1600 Smith Street (previously named Continental Center I and also known as Cullen Center Plaza) is a 51- story, office tower in Downtown

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, United States. It served as the headquarters of Continental Airlines prior to its merger with United Airlines, and at one point also served as the headquarters of ExpressJet Airlines. It is a part of the

Cullen Center Cullen Center is a skyscraper complex in Downtown Houston, Texas, United States. The complex is now managed by Brookfield Properties. Previously Trizec Properties owned all four office buildings. The complex includes the headquarters of the Houst ...

complex. The 51 story building has about of rentable Class "A" office space. The design architect was Morris Architects, the general contractor was Linbeck Construction Company, the mechanical engineer was I.A. Naman, and the structural engineer was CBM Engineers. The building was completed in 1984. The tower stands as a postmodern-style building. It is currently the 9th-tallest building in Houston.

History

Bruce Nichols of '' The Dallas Morning News'' said that in early 1984 1600 Smith Street "was so vacant it became a symbol for overexpansion in Houston". By 1987 the Canadian company Trizec Group bought debentures carrying an option to buy portions of the Cullen Center, including 1600 Smith Street. In 1997 subcommittees of the University of Houston System Board of Regents held meetings at 1600 Smith Street. In September 1997, Continental Airlines announced that it would consolidate its Houston headquarters in what would become Continental Center I. The airline scheduled to move around 3,200 employees in stages beginning in July 1998 and ending in January 1999. The airline consolidated the headquarters operation at the America Tower in Neartown and three other local operations into Continental Center I and Continental Center II in the Cullen Center. Continental anticipated taking 15 floors at Continental Center I. In addition it planned to add a company store, a credit union, and an employee service center in the street-level lobby of Continental Center I.Boisseau, Charles.
Airline confirms relocation/Continental moving offices downtown
" '' Houston Chronicle''. Wednesday September 3, 1997. Business 1. Retrieved on August 23, 2009. The airline agreed to lease of space in the Cullen Center for 11 years initially and 20 years if it takes renewal options.Zehr, Leonard. "TrizecHahn nabs U.S. leasing deal Continental Airlines enticed to move head office to downtown Houston from suburbs." ''

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''. September 11, 1997. Report on Business B7. Retrieved from LexisNexis on April 1, 2010. To make room for the airline and to increase the complex's overall tenancy, Trizec negotiated with the Shell Oil Company to renew a lease of that was scheduled to expire in 1998. The unit of Shell Oil Company agreed to reduce its square feet of space in Continental Center I to to make room for Continental. Shell had planned to downsize, so it renewed its lease for a smaller amount of space. In addition Houston Industries, Inc. paid TrizecHahn so it could break its lease on of space. This made additional room for Continental Airlines. Tim Reylea, the vice president of Cushman Realty Corp., said that the Continental move "is probably the largest corporate relocation in the central business district of Houston ever". Bob Lanier, Mayor of Houston, said that he was "tickled to death" by the airline's move to relocate to Downtown Houston. In September 2000 an electrical component burned out at Continental Center I, and the Houston Fire Department shut off the backup power supply as a precaution. As a result of the temporary power outage, delays of between 300 and 400 Continental Airlines flights occurred worldwide. The Texas bureau of Jesse Jackson's Wall Street Project opened in office space in Continental Center I in May 2001. After the

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and by September 2004 Continental laid off 24% of its clerical and management workers. Despite the reduction of the workforce, Continental did not announce any plans to sublease any of its space in Continental Center I and Continental Center II. In 2004 three new lease agreements to occupy space in Continental Center I were signed. Nancy Sarnoff of the '' Houston Business Journal'' said that the three to five year terms were "considerably short" for leasing agreements; she added that the short leases were due to an abundance of capacity in the Downtown office market, which allowed tenants to have more say in their agreements. Southwest Bank of Texas (now

Amegy Bank Amegy Bank of Texas (previously known as Southwest Bank of Texas) is a US bank operating in Texas that is a subsidiary of Zions Bancorporation. It is headquartered in the Five Post Oak Park building in the Post Oak Park business park in Houston, T ...

) agreed to occupy . Tana Exploration Co. LLC agreed to occupy . Stinnett Thiebaud & Remington LLP agreed to occupy . In February 2006 Chevron U.S.A. Inc. signed a lease for of space. The lease deal filled the building to full occupancy and removed a large portion of available space from the Downtown Houston submarket. Tim Relyea, the vice chairperson of Cushman & Wakefield of Texas Inc., said that Chevron considered other properties before deciding on Continental Center I. He did not state which other towers the company had considered. Chevron planned to place 1,300 employees in 20 floors in the building. The company planned to begin moving employees into the tower by the third quarter of 2006. Prior to the signing of the lease agreement, rumors stated that the company was looking for more office space in Downtown Houston. In 2008 Continental renewed its lease for around in Continental Center I. Before the lease renewal, rumors spread stating that the airline would relocate its headquarters to office space around George Bush Intercontinental Airport due to high fuel costs affecting the airline industry; the rumors stated that the airline was studying possibilities of less expensive alternatives to Continental Center I. If the airline had left Continental Center I, 40% of the space in the building would have been unoccupied. Steven Biegel, the senior vice president of Studley Inc. and a representative of office building tenants, said that the square footage renewed by Continental is a significant amount of space. Biegel added that if the space went vacant, the vacancy would not have had a significant impact in the Downtown Houston submarket as there is not an abundance of available space, and that another potential tenant would likely occupy it. Jennifer Dawson of the '' Houston Business Journal'' said that if Continental Airlines left Continental Center I, the development of Brookfield Properties's new office tower would have been delayed. The parties did not reveal the terms of the lease agreement. As of 2008, Continental Center I was 98% leased. In 2010, Continental Airlines and United Airlines announced that they would merge and that the headquarters of the combined company would be in the Chicago Loop in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

. As of 2010 Continental had around 3,000 clerical and management workers in its Downtown Houston offices and leased in Continental Center I, about 40% of the tower's office space. United continued to occupy space in the building following the merger, but stated in 2011 that it would not renew the lease for of space on six floors. By 2016, United had reduced their leasehold at 1600 Smith to just 140,000 SF, and announced they would be leaving at the end of 2017 for new space at 609 E Main. In 2011

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renewed a lease for of space for seven years. As of July 2018, the building was 69% leased with over 500,000 square feet available.

Design

Continental Center I includes a blue lighting pattern on the roof that displays the Continental Airlines logo. The light had been kept off for a period before 2010. After Continental had occupied the building, the airline wanted to display its logo on the roof of Continental Center I. The City of Houston had a 1993 ordinance restricting the height of any new signs in Downtown Houston to . On Wednesday August 2, 2000, the Houston City Council voted 10–4 to stop enforcing the informal agreement and enact a new law that exempts a company from the height restriction if the national headquarters of a company occupies 45 percent or more of a Downtown Houston building of over of usable space. The Mayor of Houston,

Lee P. Brown Lee Patrick Brown (born October 4, 1937) is an American politician, criminologist and businessman; in 1997 he was the first African-American to be elected mayor of Houston, Texas. He was re-elected twice to serve the maximum of three terms fro ...

, said that he supported the ordinance change since it was a promise made by Bob Lanier to the airline in exchange for enticing the company to move its headquarters to Continental Center I. Opponents of the change feared that company logos would become more prevalent in the Downtown Houston skyline. The elevators were manufactured by Fujitec.1600 Smith Street
." Fujitec Canada. Retrieved on November 14, 2009.

In popular culture

* 1600 Smith Street was featured in a significant portion of the 1990 film RoboCop 2 as the headquarters of the fictional Omni Consumer Products Corporation. Several building locations were utilized as sets for the film, including the exterior, and the main lobby area which was staged as a large executive office.

Gallery

File:ContinentalCenterIBase.JPG, Base of Continental Center I

References

External links