THIRD WARD RESIDENTS PROTEST HISD PROPOSAL TO CLOSE HISTORIC SCHOOL 
The steps in front of Ryan Middle School were the site of a rally yesterday in protest of an HISD proposal to close and consolidate the historic Third Ward school. HISD says the proposal calls to move students to Cullen Middle School on Scott St. because of low enrollment at Ryan, shown at right, which opened on Elgin St. when Yates High School moved to a new location in 1958. But teevee reporter Demond Fernandez says that the protestors see it “as a pattern of closing schools in predominately African-American communities. . . . And they say if HISD trustees move to pass a decision like that tonight, they may be prepared to go to court.” [abc13] Photo: Wikimedia Commons
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Third Ward
Design plans for the $18 million Emancipation Park overhaul are done, reports KUHF’s Pat Hernandez, and the work — including renovations (as this rendering suggests) to the gym, baseball field, pool, and community center — is expected to begin at the 10-acre Third Ward park this summer.
Houston artist Bert Long passed away of pancreatic cancer earlier today. He was 72. This photo shows one of Long’s most recognizable pieces: “Field of Vision” is located across the street from Emancipation Park on the corner of Elgin and Bastrop, next door to the Eldorado Ballroom. Born in the Fifth Ward, Long worked as a Hyatt Regency executive chef before pursuing an arts career. “Bert would walk in anywhere. He’d do anything,” Long’s friend James Surls tells the Houston Chronicle. “He was unabashed and unafraid.”
- Biography [Bert Long]
- Houston artist Bert Long Jr. dies [Houston Chronicle]
Photo: Allyn West
COMMENT OF THE DAY: BABY, PLEASE DON’T GO DOWN THE BULK FOODS AISLE “That’s Lightnin’s corner. HELL NO!!!” [SYMWAFA, commenting on Conquering Flag of Whole Foods Market, Planted in the Third Ward]
CONQUERING FLAG OF WHOLE FOODS MARKET, PLANTED IN THE THIRD WARD 
“It seems as though this sign appeared over night” at the corner of Dowling St. and Holman St., writes the reader who sent in the photo at left. It reads, “Coming Soon, Third Ward,†above and below a Whole Foods Market logo. “Is this true?” the reader wants to know. Aw, c’mon! Someone went to all that trouble to put up this sign . . . and now you want to ruin the fun? [Swamplot inbox] Photo: Swamplot inbox
COMMENT OF THE DAY: LOOKING FOR HOUSTON’S NEIGHBORHOOD-ALIKES “I think the math is already starting to work for some people. Remember the guy who was concerned that he had 30 days to vacate the Andover Richmond property in Montrose? The 3rd and 5th Wards may be a good option for tenants like him, — as older, more affordable properties continue to disappear from Montrose. Of course it’s a while before anyone would drop $3,000 a month for an apartment in that area. The New York Times had an article in January titled ‘So You’re Priced Out, Now What?‘ They looked at neighborhoods, sometimes miles from each other, in very different price points, but that looked like each other. They had pictures of a street of gorgeous brownstones in Manhattan’s Upper West Side; and an equally gorgeous street in more reasonable Prospect Heights Brooklyn. You’d swear they were side by side; not miles away. The same thing happens in Houston, and Montrose versus the 3rd and 5th Wards is starting to be like that.” [ZAW, commenting on Comment of the Day: The Rent Isn’t Too Damn High]
WHAT DO THEY WANT FROM THE THIRD WARD? “I own a small lot [near Scott and Alabama] in the third ward area, it is a gated lot near UH. A real estate agent wrote a letter asking if I would be interested in selling the lot. I paid no attention to it but he called and asked if I would be interested in selling. I told him if he made an offer I would consider it. I asked him what are they going to building on the lot but I could not find out until I signed the contract. It looks like this real estate agent does residential properties but new homes don’t sell fast in that area of third ward. Do you have any idea of what he could developing in that area? Could it have something to do with the rail line? I am just curious as to what could be built in that area. My lot is 5000 sq ft and it is surrounded by residential lots.” [Swamplot inbox]
FREEING UP FUNDS FOR EMANCIPATION PARK 
The Third Ward’s 10-acre Emancipation Park — on Elgin 2 blocks east of Hwy. 59 — is scheduled receive at least $7 million in improvements, though the historic park’s supporters are hoping to raise funds to boost that figure to $18 million. Either would mark a significant step up from the $800 the Rev. Jack Yates and a group of freed slaves pooled to purchase the property in 1872, as a location for Juneteenth celebrations. (It was later donated to the city.) Recent commitments include $4 million from the OST/Almeda Corridors Redevelopment Authority, $2 million from the city, and a just-announced $1 million grant from Texas’s Parks and Wildlife Dept. According to an HBJ report, local landscape architecture firm M2L Associates is currently at work planning an entry plaza, outdoor exhibit area, trails, lighting, historical markers, and a new building with additional parking for the park. Later phases of improvements would renovate or add a community center, pool house, playground, picnic areas, benches, and sports fields and courts. [Houston Chronicle, Houston Business Journal] Photo: City of Houston
THIS SCHOOL IS NOT FOR SALE 
The head of real estate for HISD tells Texas Watchdog’s Lynn Walsh that Jack Yates High School is not being sold, no matter what she’s heard. The Third Ward institution is wedged between a Texas Southern University parking garage and UH’s Robertson Stadium; rumors had HISD selling the 1958 campus to one university or the other. [Texas Watchdog] Photo: Nick Juhasz (license)
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE SHOPS AROUND THE CORNER “Where I live, in the Montrose area, I will soon be within a three minute drive of TWO Whole Foods, a brand new HEB, an updated Kroger, another supernice Kroger on West Gray, a Randall’s, a Fiesta, etc. Three of these will be within a 10 minute walk from my house. I’d wager that there are few (no?) other neighborhoods in America offering this kind of variety and abundance. Meanwhile, my fellow Houstonians who happen to live in the 3rd Ward have no real shopping options nearby. They have to drive 10 or more minutes to perhaps suboptimal grocery stores and fresh produce. But there is a plethora of fried and fast food options in their neighborhood. So, when deciding where to eat quickly, McDonalds or the Navy Fried Seafood store seem to be the first choices. I think what Superhouston is implying is a possibly causal relationship between poverty, [poor] health, and a lack of fresh food. The connection is complicated, multi-dimensional, and definitely worth talking about.” [Matt, commenting on Where the Grocery Stores Aren’t]
A little Midcentury Modern, a little Galveston: Except here, there’s a view of the oil-stained freeway and Downtown’s skyscrapers in the distance, instead of oil-stained beaches and faraway platforms. UH architecture professor and Renzo Piano Building Workshop refugee Ronnie Self‘s house for himself and MFAH museum shop book buyer Bernard Bonnet is perched on the edge of 288, just north of 59, on the Third Ward’s western freeway frontier. All the living space in the 1,600-sq.-ft. box (HCAD scores him with an extra 256 sq. ft. for that open-air central stairway, but not for the ground-floor utility room) is raised 8 ft. above ground level on a tapered slab, just high enough to peek over the sound wall. Which means that even when 288 fills up with water, Self’s house will still stay dry, above it all.
THE LIGHTNIN’ HOPKINS PLAQUE AND THE MAHATMA GANDHI DISTRICT “Like all good Americans, we were pleased to learn that Sam Hopkins is finally getting some belated semi-official recognition in the form of a Texas Historical Commission plaque on a corner of Dowling Street in Third Ward, a thoroughfare named in honor of the Confederate-Irish barkeep who headed off the Yankees at the Pass in the service of the effort to keep Lightnin’ Hopkins’ forebears enslaved. (Pardon our “presentism,” but, man, history is just so damn ironic!) This is a good thing, of course–the plaque, not slavery–and temporary culmination of efforts that at least to our knowledge began with a long-ago suggestion by the late City Councilwoman Eleanor Tinsley (to whom it was most assuredly suggested by someone else) to rename a street or part of a street after Hopkins. Unsuccessful as it was, this always struck us as a sweet gesture, since Tinsley didn’t seem like the kind of gal who’d have listed her self as a friend on Lightnin’s Facebook page, if he’d lived long enough to have one. . . . But the plaque is not enough. Just recently, a small swath of the home turf on and around Hillcroft Avenue was designated as the Mahatma Gandhi District . . . Our understanding is that this designation–made visible by placement of small signs, in the shape of a Hindu temple and bearing Gandhi’s likeness, atop the regular street signs–was the result of a private fund-raising effort. . . . Can anyone apply to so designate a district? And if so, where is the Lightnin’ Hopkins District? A memorial sign on Dowling is good and appropriate, but it sort of ghetto-izes the man, who . . . “embodied the country-come-to-town spirit” of our big hick burg better than almost anyone we can think of, except for its namesake, the illustrious Illiad-spouting farmboy and drunkard.” [Slampo’s Place]
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THIRD WARD ARTS DISTRICT “‘So how dicey is it really and when will it become artsy and then trendy?’ Question of the day! As Montrose ex-pats now living on Dowling St. I can tell you that we have experienced NO crime in the year we have been here. As for artsy, you can walk to Rick Lowe’s Row House installation and the relocated Flower Man house, among several other art spaces, from our new home. Artsy, yes. Trendy, very thankfully no.” [Cranky Old Coot, commenting on Home Sweet Funeral Home: Washington Terrace Mortuary Seeks Residents]
Here’s a whizzy reel showing what the new Metro trains and stations on 4 upcoming light-rail lines are supposed to look like. Dowling St. in the Third Ward, the Edloe Station in Greenway Plaza, the Moody Park Station on the North Line, MacGregor Park Station on the Southeast Line, and Lockwood Station on the East End Line each get about 30 seconds of CGI treatment, from a low-flying camera buzzing some extremely lifelike — though torpid — pedestrians.
Christof Spieler finds a few flaws:
The Third Ward footage seems to be out-of-date; it shows the old alignment crossing Dowling on Wheeler, not the new route that switches to Alabama. But other details are correct: the stations shown are the new prototype station design (by Rey de la Reza Architects), minus artwork.
It’s nice to be able to visualize what these lines might look like. But it’s also a reminder that it’s important to get the details right. At Edloe, for example, the trees integrated into the canopy are nice, but there’s no crosswalk at the west end of the station platform, which means a 500-foot detour for some riders. The Moody Park and MacGregor stations do show that crosswalk, and the sidewalks look pretty good, too. But in all the images, the overhead wires are suspended from their own poles in the middle of the street, not from the streetlight poles on either side, as on Main Street. That makes for more poles and a more cluttered streetscape.
Row House CDC has completed a second group of 8 duplexes for low- to moderate-income residents — on Francis St. between Dowling and Live Oak. That’s just north of the growing Third Ward campus of Project Row Houses, the CDC’s sister organization. At least 6 units are still available, reports Robin Foster in the Chronicle:
The units range from 700 to 900 square feet; 10 are family-sized with three bedrooms and 1½ baths and six have two bedrooms and one bath.
[Row House CDC executive director Alain] Lee said funds for the project were stretched to allow the builder to frame-in back porches. If additional money can be found, the porches will be finished as part of a courtyard envisioned for both the new and original housing complexes, he said.
All 16 duplexes were based on designs by students in the Rice Building Workshop at Rice University.
- $1.8 million Third Ward housing project 60 percent occupied [Houston Chronicle]
- Row Houses CDC [Project Row Houses]
- The Hannah Project [Row Houses CDC]
Photo of Francis St. duplexes under construction: Flickr user b2tse; photo of original duplexes along Division St.: Row House CDC
