park to the south southeast. As there isn't a transition between Uptown and the Texas Medical Center, Montrose Blvd. connects the Herman Park area with the Memorial Park area nicely. Houston has a very pretty zoo within Herman Park and, kind of a hidden jewel, the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center is a match for it in Memorial Park.
In contrast, as Houston is rather flat, the DFW area has its hilly areas. The western part of Fort Worth is quite pretty with its lakes, its zoo, and its Museum District. In fact, next to Austin and its hill country, I'd say the city of Fort Worth and the area west of it, also quite hilly, is next in line in prettiness.
In Dallas county, the southwestern portion of it is also quite pretty which is the location of the Dallas zoo in the somewhat impoverished neighborhood of Oak Cliff. While it is often criticized as a zoo, the creek the main entrance is located over and the trees and hills the zoo is located within are, well, equally pretty.
Around central Dallas, there are the three locations of Turtle Creek / Katy Trail, the Dallas Fair Park, and the Whiterock Lake area.
I would like to point out again that, in the last fifteen years, the real estate development in and around DFW has been more Austinish than the real estate has been in, well, Austin. The tallest buildings built within the cities of Dallas and Fort Worth during that time (since the mid eighties) are a little over thirty stories with those being the W Dallas Victory Hotel in Uptown Dallas and Residences and the Omni Convention Hotel in downtown Fort Worth. And, like I point out in a previous thread, the DART lightrail line, an out of the park home run contrary to all the criticism it has taken lately, is something one would have expected to be built in Austin.
In contrast, a lot of the developments in Houston can appear rather hugely monolithic.

[ardamir]

Houston is not surrounded by levees nor is any significant portion of it below sea level.

[WhoDatSB]

I've been to both cities. Personally, Houston is better. Much better food, more cosmopolitan, less stuffy, better skyline and better looking people...although Dallas looks a tad bit cleaner. Overall, Houston takes the cake.

[skyybutter]

Ive only been to Houston and Dallas. I prefer Houston. Friendlier and more southern which I prefer.

[diablo234]

Originally Posted by simms3

Texas is really still booming, which is amazing. The only question I have is when is high-rise living going to become popular in Texas outside of Austin? I suppose developers in Dallas and Houston are happy that they didn't feed their egos with monster residential projects like those in Atlanta did, but sooner or later there will be demand.

There are some high rise condos being developed around the Galleria area and around Clear Lake. However it's not at the same level as Austin since more mid-rise buildings and townhomes seem to be more popular in those cities.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by ardamir

Houston is not surrounded by levees nor is any significant portion of it below sea level.

True. Wasn't that point made? Houston, geologically speaking, is the first city west of New Orleans that is high enough in elevation to support a major metropolitan area? There does seem to be a stretch between Lake Charles and Lafayette that is above sea level, indeed. If New Orleans was able to support a larger population, would most of Houston have been built there instead?
No doubt New Orleans is a huge crossroads. It is a major break down port as I said.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by WhoDatSB

I've been to both cities. Personally, Houston is better. Much better food, more cosmopolitan, less stuffy, better skyline and better looking people...although Dallas looks a tad bit cleaner. Overall, Houston takes the cake.

This might sound like a strange question, but have you lived in Houston without a job? Sometimes being gainfully employed helps to make living in a city better. Anyway, I'm not doing a comparison here. Both cities are crap as far as I'm concerned. I just know both areas intimately. In my objective opinion, economically speaking, I think Dallas blows away not just Houston but every city in the south. However, you might be right about your opinions about Houston. I don't know what cosmopolitan means really as I'm not inclined towards sophistication nor artistically endeavored.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by skyybutter

Ive only been to Houston and Dallas. I prefer Houston. Friendlier and more southern which I prefer.

I once drove a schoolbus in Houston. The first kids I picked up early in the morning lived just a quarter mile from downtown. Amazing as it might seem, there were roosters crowing all over the place. So, I have to agree with you that Houston is not only southern, but quite friendly. Well, there didn't seem to be anyone complaining about all them roosters crowing so close to downtown anyway.
I imagine there are some neighborhoods close to downtown Dallas with lots of roosters crowing, but probably not as many as that city is more like an eastern one.
Anyway, congratulations on living in a city that doesn't suck.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by diablo234

There are some high rise condos being developed around the Galleria area and around Clear Lake. However it's not at the same level as Austin since more mid-rise buildings and townhomes seem to be more popular in those cities.

This might anger the hippy redneck crowd in Austin, but I think Dallas for the last fifteen years has been more like Austin while the weird city itself sold out and went commercial. At the same time, the DFW area is all about low rise, multi use, transit oriented developments.

[diablo234]

Originally Posted by Mister Nifty

This might anger the hippy redneck crowd in Austin, but I think Dallas for the last fifteen years has been more like Austin while the weird city itself sold out and went commercial. At the same time, the DFW area is all about low rise, multi use, transit oriented developments.

Actually there has been a fair amount of transit orientated development along the Capital Metro rail line in Austin as well.

[Trae]

Originally Posted by simms3

Yea Texas does have more personality. And interesting points that you're right, we never think about.

Texas is really still booming, which is amazing. The only question I have is when is high-rise living going to become popular in Texas outside of Austin? I suppose developers in Dallas and Houston are happy that they didn't feed their egos with monster residential projects like those in Atlanta did, but sooner or later there will be demand.

It's because Houston and Dallas have long since had high-rise residential towers. Austin is just now getting them. Plus, they are all in one place. In Houston, you have some Downtown, Uptown, and then scattered around the Inner Loop. In Dallas, they are mostly in Uptown, but there have been conversions of office buildings to lofts in Downtown. San Antonio is the one that really has nothing.

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by diablo234

Actually there has been a fair amount of transit orientated development along the Capital Metro rail line in Austin as well.

Could you please list them? Here is a string of TODs along Central Expressway:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cityplace,_Dallas,_Texas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mockingbird_(DART_station)
http://shopsatparklane.com/
http://www.midtownpark.com/user/home.asp
http://www.telecomcorridor.com/exist...e-developments

[Mister Nifty]

Originally Posted by Trae

It's because Houston and Dallas have long since had high-rise residential towers. Austin is just now getting them. Plus, they are all in one place. In Houston, you have some Downtown, Uptown, and then scattered around the Inner Loop. In Dallas, they are mostly in Uptown, but there have been conversions of office buildings to lofts in Downtown. San Antonio is the one that really has nothing.

In DFW, high rise condominiums exist in downtown Fort Worth, downtown Dallas (office tower and hotel conversions), the Design District (it is being built), Victory Park, Uptown, Cityplace, Turtle Creek, Preston Center, Park Lane, The Dallas Galleria, Oak Cliff, The Dallas Arts District (museum tower), Addison, and Las Colinas.

The area between Mockingbird Station and Lovers Lane Station, Deep Ellum, and the Southwestern Medical District area are all expected to attract high rise residential development in the near future.
(I'm not disputing you. Just being more concise.)