Could’ve been a Red Lobster or a Longhorn Steakhouse, but Darden Restaurants went the Olive Garden route with the brand-new feeder-side building-in-a-parking-lot the company built in place of the Greenway Inn & Suites — the hotel at 2929 Southwest Fwy. formerly known as the Houstonaire Motor Inn and the Colonel Sanders’ Inn, which was demolished last fall. The signs on the building, which is still under construction, went up yesterday, reports the reader who snapped these pics:
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The only other Inner Loop Olive Garden is on OST, across from NRG Park. This one, east of Buffalo Speedway, will have tableside tablet ordering and gameplaying from the get-go.
Here’s the view from Westpark:
- Previously on Swamplot: The Last Days of the Greenway Inn and Suites
Photos: Swamplot inbox
Tablet Service
wasted use of space. this could have been a mattress store.
Ugh……
Olive Garden: “Keep eating the breadsticks until the pain goes away”
Outstanding! Great new place to cruise drunk school teachers.
lol people eat there??
So this is the “Lakewood Church” olive garden?
htownproud FTW!
This can’t be the only thing going up on that parcel of land. It’s massive and stuck right in the middle is exactly what inner loopers have been craving. But given how expensive the rent must be, it was going to be a corporate chain one way or another.
Having lived next door to the old Greenway Inn, ground zero for crime and desolation in Upper Kirby, the Olive Garden is about a zillion percent improvement
Only tosspots eat at this travesty of a restaurant.
Wrong location for an Olive Garden serving tragic food. Why go there when there are so many far better Italian concepts in the neighborhood.
Finally, some Italian competition for Tony’s!
Someone needs to name the cycle of excitement and disappointment of watching new construction in Houston. The cycle begins with confusion over demo of a current structure, then rising excitement in anticipation of something new and novel, a small dip when you see what is being built looks like a generic suburban building, and the ultimate disappointment and resignation when you find out it is…an Olive Garden.
Now if only they’d put a Bennigan’s back in across the freeway. I shouldn’t have to drive out to f***king Fry Road just to get a Turkey O’Toole.
If Culberson gets his preferred Westpark routing for the University line, car-less Midtown hipsters will finally have access to unlimited breadsticks and never ending pasta
Missed opportunity. An industrial sized Denny’s serving a post-prayer Joel Slam and Your Best Skillet Now would only have to be open two days a week to pay all the rent. Everything after that, is like they say in the bidness, “rich country gravy.”
I’m sure the parking lot will be littered with glass from all the cars that get broken into by thieves who hop on the freeway to escape.
lol…snobby inner loopers don’t even warrant a Macaroni Grill.
Bares a striking resemblance to the 3.9 mil Tuscan Hedwig mansion.
Please tell me that “Colonel Sanders’ Inn” was a euphemism for KFC.
@Mark – Since when did subbing the word “concept” for “restaurant” become the new normal?
Add me to the chorus of disappointment that they used all of this effort and resources for…an Olive Garden. I live close to the “other” OG (the OG OG, so to speak) and it is always packed. (Why? I don’t know why.)
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I’m saddened that they couldn’t contain the hordes of OG to one location. Abondonza indeed.
What a bummer. Is there anything else going up on the site? The Olive Garden has a massive parking lot. Seems like an expense place to put just one restaurant.
This is a good place for the masses to go in order free up space in the good restaurants. Just like Chilis in the Heights. Everything has a purpose.
Best comment thread ever! Lol at drunk teachers, Your Best Skillet, genuine indignation at long commute for a Turkey O’Toole, resemblance to Hedwig Mansion, and all uses of “… an Olive Garden.” See how much more clever we are when we direct our ire not at each other, but at… an Olive Garden?
Purple City
April 15, 2015 at 3:55 pm
Now if only they’d put a Bennigan’s back in across the freeway. I shouldn’t have to drive out to f***king Fry Road just to get a Turkey O’Toole.
Um, yeah, that Bennigan’s was thug central……
@Lindsey:
The name of the experience you most eloquently described will, and forever be known as:
ANTICIPOINTMENT
Here it is in a sentence:
I felt the sharp feeling of ANTICIPOINTMENT after I googled this word and realized that, even though I came up with it on my own this 16th of April, 2015… it already exists in the Urban Dictionary, Wiktionary, and various other sites.
Fernando “Is there anything else going up on the site? The Olive Garden has a massive parking lot”
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Big restaurant = giant massive parking. It’s the law!
I’d be happy to have an OG or Freebirds in Meyer Park. We get no love in Westbury/Willowbend. Just a sub par Luby’s and burger chains galore. Somebody help us!
lol the author of this posting didn’t research much otherwise they’d know Darden sold off Red Lobster a while back to a private investment company.
Most of their traffic will be cutting through to Westpark or out-of-towners.
Can’t tell whether Rich is being sarcastic. In my book, OG is about equivalent to Luby’s (mediocre, but predictable), and Freebird’s is equivalent to burger chains (again, mediocre, but predictable).
I was a little sarcastic, GM. However, I’m not asking for Underbelly. We just need more variety and if we need to take baby steps with a “mediocre” Freebirds then let’s start there and not be so pretentious. The only thing we have to look forward to is a new Mc. Donalds. So much attention goes to the Heights and Garden Oaks that people lose site of very choice real estate with large lots in the Westbury SW Houston area.
To be fair, the OG has a whole new look.