Like water seeking base level, the fight over urban gas drilling in Fort Worth always seems to come back to the Trinity River. Much like the Trinity Trees situation last year, the current debate over the Greenwood Cemetery drilling site wraps up all of the dilemmas and contradictions the public space / private property situation in one neat little package.
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There may be some hope yet for the city’s tree planting program. Last week Mayor Mikey told Channel 5 that the program could avoid the budget ax altogether thanks to some creative bookkeeping to access the money from the gas drilling lock box.
Of course, I’m wonder what happened to the $500,000 that Chesapeake pledged for planting trees as part of the Trinity Trees settlement. A source at City Hall said that the money was promised as $500,000 over five years, not one lump sum, and the source is confident that the city will eventually get that money. However, the city still has not received a penny of that money pledged almost 11 months ago. Did someone forget to send an invoice? The city could sure use $100,000 for trees right now.
Also, if you would like to take a survey about the city’s tree planting program, click here. The survey is live until Friday.
A Conversation With Jerry Horton - West and Clear from James M. Johnston on Vimeo.
When you knock on Jerry Horton’s front door on Carter Avenue, you’ll notice that there’s a horseshoe above it. It’s obviously been there a long time — it’s painted the same color of white as her 100-year-old house. But any luck that horseshoe brought to the house or the rest of Carter Avenue appears to be running out — Ms. Horton has a court date scheduled for Thursday as Chesapeake Energy’s pipeline subsidiary, Texas Midstream, is moving ahead with its condemnation proceedings. On Monday evening, she and her neighbors will meet with Texas Midstream to try and reach a last-minute compromise. If that fails and Ms. Horton has to go to court, the odds aren’t in her favor. She can’t afford a lawyer and the laws of this state don’t offer much protection for property owners against entities like Texas Midstream that have eminent domain powers.
Above is a short film that West and Clear collaborated on with Fort Worth filmmaker James M. Johnston. Eminent domain abuse is an abstract problem, but Ms. Horton’s plight puts a very human face on this issue. James and I wanted Ms. Horton to be able to tell her story in her own words and show you what it is like to have a pipeline literally coming to your front porch.
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From the desk of Julie Wilson:
We thought you’d like to have a heads-up on an exciting event: Chesapeake will be spudding Fort Worth’s first downtown well this Friday, August 15.
Trinidad Rig #111 – the same turquoise rig that drilled the Pearson site (aka the “Trinity Trails” site near Colonial) will be drilling the Westgate 1-H on the south edge of downtown behind the old red brick Star-Telegram warehouse off Lancaster. We’ll be doing preliminary work and rigging up from Tuesday to Thursday and turning the drillbit on Friday morning.
The initial well will be drilled westerly, not actually under downtown. Key mineral owners for the first well include UPRR, J. Don Williamson, World Life Insurance, Richard May, Robert Ritter, Champion Parts, Ron Investments, and Harmony Realty Corp. Future wells from this site could develop the minerals underneath City Hall, the Convention Center, the Fort Worth Club, portions of Sundance Square, and other parts of downtown. Chesapeake plans to develop the balance of Downtown from our four other sites in the area, including our “Ron” site - located behind the Ashton Depot, the “Dakota” site - located northwest of Downtown near the railroad tracts and Dakota St., the “Henderson Bazaar” site - located at the intersection of Jacksboro Highway and Henderson St., and the “Fourth Street” site - located just east of I-35W and south of 4th St.
This Trinidad is one of the newer, quieter, and more attractive rigs in our fleet. Because this location will have such high visibility from the highway as well as downtown, we want you to know that we’re paying special attention to the noise and aesthetics. Frankly, the noise shouldn’t be an issue as this is close to the active train tracks as well as the highway, but we will nonetheless be very mindful of neighbors and install sound blankets. We will be restricting our construction traffic to avoid business commuter times (curtailing from 7 – 9 am and 4 - 7 pm). The city-approved traffic route is from I-30 to Lancaster to Lamar. As with other wells, the drilling here should take about 18-24 days. We are only drilling one well here at this time, so the rig will move off in early September.
Because we anticipate interest in this location will be high – and the location convenient - we’ll offer a series of “rig tour” times for civic leaders, city staff, and council members. Although we don’t know yet exactly what time the drilling will commence on Friday, we will hold a small inaugural tour at 2 pm for those who’d like to be present on the exciting first day. If you would like to participate, please let us know, as space will be limited. Otherwise, we will send you a schedule of other tours so you can select a convenient date and time.
Anyone want to go? Email Julie Wilson now. Tell her West and Clear sent you.
So four lawyers walk into a Presbyterian Church last night and three lawyers say that the city needs a master plan on pipeline infrastucture. Who was the odd person out? Was it:
Gosh, I suppose I couldn’t have put it any better myself…
From the text of the story aired on NPR’s “All Things Considered” today. (Emphasis mine.)
In the wake of Chesapeake’s infomercial comes Shale TV, a daily talk show about the Barnett Shale set to air this fall. The company has hired three award-winning Dallas broadcast journalists to produce the show.
Julie Wilson, Chesapeake vice president for corporate development, says she understands there’s skepticism about the objectivity of Shale TV, but she insists it’s no different than the rest of corporate media.
“Well, I think we pay those journalists — whether on Channel 8 or Channel 11 or the Star-Telegram — in terms of advertising support,” Wilson says. “We see this as pretty much instead of running the ads on the program, we’re just writing the check direct.”
For those of you who don’t follow the NBA, the Seattle Sonics are relocating to Oklahoma City. Now comes the frenzy to buy the naming rights for the new arena in OKC which interests us for two reasons: 1) Chesapeake Energy and Devon Energy will both be in the mix for the naming rights, and 2) interesting anomaly known as the stadium naming-rights curse. Google it now and you will find a landscape littered with large naming-rights deals and ruined companies — the most famous example is, of course, Enron Field, the former name of the Houston Astros ballpark. Anyone remember Ameriquest Field?
Needless to say, Chesapeake-Devon Arena would be my choice. It has a nice ring to it.
One of the more underreported stories in the Barnett Shale is the ongoing antipathy between Chesapeake and XTO — I think the Eighth Avenue situation owes as much to this dynamic as it does to Bill Davis. For an amusing take on the war of words between Chesapeake CEO Aubrey McClendon and XTO CEO Bob Simpson, check out the A&D Intelligence Blog.
Mayor Mikey shudders
Lexuses fill parking lot
Standing room only
Somebody call Beijing, quick! Chesapeake Energy reported on a $1.6 billion loss for the second quarter.
