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Featured Posts
03/26/18 4:00pm

Montrose Blvd. Aqua Car Wash Wants To Add Mixed Drinks to Its Menu

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Montrose, North Montrose, Retail, Signage
23 Comments

The Aqua Hand Car Wash & Detail on the corner of W. Dallas could get even wetter pending the TABC’s permission for the business to serve mixed drinks on-site. The photo above, sent in by a Swamplot reader, shows the 680-sq.-ft., butterfly-roofed building where a notice naming Aqua Heights LLC as the applicant for a mixed beverage permit now hangs in the window.

The building went up on the long-vacant field at 1013 Montrose in 2011. Washing, waxing, and detailing take place in a parking lot to the east and south of the structure.

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Wet Bar
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Featured Posts
03/26/18 2:00pm

Fleet Feet Sports Now Up and Running in Neal & Company’s Abandoned Antique Store on the Corner of Greenbriar and Bissonnet

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Retail, Signage, Southampton
2 Comments

The 1950 building at 4502 Greenbriar formerly home to the Neal & Company antique shop has been taken over by Fleet Feet Sports. The running gear retailer bought the building — last renovated in 2005 — just under 2 months ago. Shortly before the sale, Fleet Feet closed its nearby store in Rice Village — on the north side of Rice Blvd. next to Tea Bar and Organics.

Head-in parking now fronts 2 sides of the Greenbriar location — as opposed to just one at the old Rice Village store:

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Head-to-Head Head-In Parking
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Featured Posts
03/26/18 11:30am

The Mind-Boggling Underground Multi-Bayou Tunnel Drainage System Now Proposed for Harris County

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Flooding, Quicklink
54 Comments

THE MIND-BOGGLING UNDERGROUND MULTI-BAYOU TUNNEL DRAINAGE SYSTEM NOW PROPOSED FOR HARRIS COUNTY The Harris County Flood Control District is considering digging the nation’s largest network of high-volume tunnels 100 to 200 ft. underground to drain stormwater from several waterways, including — write the Chronicle‘s Mike Morris and Mihir Zaveri — Buffalo Bayou, White Oak Bayou, Hunting Bayou, Greens Bayou, Halls Bayou, Clear Creek, and Cypress Creek. “The goal under the plan,” they report, “would be for those waterways to be able to keep a 100-year storm event within their banks.” Flood czar Steve Costello argues that despite the project’s enormity, the tunnels might actually be the cheapest way to bring the all the county’s major waterways up to 100-year capacity. Even if such a one-shot solution does cost less than a series of smaller mitigation efforts, the pricetag for the tunnels would still be in the billions, or “perhaps $100 million per mile,” Costello says. On Tuesday, the Commissioners Court is set to vote on whether to pursue a contract with Fugro USA Land — a global engineering firm — for a feasibility study of the proposed project that would cost around $400,000. [Houston Chronicle ($)] Photo of Harvey flooding near UHD: Kelsie H. Dos Santos

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Apartments
03/23/18 4:00pm

23-Story Old Folks’ Tower Going Up on Site of Retired Ripple Creek Townhomes off Woodway

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Memorial, Proposed Developments
No Comments

Tradition Senior Living has kicked off construction on a new, 23-story tower it’s building on the site of the Ripple Creek Townhomes just east of the Second Baptist Church complex on Woodway Dr. — which were demolished last year. The tower will overlook the concrete-lined Bering Ditch as shown in the rendering at top — taken from the website of a Vietnamese firm that’s touting the project as a way for foreigners to earn green cards by investing in it.

The new apartment’s parking lot and landscaping on Woodway are shown hugging Texas Dow Employees Credit Union’s branch building on the corner of S. Ripple Creek Dr. East of the bank — in place of what are now 2 vacant strip buildings — a dog park, water feature, porte-cochère, and driveway onto Woodway are planned:

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Waterfront Property
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Downtown
03/23/18 12:45pm

Stripped Americana Building Garage Stump on Dallas St. Downtown Now Getting a Paintjob

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Parking, Renovations
2 Comments

Workers are now applying paint to the 5-level garage stump of the former Americana building at 811 Dallas St. Over the last year, the 10-story office tower that sat atop the southern half of the garage was removed.

9-in. aluminum louvers were added to the portion of the parking podium pictured above on the corner of Dallas and Travis streets during a renovation in 2000. That exterior layer was stripped off as part of the recent work on the building, however, exposing the original clay block surface underneath.

30,000-or-so-sq.-ft. of ground-floor retail are also receiving touch-ups as part of the current work on the property.

Photos: Drew (parking garage); Boxer Property (Americana)

Clay Tile Refresh
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Apartments
03/22/18 5:00pm

New Construction Barricades Herald Pending Arrival of River Oaks Shopping Center’s Biggest Corner Tower Yet

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New Construction, North Montrose
12 Comments

Orange barricades now flank the far east side of the northern portion of the River Oaks Shopping Center where a 30-story highrise — dubbed The Driscoll — is planned in place of Café Ginger’s original corner spot on W. Gray. The saucer-like tower shown in the photo above was appended to the retail building as one of many modifications its owner Weingarten Realty has made to the originally Art Deco structure over the years. When the new apartment rises, it’ll tower over 5 storefronts in the retail center, as opposed to just one.

Café Ginger’s northern neighbor Local Pour also shuttered in the portion of the building that’s replaced by The Driscoll’s lobby in the rendering below from architect Ziegler Cooper:

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The Driscoll
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Featured Posts
03/22/18 3:00pm

City Votes To Plant New Sunnyside Multi-Service Center Closer to Home, Steering Clear of Tired Brownfield

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Proposed Developments, Sunnyside Place
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Houston City Council voted unanimously yesterday to purchase 2 vacant parcels of land — just under 8 acres total — off Reed Rd. in Sunnyside for a new community service center and health clinic, as well as an adjacent park. Unlike the more remote site the officials first proposed for the new service center — on city property next to a former landfill that’s still home below ground to 3.5 million tires — the Reed Rd. location has never been developed, is just down the street from the existing center at 9314 Cullen Blvd. (pictured at top), and is now privately-owned.

A garbage incinerator once located on the 299.5-acre landfill on Bellfort St. just east of 288 closed in 1974 after a report from the Environmental Protection Agency said it was letting off deadly levels of lead into the air. The city commissioned new soil tests last year and argued that the brownfield — shown above — was safe. But the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality says it’s still contaminated with metals, pesticides, solvents, and potentially toxic volatile organic compounds.

Here’s what the furnace — dubbed the Holmes Road Incinerator — looked like around the time the city shut it down:

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Holmes Road Incinerator
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East Montrose
03/22/18 9:45am

Les Noo’dle’s Nametags Replacing Les Ba’get’s on the Montrose Blvd. Restaurant Building Near W. Gray

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Montrose, Renovations, Restaurants
2 Comments

The building on the corner of Montrose Blvd. and Bomar St. is showing signs of rebranding as Les Ba’get’s owners prepare to open a new, more pho-friendly joint in its place — dubbed Les Noo’dle. February 2 was closing day for the original Vietnamese restaurant; it’s now getting situated in a new Oak Forest shopping center on Ella Blvd. where it will double its space.

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Apostrophe Intact
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Featured Posts
03/21/18 2:00pm

King’s Bierhaus Owners Will Hatch Egghaus Next Door

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Proposed Developments, Quicklink, Restaurants, Shady Acres, Strip Centers
1 Comment

KING’S BIERHAUS OWNERS WILL HATCH EGGHAUS NEXT DOOR Egghaus Gourmet is what the father-and-son owners of King’s Bierhaus are planning to call the new breakfast restaurant they have planned next to their existing beer hall in the strip center on T.C Jester, just off Ella. The Chronicle’s Greg Morago reports that Hans and Philipp Sitter have already “secured the Egghaus space” on the east side of the building. Upon opening, the new restaurant will bring the tenant count of the 17,500-sq.-ft. strip to either 3 or 4, depending on the state of another neighboring business: Tea & Victory. Announced last September, the board game cafe is still in its incubation phase, but a representative now tells Swamplot it’s looking at an early April opening. [Houston Chronicle] Photo of 2042 and 2044 E. T.C. Jester: JJ J.

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Adaptive Reuse
03/21/18 12:00pm

Smoosh, Teapresso Setting Up Next to Snooze in Lowell Street Market off Shepherd

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Houston Heights, Mixed Use, Openings and Closings, Renovations, Restaurants
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In the wake of Snooze, 2 more businesses with names suggesting AM activities are on their way to the new Lowell Street Market on 18th St. between Shepherd and Durham. Radom Capital began transforming the 3-building former warehouse complex in something retail- and restaurant-ready back in 2016. Since then, Snooze  has been the only restaurant to open in the development.

Building permits filed for the empty spots neighboring Snooze and Smoosh now show reveal the name of a third eatery that could be on its way to 718 W. 18th St.: Teapresso Bar. The Hawaiian tea shop chain has most of its current locations on Oahu, with a few on Maui as well. Lowell Street Market would be its first step onto the mainland.

The site plan below indicates all 3 buildings in the complex:

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The Early Risers
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Bayous and Waterways
03/20/18 4:30pm

Funding for Downtown Houston’s New Island

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Flooding, Quicklink
12 Comments

FUNDING FOR DOWNTOWN HOUSTON’S NEW ISLAND Houston’s flood czar Steve Costello tells the Chronicle’s Mike Morris that the city plans to apply for FEMA resiliency grants in order to build the North Canal Bypass — the long-whispered diversion channel that would relink White Oak and Buffalo bayous between Main and Elysian streets. The waterway concept bubbled up last year in Plan Downtown where its course formed an island northwest of Allen’s Landing indicated in the imagined map above. By bypassing the bayou’s oxbow, the channel is expected not only to reduce flooding downtown — it could also “help lower the water level in White Oak Bayou all the way to the 610 Loop and in Buffalo Bayou as far west as Gessner,” according to a county study. The result: “A little more than half of the 854 structures in the 100-year floodplain along White Oak and an adjacent tributary, Turkey Gully, would be removed from the floodplain.” [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Map: Plan Downtown  

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Churches
03/20/18 12:30pm

Churchyard Excavator Now Breaking Down Walls Between Sojourn Heights’ Current Home on Aurora and Its Soon-To-Be Sanctuary

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Demolitions, Houston Heights, Renovations, Sunset Heights
17 Comments

Crews are now digging a hole through the middle of the Sojourn Heights church campus off Gostick St., south of Aurora in Sunset Heights. The rendering above looks west across Gostick to show the fenced-off lawn that will eventually grow in place of the demolished building. The new green space is bookended by renovated street-fronting structures and backed by a smaller addition that’s planned on the far west side of the just-over-an-acre church property.

Before the takedown got started yesterday, the complex consisted of 3 buildings that lined Gostick:

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Prayer Semi-Circle
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Downtown
03/19/18 4:30pm

Sapporo Japanese Restaurant Preparing To Rub Shoulders with Barnaby’s Across from Market Square Park

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Openings and Closings, Restaurants
6 Comments

Update, 1 pm, March 21: The numbers of Sapporo restaurants under the same ownership but with different names have been clarified.

Now on its way to the former Fusion Taco space shown shaded by trees and orange awnings next to Barnaby’s in the photo at top: Sapporo Japanese Sushi & Bar. The restaurant’s spot in the Henry Henke Building on the corner of Congress and Milam — across from Market Square Park — will be its second location with this specific name; its first is just off the western end of Woodlands Pkwy. Two other Sapporo Japanese Steakhouse & Bar restaurants are also located in the Houston area.

Fusion Taco opened at 801 Congress in 2013. Here’s what the view east from its sidewalk seating area looked like before the place shuttered:

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Fusion Taco Turnover
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Featured Posts
03/19/18 12:00pm

Digging Up the Latest Addicks and Barker Reservoir Dirt

by
Flooding, Quicklink
9 Comments

DIGGING UP THE LATEST ADDICKS AND BARKER RESERVOIR DIRT The Army Corps of Engineers is exploring the possibility of deepening the Addicks and Barker reservoirs in order to increase their floodwater capacities. The Chronicle’s Mihir Zaveri digs up a request the Corps posted online quietly in January for specifics on how to remove soil from the reservoirs. The notice says the Corps is “evaluating the level of interest” from contractors, government agencies, and others “to allow for the beneficial use of material by interested parties while increasing capacity of the Government project.” Respondents are asked how much how much soil they would remove from the reservoirs, what methods they’d use to collect and transport it, where they’d deposit it, and how long the work would take. The deadline for responding to the agency was last Thursday. [Houston Chronicle; posting] Photo of American Shooting Centers and Millie Bush Dog Park off Westheimer Pkwy. in Barker Reservoir, flooded after Memorial Day, 2015: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers [license]

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Featured Posts
03/16/18 4:30pm

House of 11 Stacked Shipping Containers on McGowen Now Awaiting Doors, Windows, Electrification

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New Construction, Third Ward
34 Comments

When the owner’s work is finished on what he’s calling the McGowen Container House, the stack of boxes just east of 59 will be a 4-story house with a carport at ground level and a terrace atop the blue Hanjin unit shown in the photo above. A few windows, doors, and portions of the staircase that will climb through the building’s east side have been installed, according to the blog for the project. Rough-in plumbing and some preliminary electrical wiring is finished as well, but the utilities aren’t on yet.

Here’s a view of the cargo hold from the east, near Hutchins St.:

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Third Ward Freight
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