- 834 W. 20th St. [HAR]
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From the AIG tower neighboring to the north, a reader peers down behind the construction fencing now up at the corner of Waugh Dr. and D’Amico St., in an effort to figure out what might be gettin’ real in the Whole Foods Montrose parking lot. An employee tells Swamplot over the phone that the store is planting additional parking spaces on top of what was previously a walkway lined with grass and picnic tables, adding parking has been a squeeze on the weekends (which lines up pretty well with earlier reports from the scene). The rep also says that the tables (positioned across Waugh from BMW service garage Bavarian Machine Specialties and catty-corner to the health-and-beauty-shop-laden strip center across D’amico), were almost never used. Permits for the pave-over were issued at the end of May.
- Previously on Swamplot: Later on Opening Day: Whole Foods Montrose Afternoon Parking Report; Opening Day: It’s Getting Real Crowded at the Montrose Whole Foods Parking Lot, Beer, Wine, Art, and BBQ on Tap: Here’s Your New Whole Foods Market, Montrose, This Kind of Whole Foods Thing, Getting Real on Waugh at West Dallas This Weekend,
Photos: Randy Saad (top), Swamplot inbox (bottom photo showing opening day, 2011)
Leaner Green
COMMENT OF THE DAY: DOES ‘EAST RIVER’ ERASE BAYOU HISTORY, OR DRAW IN NEW STUDENTS? 
“‘East River’ . . . that does sound like a lame sort of urban infant suckling at Mama NYC’s teat. But really, a 2-word name with each word having a strong, apropos and simple meaning is positive. It is the east part of Houston, and it is a river (called a bayou). But not just [any] bayou — the womb of the city. In the 1840s-60s, the west of the Allen’s Landing section was nothing but a well-wooded open sewer and hideout/hangout for the various characters and scoundrels of Vinegar Hill. [But] east of Downtown it was a river, with masted ships and energetic influx. We should be familiar with every bend of it, but [the bayou’s history is] mostly unknown. ‘East River’ can serve as an introductory directional appetizer for those unknowers who are already here, and those yet to appear.” [Dana-X, commenting on Comment of the Day: The Ongoing Rewrite of Houston’s East Side Story] Illustration: Lulu
YOU MIGHT WANT TO TAKE THAT DIOXIN OUT OF THE SAN JACINTO BEFORE A HURRICANE DOES IT FIRST 
Yesterday marked the start of the 60-day public comment period on this week’s proposal to pull about 202,000 cubic yards of dioxin-laced muck out of the San Jacinto River near I-10. The Houston Chronicle editorial board was among the first to jump in (though not through official comment channels), highlighting the EPA’s conclusion that the waste, which has already been seasoning the seafood and (potentially) the river’s swimmers and nearby residents since the 1960s, could cause much larger problems if the wrong storm or hurricane hits the site; the board also calls out International Paper and Waste-Management-affiliated McGinnis Industrial Maintenance — companies potentially on the hook for the cleanup bill — for purportedly slowing down the cleanup process. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Map of higher-than-background dioxin levels near San Jacinto Waste Pits site at I-10: EPA
The street-sign-strip-tiled interior of the toothy structure above will host musicians and speakers this evening during the opening-party-slash-fundraiser for Smither Park, the narrow stretch of art-filled greenspace on Munger St. next door to the Orange Show. The park, backed up against the Pallet-Ops warehouse and laydown yard on Gulf Terminal Rd., is crammed full of other visual and tactile oddities, including an under-development marble run, a meditation garden, a boxy events pavilion, and a dragon-topped bench-swing swingset, all backed by the 400 feetmosaic-encrusted walls running along the edge of most of the space.
- Smither Park Grand Opening & Fundraiser [The Orange Show]
- Smither Park’s Features [The Orange Show]
Photos: Orange Show
Orange Show Green Space
- 12010 Surrey Ln. [HAR]
A reader sends over this morning’s sunrise view of the Hotel Zaza Memorial City mid-to-highrise, now slowly rising west of Bunker Hill Dr. directly behind the Guadalajara Hacienda. Unlike the storied original in the former Warwick Hotel by Hermann Park, this one will be getting 4 floors of apartments to wear on top, and Hotel Zaza’s marketing materials also point out that it’ll be the first of the chain to be co-managed by a third party (that’d be MetroNational).  Here’s Kirksey’s rendering of what the place is supposed to look like when it’s done, and done up in a calmer beige — just imagine the Murphy, Cobalt, and Nexen office buildings spread out around it:
Glamming Up on I-10
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE ONGOING REWRITE OF HOUSTON’S EAST SIDE STORY 
“East River? Ugh, another name copied from New York City. We’ve got the East Village being developed (or is it ‘east village’, in all lowercase?), we’ve got Downtown, Midtown, and Uptown (none of which make any directional sense like they do in N.Y.C.), and now we have this. Is the area around it going to start to be called the Upper East Side?” [GL, commenting on Midway’s Latest Plans for the KBR Site; Big Turnout for the Public Housing Vouchers Waiting List; previously on Swamplot] Photo of former KBR site at 4100 Clinton Dr.: LoopNet
Yesterday the EPA released their recommendations for what to do about the toxic muck in the San Jacinto Waste Pits, after more than a decade of local and federal agencies poking and fishing around in the area (on either side of the I-10 crossing of the river). So far the Superfund site has been temporarily dealt with by the 2011 placement of a pretty-much-just-a-tarp-with-rocks-over-it armored cap, which the EPA says has already been repaired at least 7 times; the document released yesterday notes, however, that disturbances at the site caused by weather and previous nearby sand mining operations “could cause a catastrophic release of the highly toxic waste materials from the impoundments, if they remain in place.”
The EPA wants to remove about 202,000 cubic yards of contaminated material (roughly enough to fill the floor of the Astrodome with a 13-foot-deep layer) but says it’ll have to be done carefully so as not to accidentally stir up the waste into the surrounding river while trying to get it out; the removal would also probably take place in stages to avoid potentially exposing too much of the waste at a time to storms or flooding. Here’s the EPA’s map of the 2 sites where the paper sludge was originally dumped in the 1960s — the (capped) northern area is outlined in blue and labeled Cap Site, while the southern site (outlined in yellow and labled Southern Impoundment) is covered in part by the Glendale Boatworks building, next to Southwest Shipyard:
Not Keeping a Lid on It
Recognize any of the images above? They’re each depictions of actual houses in the Heights area (yes, even that really skinny one in the top right corner) as drawn by local designer Dalia Rihani, who tells Swamplot she’s long been fascinated by her neighborhood’s architectural landscape. Rihani started out planning to draw 1 home per week as an outside-of-the-9-to-5 creative outlet — but says she’s found herself doing it much more frequently than that, and has since been taking commissions to illustrate specific houses as requests started to pour in. She’s also been turning the graphics into post cards that she’s sent to some of the home’s owners, as a reader showed Swamplot:
Sketchy Activities
- 7218 Foster Island Dr. [HAR]
A construction fence has gone up around the former King’s Wholesale building in East Downtown, a reader tells Swamplot. The rendering above shows a planned renovation for the structure at the corner of Polk and Nagle streets, just a few blocks northwest of the purportedly-reopening-in-October Ivy Lofts sales center. The curved awning-fin isn’t new, but the glass storefronts are — below is a shot of the building’s pre-redo state, from when it last hit the market:
CONTINUE READING THIS STORY
Opening Up in East Downtown
COMMENT OF THE DAY: SAVE-THE-DOME SAGA’S PARKING GARAGE ENDING LEAVES ROOM FOR A SEQUEL 
“I think people are missing the larger view here. Of course there is plenty of current surface parking — but putting parking beneath the Dome begins to open up the possibility of densification on this site and on the old Astroworld site. This is the first, and necessary, step in transforming this entire area. I am betting that in 20 years or so this site will barely resemble the vast wasteland of parking lots and open space that it is today.” [SH, commenting on County Approves First $10.5 Million for Astrodome Basement Parking Garage Plan] Photo: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool
The folks at Save Buffalo Bayou send over some before-and-after photos of the Memorial Park boat launch and companion drainage structure just east of where the stream crosses beneath Woodway Dr. The group says the canoe and kayak put-in spot, on a 30-acre section of the park once used as an archery range, had been slowly greened back up by native river plants following the area’s multi-year closure and workover by the Uptown TIRZ, which involved some de-treeing work and the planting of some contractor-friendly non-native grasses on the newly reshaped slope.
Memorial Park director Jay Daniels told the group that the mowing was not planned, as park groups are currently trying to promote native plant growth in the park. Daniels said that he talked to a work group clearing some bayou access paths this weekend about removing some invasive Johnsongrass at the site; the conversation apparently led to some confusion, which led to mowing, which led to many folks being given a stern talking to.
Here’s a post-op look from July 2014 at the drainage setup (also intended to control bank erosion), partially covered in what appears to be eroding dirt and deposited sediment:
Trimming the Johnsongrass
HISD TOSSING AROUND A BELLAIRE HS REBUILD ON THE CHEVRON CAMPUS UP THE STREET 
On Monday some HISD folks pitched the idea of buying Chevron’s soon-to-be-empty land on Fournace Place to a committee overseeing the lately-stagnant push to rebuild Bellaire High School, Charlotte Aguilar reports this week. The 28-acre tract, which goes on sale on Saturday, is about 2 miles north of the school’s existing 17-acre campus and also fronts S. Rice Ave. HISD trustee Mike Lunceford tells Aguilar that Bellaire, “while one of the largest high schools in HISD, is on the smallest property.â€Â Principal Michael McDonough emailed stakeholders to say that if HISD decides to back the plan and is able to buy the land, funding would probably be put to a bond election; meanwhile, the existing school would still need some work while a new one was built. The Chevron land currently has a 10-story office midrise on it; the shot above looks out the window of that building toward the West Loop and the freeway-side Shell station next door (also up for sale). [Instant News Bellaire; previously on Swamplot] Photo from 4800 Fournace Pl.: Alvin A.
