Allyn West

7 Comments

Just outside the Loop on Telephone Rd., Frank’s Grill — or Rank’s Rill, as Hurricane Ike rendered the standalone greasy spoon’s sign — will be closing and moving south about a tenth of a mile into the larger suite shown here in the recently completedÂ strip center on Telephone and Fairway. The strip center replaced a car dealership and a body shop. There’s no date set for Frank’s move, but an employee tells Swamplot that it should be happening in about two months.

Previously on Swamplot: Ruh-Roh: What Ike and Scooby-Do Did to Frankâ€™s Grill

Photos: Allyn West

77087, Gulfgate, New Construction, Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Telephone Road

Houston History

03/12/13 4:00pm

$17.5M To Be Spent Repairing Battleship Texas

77571, Houston History, Houston Landmarks, Houston Ship Channel, Quicklink, Renovations, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department

16 Comments

$17.5M TO BE SPENT REPAIRING BATTLESHIP TEXAS Leaking and taking on Ship Channel water since last summer, Battleship Texas will be receiving some structural repairs beginning this April: Texas Parks and Wildlife announced today — the 99th anniversary of the ship’s call to action — that a $17.5 million contract with a North Carolina firm will cover “aboutÂ half” the repairsÂ needed; they’ll be “a first step,” says TPWD’s Scott Stover, to ready the sinking ship forÂ its eventualÂ dry berth. During the repairs, history seekers and field trippers should still be able to see some significant sights: “[T]he ship will remain open to the public as conditions allow, and visitors will see plenty of activity at the site, as well as construction equipment and an access barge on the north side of the ship.” [Texas Parks and Wildlife; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Candace Garcia

Geography

03/12/13 2:00pm

Houston’s Class Divide, Color-Coded

13 Comments

This map from Rise of the Creative Class author Richard Florida’s series at The Atlantic on “class-divided cities” shows where Houston’s working, service, and creative classes live.

Denoted here in purple, what Florida considers the creative class — that is, he writes, “people who work in science and technology, business and management, arts and culture, media and entertainment, and law and healthcare professions” — makes up 33 percent of Houston’s workers; that’s just a little bitÂ larger than the national average, according to Florida, of 32.6 percent.

And what about the service and working classes?

Geography, Houston Data, Maps, Population

Awards

03/12/13 10:00am

A Look Inside a Renovated Glenbrook Valley Mod

Last week, owners Cheryl and David Bowman of 7919 Glenview Dr. were given a Good Brick Award from Preservation Houston for their renovation of this 1954 mod — one of the original 6, says Cheryl Bowman, built inÂ Glenbrook Valley. Purchased in March 2011, the 2-bedroom, 1,834-sq.-ft. home, shown here from the backyard, wasn’t always such a pretty picture . . .

77061, Awards, Glenbrook Valley, Historic Districts, Historic Preservation, Interiors, Mid-Century Modern, Renovations

Downtown

03/11/13 4:00pm

A Few Last Looks at Macy’s

8 Comments

A FEW LAST LOOKS AT MACY’S And that’s it. After 66 years, there’s no more shopping to be done. Macy’s is closed. Swamplot photographerÂ Candace Garcia finds a perch Downtown from which to take this farewell photo of Kenneth Franzheim’s former Foley’s — and Hair Balls’ Abraham Garza goes inside for a few last looks of the liquidation as the business hours dwindled on Saturday to zero. Garza says: “The only items I saw for sale, other than fixtures and empty jewelry cases were mink coats.” [Hair Balls; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Candace Garcia

77002, Houston Architects, Houston History, Macy's, Openings and Closings, Quicklink, Retail

Downtown

03/11/13 3:00pm

Where Downtown’s New Residential Tower Will Go

20 Comments

This crumbly parking lot at 1625 Main St. will be where a 24-story, 336-unit residential tower called SkyHouse will begin going up in April. Concrete’s already been poured to improve the sidewalks and make planters for token landscaping to shade the street. A rep from the architecture firm Smallwood, Reynolds, Stewart, and Stewart tells Swamplot that renderings and site plans for the luxury highrise aren’t available; the photo here shows a similar development, SkyHouse Midtown in Atlanta, from the Atlanta-based firm.

77002, Apartments, Downtown, Luxury Highrises, New Construction, Proposed Developments

Construction Materials

03/11/13 11:55am

Getting to the Bottom of the Williams Tower

12 Comments

GETTING TO THE BOTTOM OF THE WILLIAMS TOWER The $412 million sale last week of theÂ Williams Tower seems to have provoked someÂ curiosity in the Houston Chronicle’s Katherine Feser: Pursuing a lead from a retired employee that, were it not for those pesky FAA regulations, the record-breaking 64-story skyscraperÂ would have been even taller, Feser goes into the paper’s archives and finds evidence that the tower’sÂ slab was something to behold, too:Â “The foundation pour . . . started at midnight Friday and was completed early Saturday night. The contractor, J.A. Jones Co., said it was believed to be the largest continuous pour ever made in Houston — more than 10,000 cubic yards of concrete. There have been larger pours but they have been completed in several stages. The area of the poured mat is 200 feet by 200 feet, almost an acre.” [Prime Property; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Russell Hancock

77056, Houston History, Houston Landmarks, Quicklink, Uptown, Williams Tower

Public Transportation

03/11/13 10:00am

Houston’s New Short Buses

HOUSTON’S NEW SHORT BUSES Metro will roll out a fleet of these 15-passenger van-like buses this week on 13 underused routes, reports The Highwayman’s Dug Begley: “Following a voter referendum to continue giving a quarter of Metroâ€™s sales tax collections to local cities for road repairs, the agency said smaller buses would be a better fit for routes where conventional 40-foot buses were mostly empty.” According to a press release from Metro, the shorterÂ 27-ft. buses will have “all the amenities” of the conventional ones, with “header signs, interior pull cords, and audio/visual announcements.” You’ll be able to see them for yourself tomorrow at the Southeast Transit Center on Scottcrest; the buses will begin running routes Wednesday and Thursday from the Magnolia TC on Harrisburg and the Acres Homes TC on Little York.Â [The Highwayman; Ride Metro] Image: Write on Metro

Buses, Metro, Public Transportation, Quicklink

New Construction

03/08/13 3:00pm

UH’s Dead-End Den for Cougars of Age

24 Comments

This is what’s going up on some prime spurfront property at the University of Houston. Next to a Chinese restaurant and that prideful parking garage on Spur 5 that inspired the Houston Chronicleâ€™s Lisa Gray and some student rappers back in 2010, the 2-story building at the end of Calhoun Rd. on campus is being billed as Cougar Den Plaza.

77004, Proposed Developments, Restaurants, Retail, University of Houston

Openings and Closings

03/08/13 1:00pm

HISD To Close Third Ward’s Ryan Middle School

HISD TO CLOSE THIRD WARD’S RYAN MIDDLE SCHOOL Despite the community’s protests, HISD voted 5-3 last night to close Ryan Middle School at the end of the school year, reports the Houston Chronicleâ€™s Ericka Mellon: “Roughly two dozen speakers — mostly alumni and community activists — blasted the Houston Independent School District over the closure plans, at times nearing tears and shouting from the audience. They called the Ryan closure ‘blatantly discriminatory.'” Ryan’s 263 students, reports Mellon, are the fewest among HISD middle schools; the students will be consolidated about 4 miles away at Cullen Middle School on Scott St. HISD superintendentÂ Terry Grier says that Ryan’s 1958 Elgin St. building might be repurposed into a DeBakey-like health-careersÂ magnet. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Wikimedia Commons

77004, Openings and Closings, Quicklink, Schools, Third Ward

Crime

03/08/13 11:30am

Downtown’s New Drunk Tank

The redo of this Chenevert St. warehouse is complete, Mayor Parker announced yesterday, and the Houston Center for Sobriety is ready to give drunk people a place to dry out. Next to the Eastex Fwy., the 84-bed center at 150 N. Chenevert will operate out of a 19,000-sq.-ft. building behind the Star of Hope homeless shelter, across from Irma’s Mexican restaurant on Ruiz and just a few blocks north of Minute Maid Park.

77002, Downtown, Institutional Buildings, Public Health, Renovations

Comments

03/07/13 3:45pm

Comment of the Day: Walking in Oak Forest

6 Comments

COMMENT OF THE DAY: WALKING IN OAK FOREST “Greater Oak Forest probably has fewer opportunities to be walkable than either the newer or older master-planned communities (i.e. Eastwood or The Woodlands). The older ones have secondary thoroughfares spaced at shorter intervals, so for instance every four blocks instead of every ten blocks; they were built with sidewalks; deed restrictions tended to be weaker; and they were much smaller to begin with, easier to escape on foot. The newer MPCs were designed to have jogging trails and interconnectivity for recreation rather than for transportation, but thatâ€™s something at least to walk around for. The Oak Forest walkability problem is apparent if you just look at Google Earth. Itâ€™s a big gigantic green splotch with only one viable commercial strip running through it and 34th Street (across the tracks) as the red-headed stepchild of neighborhood retail. The neighborhood streets tend to run parallel with the commercial strips with perpendicular streets at much less frequent intervals. Itâ€™s not walkable. It wasnâ€™t intended to be walkable by design. When I lived in that area, Iâ€™d walk two miles to Petrol Station and back. Thatâ€™s how I justified to myself indulging in the Rancor Burger. But then . . . you have to understand that I am insane. Not as profoundly insane as the Art Guys, but Iâ€™m the sort of person that will walk alone from Montrose to Bellaire and back via the TMC from between 10PM and 3AM for no particular reason. Normal, sane people arenâ€™t gonna walk like I walk. But donâ€™t get me wrong. I suspect that Greater Oak Forestâ€™s relative lack of walkability or mixed-use potentials is part of what draws the big money in. They prefer it to be insulated from the urban core physically, aesthetically, and demographically. If you own property there, you will prosper. [TheNiche, commenting on Comment of the Day: The Drive for Oak Forest Retail]

Comments, Quicklink, Walking

Evictions

03/07/13 3:00pm

Pearl Bar Locked Out on Washington Ave.

6 Comments

PEARL BAR LOCKED OUT ON WASHINGTON AVE. Landlord Eva Hughes has changed the locks on her building, reports Chris Gray, for Pearl Bar’s non-payment of rent: According to Hughes’s attorney, adds Gray, eviction “proceedings” are underway. This isn’t the first time the tenants at 4216 Washington Ave. have had a visit paid by such sober guests: “[I]n January agents from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission and state comptroller’s office visited the bar and confiscated cash to count against a back-tax bill a comptroller’s spokesman estimated at more than $40,000.” [Hair Balls] Photo: Pearl Bar

77007, Bars, Evictions, Quicklink, Washington Ave.

Openings and Closings

03/07/13 2:00pm

A 60 Degree Turnaround on Westheimer