This white box, covering up the emergency exit of a vacated belly-dancing studio, will be the new entrance of Houston’s first indoor rowing facility, says founder Greg Scheinman. In West University Place, ROW Studios is building out the former Sirrom Dance behind the Randall’s in Weslayan Plaza and resurfacing the parking lot facing Academy St.
There’s a stuccoed Dutch-Colonial-Swiss Colony on the not-so-mountainous streets behind Weslayan Plaza’s west side in the College Court section (aka the “chimney”) of West University Place. The lookalike cottage and quarters are steps away from the new Buffalo Grille and a U.S. Post Office. West U’s Judson Park to the south and a proposed rail station for Metro’s supposed University Line are also blocks away. Railroad tracks, meanwhile, are just up the street.
During construction of the 1983 main house, a former 1940s “barn” on the site became a 2-story guest house in lieu of a garage. HCAD cites some remodeling in 1991 to the home. Last Friday, the property re-listed at $462,500 after a previous listing by the same agent initially sought $575,000 in April 2012, with adjustments to $565,000, $550,000, and then a summer of $524,990. The home’s side entry and hipped roof make for an atypical floor plan:
This expanded-since-1938 home in West U has a 2-story front facade, but 3 stories of living space. Its last redo was in 2000. Listed in mid-June at $1,091,000, the home is located west of Buffalo Speedway in a section of the small city where lots run 50 ft. by 150 ft. Unlike many newer properties, this 5-bedroom home has no brick or stucco and doesn’t fill the lot. Behind the house there’s a deck with an outdoor kitchen and a bit of a yard — or is that a garden?
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE TEARDOWN CHASE “Nice house. I remember back in the mid 80′s when places like that were available in West U for about the same price. My wife and I would see an ad for one in the paper, go rushing down to West U to look at it and find a bare patch of brown earth where the house stood a few days prior. We never could get to a house before the builders.” [Bubba, commenting on Bus or Bike Now, Ride Rail Later from Eastwood-Area Bungalow]
CATS STILL HANGING AROUND WEST U APARTMENTS, UNAWARE OF REDEVELOPMENT PLANS 
A group of 25 or so cats still hanging around the 2-and-a-half-acre grounds of the recently vacated Courts at West University apartments at 3810 Law St. have apparently not been informed of the 5-story Alexan West University complex set to go up on their old stomping grounds. An animal advocacy group concerned that the cats may get in the way when the existing buildings are demolished early next month has sounded the alarm, requesting donations and assistance in setting up a feeding station away from the demo site, as well as finding adoptive and foster homes for the uninformed animals. [West University Examiner; previously on Swamplot] Photo of Elmo at Courts of West University: Kathy Golding
Houston’s Sunset Terrace subdivision could be getting a new neighbor. A five-story one. Trammell Crow Residential is floating plans for its proposed Alexan West University apartment project. The intended 2.5-acre site is bordered by Bissonnet, Law and Auden streets. Currently, that location is home to the Courts at West University, a 1973-vintage two-story garden style apartment complex at 3810 Law St., complete with its own bark park:
COMMENT OF THE DAY: SHARON TYLER’S TILES “I have to agree this house is over the top and she went ‘architect’ nuts with it. I actually live in one of the few other houses that Sharon Tyler built in West U. She built a few others and acted as the ‘architect/builder.’ I have to say the house is built super solid and has a timeless design to it. The bathrooms did have the Sharon Tyler signature floor to ceiling 2×2 tiles and that got old as soon as the 90s hit. Hoewever, in one of the bath remodels I brought a tile vendor to give me a quote to knock down all the tiles and put something more current. The guy liked the Sharon tiles so much that I thought he was going to hit me with a bat for wanting to tear them down. So to each its own. However, I have to say that having lived in a Sharon Tyler house, I have the outmost respect for that woman. No detail was overlooked and I understand she oversaw the construction herself and it was not uncommon for her to stop at the construction and asking to start from scratch on a particular job if she was not pleased with the work. And it shows, the house is solid quality construction.” [west u rez, commenting on Living Large in Houston, Before Her Homes Got Not So Big]
MORE JOLTS FROM BUFFALO GRILLE COFFEE Now in the H-E-B Buffalo Market parking lot at Buffalo Speedway and Bissonnet, on the site of what used to be the Buffalo Grille: the first in a network of eVgo electric vehicle charging stations to be planted in parking lots around the city. The plug-in spots are right near what used to be the coffee serving area, notes Chronicle energy reporter Tom Fowler. Opening in the next couple of weeks: stations near NRG’s headquarters at the Shops at Houston Center downtown, and in front of 2 Walgreens: at 19710 Holzwarth St. and 8942 W. Sam Houston Pkwy. North. 25 of the Houston-area stations, featuring both 240-volt and the faster 480-volt chargers, are scheduled to open by the end of the year. [Fuel Fix; previously on Swamplot]
It’s just about summertime, and all you fans of fresh West University produce know what that means: Yes, it’s well past time to set up those security cameras to monitor your vulnerable front-yard fruits. “The camera and fruit-thief deterrent signs have returned,” notes the reader who sent in these photos of this ripe “either peach or nectarine” tree on Tangley, west of Buffalo Speedway. But the security effort actually appears to be a bit more subdued than last year. The bilingual warning signage featured on the tree and a few of its neighbors last season has been replaced with a smaller and simpler handwritten “Camera” warning.
Swamplot’s West U fruit scout says there’s another sign on the other side of the tree “that says something like ‘Don’t even think about it.’” No photo of that? Explains the source: “I was in a hurry and, of course, wanting to stay out of the camera’s wily view.”
Photos: Swamplot inbox
There’ll be a West-U-ish Molina’s Cantina location for the first time in 3 years — once the Tex-Mex chain opens up its new digs in one of the spaces left after the twin Terlingua Texas Border Cafe flameouts in March. Molina’s will go into Terlingua’s Braes Heights Shopping Center space on Bellaire near Stella Link. The last West U Molina’s, on Buffalo Speedway, closed down 3 years ago to make way for H-E-B’s Buffalo Market.
In other on-the-ashes-of-failed-restaurants news, the former Sabetta Cafe space at 2411 South Shepherd near Fairview is now the home of recently opened performance-art venue Greatfull Taco.
Photo of future Molina’s Cantina location, 3801 Bellaire Blvd.: West University Examiner
From reader Josh Burdick come these graphic images from this morning’s speedy takedown of the Buffalo Grille — the last remaining portion of the shopping center that stood at the corner of Bissonnet and Buffalo Speedway before the H-E-B Buffalo Market took it over. Can H-E-B chew up this breakfast spot and spit out a few more parking spots for grocery shoppers fast enough? A bit more of Burdick’s bite-by-bite coverage:
Ding! That’ll be all for the Buffalo Grille — or its 26-year location at Bissonnet and Buffalo Speedway, at least. The restaurant closed at 2 o’clock today, minutes after serving its last meal (an order of chicken enchiladas, if you have to ask). Next assignment for the building: to go away, and leave behind a few more concrete parking spaces for the H-E-B Buffalo Market.
Sometime next week, a slightly larger Buffalo Grille will reopen a mile to the west at 4080 Bissonnet, on the Academy St. end of the Randall’s shopping center, Weslayan Plaza. Inside will be an even-more-enclosed version of the restaurant’s enclosed patio, plus space for an eventual actual outdoor patio next door:
