- 1824 Heights Blvd. [HAR]
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Houston Heights
A reader sends the latest from the corner of 19th St. and N. Shepherd Dr., where the facade of the former Mr. Pro Lube and Tune-Up Plus building is now fully swapped out with fresh Take 5 Oil Change logos and exterior branding. The shop is across the street from almost-ready-to-open Dallas pizza import Cane Rosso, and catty-corner to Fat Cat Creamery and its strip-center companions.
Below is a snapshot of what the corner looked like back in 2013 before the trade-out began — and before the space on the corner north across 19th st. changed over from Art & Showcase Flooring to Heights Retreat Salon & Spa:
Strip Center Tune-Up
Some renderings and potential site plans for a retail redo of 3 warehouses at the southwest corner of W. 18th St. and N. Shepherd Dr. make an appearance in the current leasing listing for the property. Preliminary plans for the development, to be called Lowell St. Market after a former name of N. Shepherd Dr., show a greened-and-glassed-up version of the Savvi Commercial Furniture warehouse (above on the left), with a matching redo of the Airmakers Cooling & Heating building (visible on the far right).
The flier bears the logo of Radom Capital, which is a partner in the Heights Mercantile development on 7th St. Radom is also behind the pink-and-white redo of the former Heights Plaza shopping center on E. 20th, which Steel City Popsicles told Eater they’d be ready to move into some time this month. Plans for the Lowell center are still a ways off, however; the leasing flier gives summer 2017 as an estimated construction start date, but also mentions that sale or leasing of the whole property as-is isn’t off the table.
The 3 structures currently on the site add up to 20,380 sq.ft. of space; the redevelopment would scoot some of that space around and pare it that down to 10,000 sq.ft., making room for a parking lot in the back. Here’s what the footprint could look like following that trim-down:
Lowell St. Market
An indiegogo page has just been launched to crowdfund the removal and reuse of an unexpectedly large group of well-preserved 1930s bricks from the now-under-deconstruction Yale St. bridge over White Oak Bayou. The group calling itself Friends of Houston’s Yale Bridge Bricks says the funds will be used to preserve the bricks for reuse both around the bridge and elsewhere around the city.
The fundraising effort shares some organizers with Friends of the Fountain, which launched the late-February campaign to crowdfund the de-restoration and subsequent repair of the Mecom Fountain following its short-lived experiment with limestone couture. That effort raised more than $50,000 toward a $60k goal in one month; Bill Baldwin (of both Friends groups) says it the fountain’s fundraiser received over $100k in total, including offline donations. This latest round of online crowdfunding the preservation of National Register of Historic Places structures is starting the bar higher, with a goal of $100,000 shown on the fundraising page.
- Friends of Houston’s Yale Bridge Bricks [IndieGoGo]
- Previously on Swamplot: Flooding Keeps Yale St. Bridge Open But Closes Hwy. 6 and 290; Yale St. Crossing of White Oak Bayou To Cut Out in 2 Weeks, Reopen in 2018; Private Group Now Trying to Crowdfund the Un-Restoration of the Mecom Fountain’s Basin Wall;
Photo of work on Yale St. Bridge and Memorial Park Mattress Firm: Friends of Houston’s Yale Bridge Bricks
Follow the Yale Brick Road
An orange and black construction marquee is now advertising the upcoming closure of the Yale St. bridge over White Oak Bayou just south of I-10, starting the Monday after next and running until the New Year’s Eve after next. The 1931 bridge, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is slated for replacement after years of asking crossers to please watch their weight (with 10,000 pounds per axle being the most recent upper limit). The per-axle limit was at 8,000 pounds prior to a 2012 drop to 3,000 (which disqualified some SUVs and minivans). The addition of carbon strips to the structure caused TxDOT’s weight limit to yo-yo back up to 10,000.
The plans for the new bridge floated by TxDOT in 2014 included wider outside vehicle lanes and slightly narrower sidewalks (down to 5 feet from 6). But summary and followup notes from the public meeting held at the end of July 2014 say the design has been updated to include 8-foot-wide shared bike and pedestrian pathways on either side of the bridge, in response to the public comments on the project.
The TxDOT meeting summary notes also documents the agency’s attempt to sell the bridge in the Houston Chronicle:
Coming Back a New Bridge
A slew of updates from N. Shepherd Dr. come from a nearby dermatology office with a regular lens on the rapidly-redeveloping retail scene. Above is the former site of Tune-Up Plus (on the southeast corner of N. Shepherd with 19th St.) which has been decked out in yellow, lately. A remodeling permit issued on the 23rd for the spot at 1818 N. Shepherd now refers to it as a Take 5; the oil-change and auto-repair chain currently has locations dotted all along I-10 and I-85 between Beaumont and the Blue Ridge Mountains, along with some Dallas locales; the first Houston-area Take 5 is purportedly on its way to Louetta Rd. just east of Steuber-Airline Dr. up in Spring.
Meanwhile, across N. Shepherd, the former Houston Alternator store that’s been getting the restaurant-retail treatment is almost ready to open as Cane Rosso’s first Houston spot, ahead of its also-under-construction Montrose branch:
Heights Retail Replacements
A for sale sign has appeared on the fence outside of the 1918 house on the northwest corner of 20th and Harvard streets, notes a reader. The 2-story brick-over-concrete home, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983 as the Banta House, was listed for sale in February along with the Ink Spots Museum next door at 117 E. 20th. The 21,120 sq.ft. now mentioned by the sign as up for grabs and division appears to include the parking lot behind the 2 buildings, along with the land holding the blue house at 2005 Harvard St. (also penned in by the fence).
Houses Divided
A construction crew is currently at work around and on top of the bare former site of Texas Cafeteria, shielded from prying eyes on N. Shepherd Dr. by a small dirt pile. MFT Development (the group currently planning new and mixed uses for the site of the increasingly romantic former Heights Finance Station post office) is dressing up the space at the corner with 24th St. as another restaurant and maybe some retail, following the joint’s sale, shutdown, and stripping in early 2015. Behind the property to the right, the Fiesta Mart can be seen across 24th counting down to its March 27th closing, as the flags from Monterrey Tire Center peek over the former cafeteria’s roof.
Here’s a rendering of what the planned buildout could look like, plus or minus some tenant signage:
Where the Fiesta’s Ending
Alabama Furniture & Accessories’ 2-decade locale is getting cleared out for its planned redo, a neighbor notes. The building at 2200 Yale St. got a demo permit yesterday and started coming down later in the day. The site at the corner with 22nd St. is being cleared for another Braun Enterprises project: a third non-mobile Bernie’s Burger Bus location, as confirmed in October. The furniture store (named for its original 1992 location on Alabama St.) cleared out of its Yale home by the start of March, and has flown even further north to 4900 N. Shepherd Dr. between W. 43rd St. and Tidwell Rd.
- Bernie’s Burger Bus lands Heights brick-and-mortar location after months of speculation [HBJ]
- 2200 Yale; Is Bernie’s Burger Bus Coming to the Houston Heights? [Not Of It]
- Alabama Furniture to relocate as Yale Street developers move in [The Leader]
- Previously on Swamplot: Daily Demolition Report: Hard Cornered
Photo of demo at 2200 Yale St.: Mosaic Clinic team
Migrating North
THE FIESTA ON N. SHEPHERD WILL BE SHUT DOWN IN 17 DAYS 
The Heights branch of parrot-adorned grocery store Fiesta Mart at 2300 N. Shepherd Dr. will be shuttered for good after closing time on March 27th, the store’s assistant manager told Betsy Denson of The Leader. The land has been owned by 2ML Real Estate since mid-2015, but 2ML president Jim Arnold, who’s other company owned the Fiesta until a few years ago, tells Denson it was Fiesta’s choice to bow out. As for the land itself, Arnold has “been approached by someone wanting to put in apartments – but any decision will wait for land studies and surveys. When asked if he’d like to see an H-E-B on the land, Arnold said he wouldn’t rule it out.” [The Leader; previously on Swamplot] Photo of Fiesta Mart at 2300 N. Shepherd Dr.: Terah K.
A reader notes a notice of an application to sell alcohol posted on the door of the former Dealer Sales building at 1919 N. Shepherd Dr. The HBJ reported last August that Atlanta-based pizza-and-recently-burger chain Mellow Mushroom leased the space at the corner with 20th St. from serial redeveloper Braun Enterprises. The chain, which dropped its first Houston-area spore up in Spring, appears to be sprouting its second location within the somewhat ambiguous boundaries of the Houston Heights’ nominally dry zone.
The pizza place may provide more savory counterbalance to the sugar-laced shopping strip just to the south on the same block — where Fat Cat Creamery, Hugs & Donuts, and Smoothie King all nestle in with Finch Properties and hair salon Black Sheep Parlor along 19th St., sheltered by N. Shepherd-facing Ka Sushi. Renderings released last year for the redeveloping building show the Mushroom popping open in line with some additional retail space; the strip could also get lawyered up:
Sober News on N. Shepherd
The recently dumped Heights Finance Station post office at Yale and 11th streets was treated to a makeover this month, as demolition looms on the horizon. If all goes as planned, the building will eventually be brushed aside to make way for the younger-and-likely-prettier Heights Central Station mixed-use shopping center headed for the site; until then, it’s playing canvas for some Houston graffiti artists, including Wiley Robertson (one of the usual suspects behind giant love notes spotted around town).
A reader sends a fresh batch of lunchtime snapshots of the mural, which seems to have been wrapped up in the last few days:
Love Is In The Aerosol
The custom home and office building of Heights homebuilder Fisher Homes at 832 Yale St. is currently up for sale or lease. Construction on the just-under-15,000-sq.-ft. building south of 9th St. wrapped up near the end of 2014; the property listing indicates that availability started in January of this year.
Amenities at the Morrison Heights and Studemont Mid-Rise developer’s mixed-use space include an indoor basketball court, downtown views from the above-3rd-story rooftop terrace, and various conference rooms. Floorplans of the building show the middle-of-the-house driveway (which provides access to the backyard parking lot) separating a 437-sq.-ft. apartment (circled in dotted red below) from the main structure:
For Sale on Yale
Here’s the latest cloud-edged rendering of what could be coming to the corner of Yale and W. 21st streets, if Wellington Development gets its requested setback variance wish granted. A reader noticed the notice of the request posted outside of the building currently at 2105 Yale, which formerly housed Dorsey’s Beauty Academy prior to a decade of abandonment.
Wellington bought the spot last July, around which time Collum Commercial put out a leasing flyer showing a new floor-slash-parking plan for the property, which is boxed in on the non-Yale-and-21st-streets sides by the 2125 Yale apartments. Planned renovations to the building, which is listed in county records as 13,000 sq.ft., appear to involve some major trimming and resculpting to fit in new off-street parking spaces:
Yale Street Plaza
A brand new multi-building mixed-use development is planned for the site of the former Heights Finance Station post office, which shut down at the end of last year after being declared “no longer necessary” by USPS. The land on 11th St. between Heights Blvd. and Yale St. will move on, change its name to a less-stodgy Heights Central Station, and start a new life as the site of multiple 2-story lowrises housing ground-floor retail and restaurants with office spaces on top.
Heights Central Station
