AGING OUT OF 2018 
It’s that time of year again: the end of it. Swamplot is taking off the rest of today and all of tomorrow in order to gear up for the new year. Join us again on Wednesday as we offer up our first real-estate-related dispatches of 2019. Photo of Bagby St. at Elgin St.:
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The rendering at top of a new West-Loop-fronting hotel shows 2 different signs adoring its upper facade: one for Holiday Inn Express, the other for Staybridge Suites. Both brands will be housed under one roof in the planned 14-story building that’s due to crop up between Public Storage and the Stages Stores corporate office building north of Westheimer and east of the West Loop. On the second floor, you can see the pool deck that’s planned. No word yet on how that outdoor area or the building’s 319 rooms will be divvied up between the 2 brands, or if there will be any distinction at all.
InterContinental Hotels Group is the corporate overlord behind both Staybridge and Holiday Inn. Its logo makes a sly appearance on one of the flags in the rendering.
2-in-1 Deals
- 3246 Prince George Dr. [HAR]
HOW TIKI ISLAND CAME TO BE, AND TO BE CALLED TIKI ISLAND 
“I wanted to call it” — wait for it — “Buccaneer Bay,” says the peninsula’s developer Welcome Wilson Sr. in a recent interview with the Chronicle‘s Nancy Sarnoff. For all its alliterative charm, however, Wilson’s business partner Bill Sherrill vetoed the suggestion, and Wilson dropped it because he owed Sherrill one. Indeed, it was Sherrill, Wilson tells Sarnoff, who “noticed that when we drove to Jamaica Beach” — the duo’s first project together — “he would see this land over on the right that was about 6 in. above sea level, at the causeway. So he began to wonder: Is that privately owned?” It was, by about 5 different entities, says Wilson. “So he came to me and said, ‘You know, this is 25 minutes closer to Houston than Jamaica Beach,'” adding that if they dug canals as part of the development, the resultant dirt would be enough to elevate the surrounding land. Wilson gave his sign-off and Sherrill bought the land. “Then, just as we got going,” in the late ’60s, says Wilson, “the President of the United States, Lyndon Johnson, appointed [Sherrill] to the Federal Reserve Board in Washington and he left town, sold it out to me.” But the name stuck — and was formalized when the area incorporated as The Village of Tiki Island in 1982. “It was all Bill’s idea,” says Wilson. “No question about it.” [Houston Chronicle] Photo of Tiki Island: HAR
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CANINO PRODUCE WILL CLOSE ON MLK DAY 
“After 60 years in business, Canino Produce is shutting its doors,” reports KTRK. The Houston Farmer’s Market mainstay plans to stick around until January 21 and then vacate its 20,000-plus-sq.-ft. space on Airline Dr., according to its 2 owners. After that, it’ll be MLB Partners’ call what to do with the hole and how to integrate it into the touristy farmer’s market redo it’s had underway since shortly after buying the whole collection of vendors last year. [abc13; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Chris S.
- 23907 Conefall Ct. [HAR]
ANDERSON TODD, 1921-2018 
Tucked back on a corner lot a block north of Rice is one of the courtyard houses Anderson Todd designed and lived in during his nearly 70 years in Houston. It’s shown above in all its flat-roofed glory. Like many of the buildings Todd dreamed up around town, the house rests on principles he took from German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, his teacher at Princeton and mentor thereafter. Upon joining Rice’s then-not-so-modern architecture department in 1949, Todd set about implanting Miesian concepts in his students’ brains for the next 4 decades. He also found time to convince Mies himself to design 2 successive additions to the MFAH: Cullinan Hall and the Brown Pavilion, notes the Chronicle‘s Jasper Scherer. Todd retired from his professorial duties in 1992, and, last Friday, passed away at the age of 97. [Houston Chronicle] Photo: Swamplox inbox
WHERE TO GLIMPSE METRO’S FIRST DRIVERLESS SHUTTLE IN ACTION NEXT YEAR 
“The surge of students biking and walking” along the closed stretch of Wheeler Ave. shown above that forms TSU’s “Tiger Walk” will soon “be joined by a slow-moving, minivan-sized driverless shuttle,” reports the Dug Begley in the Chronicle‘s last Sunday edition. “Though it will run a small, circuitous route at first,” he writes, METRO’s long-term goal is to nudge the shuttle out onto Scott St., where it would stop at the Purple Line light rail station between the TSU campus and UH’s TDECU Stadium. “Transit and university officials are working on an opening day,” according to Begley, “likely in mid-to late January.” [Houston Chronicle] Photo: Campuspride.org
- 23606 Riverwood Dr. [HAR]
Note: This story has been updated to note that the church is located in Sixth Ward, not First.
In April, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura — the highest judicial body in the Catholic Church — issued a ruling direct from Rome to the corner of Silver and Center streets, reports the Chronicle’s Lisa Gray: St. Stephen Church, across from Platypus Brewing, would be required to reopen. (It wasn’t until the fall that members of the church found out, though, seeing as “the Vatican doesn’t just post its rulings on the web. Its documents are in Latin, and are not made public,” Gray writes.) The church’s 1941 brick building had been boarded up since closing in 2016, around which time Lovett Commercial — the owner of the strip housing Platypus and neighboring retail — announced plans to redevelop some of St. Stephen’s parking and expressed interest in buying the church itself, according to congregants.
Divine Intervention
NEEDVILLE WATER TOWER WILL STAY STANDING FOR NOW ON ACCOUNT OF IT MIGHT BE COVERED IN LEAD Needville’s city council appeared unmoved by local preservationists’ 2-year campaign to repaint and rehab the town’s signature WWII-era water tower earlier this month when it voted 3-2 to demolish the, um, patinaed structure. But just last Friday, 2 people with land near the tower took a new approach to preserving it, arguing in district court that the structure’s worth saving not just for its looks but because lab tests, their attorney wrote, showed that its exterior “was coated with six layers of lead-based paint,” each containing a high level of the chemical. A temporary restraining order granted against the City of Needville the same day now bars anyone from toppling the tower until “safety protocols are established by competent experts,” to ensure that “no environmental contamination” will result from the teardown. (“The contractor hired by the city council is a nice guy,” one of the plaintiffs, Rick Sinclair, told the Chronicle’s Kristi Nix, “but I don’t believe he is licensed or accredited to handle this level of lead abatement.”) A hearing to consider the lawsuit is now set for January 19. According to the plaintiffs, “Restoration coating systems have been identified” that would protect the tower while also sealing in the lead. [abc13] Video: Picture Perfect Productions
A HOLIDAY SIGN-OFF 
Swamplot is checking out early today in the spirit of Christmas Eve. We’ll be gone tomorrow, too, but don’t let that detract from any merry plans you’ve got scheduled for the holiday. If you’re really aching for a dose of Houston real estate reporting, our archive remains online 24-7 for a quick peek. And we’ll be back to our regularly scheduled coverage on Wednesday, at which time we hope you’ll rejoin us for the year’s final stretch of news coverage. Photo: elnina via Swamplot Flickr Pool
For the past 2 weeks, workers have been gutting the gray-painted 1940s bungalow at 1408 Sul Ross St., opposite the Rothko Chapel. In some cases, they’ve chucked the removed house parts in the dumpster that’s parked in the driveway.
In other cases, they’ve been saving them for reuse by stockpiling them inside:
Special Exhibition
- 3737 Sunset Blvd. [HAR]
