Also on today’s menu: a row of takedowns on Center St., a building that was once on Nantucket, and so much more:
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- 37726 Edgewater Dr. [HAR]
The U.S. Postal Service plans to end all retail operations at its flagship Downtown Houston post office next Friday, May 15th. And that’ll be it for the Barbara Jordan Post Office in the 5-story 1962 building with concrete fins at 401 Franklin St. All P.O. box and caller services at that location have already ended; they stopped on May 1st. And the post office boxes themselves have been gently extricated as well, leaving this scene inside:
Get Your Stamps There While You Still Can
The colorful team behind the beer-and-hot-dog hangout Moon Tower Inn has plans to open a much larger and meatier restaurant a couple blocks northeast of its spot on Canal St. in the East End. A new “Proper Texas BBQ and Watering Hole” will go into a warehouse-turned-auto-repair-shop at 3125 Navigation Blvd., a few blocks down the street from Ninfa’s and El Tiempo, sometime in 2016, according to a post on the Moon Tower Inn’s Facebook page. Its name: B.R. Young’s Lost Indian.
Here’s a view of it:
B.R. Young’s Lost Indian
HOUSTON METHODIST’S NEW SUBURBAN-STYLE TMC HELIPAD 
From reader Stephen J Alexander comes this pic of the new helistop that’s landed at the corner of Bertner Ave. and S. Braeswood, just over the southern (Brays Bayou) border from the Texas Medical Campus, as viewed during construction last month. It’s directly across the street from M.D. Anderson’s 25-story Mid Campus Building 1, but the helicopter landing pad is a project of Houston Methodist Hospital, according to permit info posted onsite; it sits on a portion of Methodist’s West Pavilion remote lot. Photo: Stephen J Alexander
EXPLORING TEXAS’S INTRASTATE ART HIGHWAY SYSTEM 
“In recent months, I’ve watched work from artists in just about every region of Texas make its way to other regions in Texas. It happens constantly. Celia Eberle (Ennis) to Beaumont; Camp Bosworth (Marfa) to Albany; Margarita Cabrera (El Paso) to Dallas; Ludwig Schwarz (Dallas) to Houston; Gregory Ruppe (Dallas) to San Antonio; Hills Snyder (San Antonio) to Lubbock, Danielle Georgiou (Dallas) to Marfa, Rick Lowe (Houston) to Dallas. You get the picture. The state, despite its size, enjoys a remarkably active farm-to-market road system for current working artists. This is unique in the U.S. In Texas, a town needs only one of the following to make art pop up there: 1) a university, 2) a few sharp galleries, 3) an accredited museum, 4) an artist residency, 5) a rich, well-traveled, collecting family who start a non-profit or private exhibition space. Texas is bent on importing art from outside of the state, yes, but that intractable ‘Texan’ identity (whatever it means to each region) also drives ongoing interest in homegrown talent. And given the state’s 27 million people, there’s some talent to swish around.” — Christina Rees, after shouting “Jesus Christ! Texas is so freaking big!†on a road trip to Marfa. [Glasstire] Photo: Christina Rees
King Dollar, Pizza Hut, Sherwin-Williams, Sun Loan, Mini’s Cleaners, Ruchi’s Taqueria, Schlotzky’s, Tiendo Rio Lempa, Denny’s, Hairtex & Nails, Nancy’s Cake Designs, Nationwide Insurance, Edible Arrangements, Todo Jewelry, Video Square, V Star (pictured here), and all of the businesses in the Woodridge Plaza shopping center at 6969 Gulf Fwy. — they’re all going away. The Houston Community College System wants to expand its Southeast College East Side Campus onto the 5.7-acre property to its south, on the north side of I-45 near Gulfgate. A reader who isn’t involved in the legal tussle, but who’s looked through the records on the county clerk’s website, describes the back-and-forth as laid out in the documents: “It looks like the special commissioners valued the shopping center at $12,500,000. Both the landowner, Compass Investors Group LLC, and HCCS objected and are seeking a trial for a higher, and a lower valuation, respectively. Texas Capital Bank is owed about $3.5 million on a mortgage on the property and also intervened. The landowner lawsuit is in Cause number 1043516 in County Court 4. HCCS also filed condemnation actions against all the tenants (cause 1057330 in County Court 4).”
Images: Moseley Commercial
The Taking of Woodridge Plaza
HOW YOU CAN HELP HOUSTON’S FIRST FULL-TIME HUMAN TRAFFICKING COFFEE SHOP COME TO LIFE 
Been looking for a good coffee shop somewhere around the Heights where folks can get together and discuss Houston’s role as a major hub for human trafficking? Where caffeine-hunters can experience moments of genuine outrage — then find themselves drawn toward information sessions, group discussions, planning meetings, and double espressos — knowing that all profits from their chatting and coffee-drinking habits will go toward charitable stuff like providing classes and counseling for survivors of human trafficking? If so, then you’ll be happy to learn about A 2nd Cup, which opened as a part-time “incubator” project a couple of years ago. Now the nonprofit, led by former junior-high science teacher Erica Raggett, has begun work on a buildout for a permanent, full-time home — in the Vineyard Church of Houston’s Storehouse storefront at 1111 E. 11th St., just east of Studewood St. (pictured above, right next door to longtime late-night cop favorite Andy’s Café). A 2nd Cup’s backers are trying to raise an additional $100,000 toward the effort on Indiegogo now. [Indiegogo] Photo mockup: A 2nd Cup
The sixth and last of the replacement street trees was planted in the public right-of-way surrounding the Wendy’s drive-thru at 5003 Kirby Dr. over the weekend. “It is a big specimen tree, taller than what was removed,” writes the reader who sent in these photos of the installation paid for by a special city fund for Houston parks — so we can all see for ourselves. The previous weekend, 5 replacement oaks were put in along the side street, North Blvd. Crews hired by the franchise owner, Mohammed Ali Dhanani of Haza Foods, had chopped down 6 trees on adjacent city property last October. You can compare the current scene in these photos and in our story last week with how it all looked before the chainsaws were fired up.
Regrowth
Spend time trying to remove your mistakes one by one — or get rid of all of them with one dramatic action.
- 903 English St. [HAR]
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE ART OF OBTAINING CITY PERMITS 
“When Havel Ruck Projects was commissioned to create ‘Fifth Ward Jam,’ it was under the premise that it was temporary (although 5th Ward CRC decided to keep and maintain it). We needed to obtain a permit to move the shack we used for the piece to the empty lot where it stands today. With the help of Fifth Ward CRC, we met with city permit people and discussed that we were not creating a dwelling, but a work of art. They said we needed a building permit to move the house. We said it was our desire that we did not need a building permit after moving the house because it was going to be made into a work of art. So, saying they never have done this before, they wrote us up a creative permit that deemed the house a dwelling while it was being picked up and moved, but it would be officially deemed an ‘art structure’ after it was on the site, thus allowing us not to need building permits to construct the piece. With a little education and persuasion, the permit people can be pretty accommodating . . . seems back in the day, us artists did stuff and then apologized later.” [Dan Havel, commenting on Saving Houston’s Unzoned Artistic Spirit] Illustration: Lulu
If you thought it was kinda adorable how those 2 same-owner mattress stores are snuggling up right next to each other at the corner of Westheimer and Montrose Blvd. in Montrose, you’re sure to be enthralled by the suburban version of the same like-kind pair-up down about Sienna Plantation, what with their separate, straight-laced façades and separate showrooms. Mattress Firm has been open for a couple years already at 8741 Hwy. 6 South in Missouri City; the same company’s slightly larger Mattress Pro just opened up next door at 8735 last month. Better yet, the buildings are for sale, together!
Bedroom Community
