FEEDING NEW APARTMENTS TO THE GRAND PKWY. FEEDER 
Austin developers Oden Hughes say that they have been eager to build in Houston, but the company’s first project here has come only as far east as Katy: A 354-unit apartment complex is going up a few miles east of Katy Mills Mall on 14 acres at the southwest corner of Kingsland Blvd. and the southbound Grand Pkwy. feeder. The Rancher reports that rent here at the so-called Parkside Grand Parkway will range between $850 and $1,655 a month for the complex planned to include 2 pools, a fitness center, and “an air-conditioned dog washing station.” [The Rancher] Rendering: Oden Hughes
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Seems the end is coming at the end of the summer for this 1955 12-plex just inside the Loop on Oakshire Dr.: A rep from the city says that the planning commission has approved a subdivision of the 0.4-acre property underneath it into 7 skinny single-family slots. And the Swamplot reader who has been keeping us updated now and again about the building located just south of W. Alabama near Afton Oaks writes in with what might be the last word: “I just heard from a resident who is still there that they are planning on starting the tear-down August 1st.”
This photo shows 6th St. between Allston and Yale, the street that would more than likely be pressed into service for the 2 Alexan-brand apartment midrises that Trammell Crow has said it plans to build here. Alexan Heights, the first of the 5-story, 300-odd-unit complexes to be announced, would take up much of the lot to the north to the hike and bike trail near 7th; Alexan Yale, the second, which neighbors seem to have found out about just last week, would take up much of the lot to the south to 5th. The photos below walk you around the lots in question:
“Soon!” You can almost hear this dormant excavator warning the Montrose Fiesta. The first one started sneaking up on the strip center at Dunlavy and W. Alabama back in March, but it wasn’t until late last week that the permits were granted and the real smashing began. The Fiesta closed for good almost exactly a year ago, not long after the H-E-B Montrose Market went up across the street where the Wilshire Village apartments once stood. Fittingly, developer Marvy Finger has said he plans to replace the soon-to-be-felled grocery store with apartments.
More shots of the carnage:
A SECOND MIDRISE ALEXAN PLANNED RIGHT BESIDE THE FIRST ONE ON YALE 
The Leader reports that notices have gone out to Heights neighborhood groups indicating that Trammell Crow is planning a second Alexan-brand apartment complex on Yale. This one, writes Cynthia Lescalleet, would also be 4 stories set atop 2 levels of parking. It would sit on a 4.9-acre lot on Yale between 5th and 6th, immediately south of the 3.5-acre lot targeted for the proposed Alexan Heights — the rendering for which is shown here — bound by 6th, Allston, Yale, and the Heights hike and bike trail. Lescalleet quotes from the notice sent around by city council member Ellen Cohen: “TCR has the site under contract and is currently performing preliminary due diligence, and they expect to close the purchase of the property by the end of the year. Once TCR establishes a site plan and unit count, they will perform a new traffic study that will include roadways and intersections included in their previous TIA, while also including new intersections on Yale St., Heights Boulevard, and I-10, as well as pedestrian counts.†[The Leader; previously on Swamplot] Rendering: Trammell Crow Residential
HOW ONE BUYER WOULD USE HISD’S LAW ENFORCEMENT HS PROPERTY 
If the High School for Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice is sold to St. Thomas High School competitor AV Dickson Street, the investment company has said it plans to link the 11-acre Magnolia Grove property with the adjacent and recently purchased Bayou Park apartments at 4400 Memorial to create a mixed-use district: Alison Malkhassian of AV Dickson Street tells The Leader‘s Charlotte Aguilar that “the long-term goal . . . could be to create a 26-acre mixed-use luxury retail-office-residential development on the combined properties — a process that would take about a decade.” Yesterday, HISD received the 2nd round of bids: St. Thomas is offering $42 million, about $800,000 more than AV Dickson Street — but Aguilar suggests that the sale might come down to rent: St. Thomas said it would charge the school $225,000 a month to lease the space for the next 5 years, compared with $100,000 a month from AV Dickson Street, a difference of $7.5 million over that time. [The Leader; previously on Swamplot] Photo: HISD
Trammell Crow seems to be planning another of its Alexan-brand apartments here — at the southwest corner of the Katy Fwy. and Wilcrest Rd. This would be about 9 miles west of Trammell Crow’s so-called Alexan Silber at 7777 Katy Fwy. This photo from a reader shows what remains of the Phillips 66 station, one of the structures on the site bound on the south by Lasso Ln. that the reader says the Wilchester Homeowners Association has learned will be demolished; the station’s underground tanks are already being torn up.
FROM NO SUCH HEIGHTS: DOWNTOWN’S NEXT APARTMENT BUILDING TO RISE JUST 5 STORIES 
Developer Alliance Residential has shared with the Houston Chronicle this rendering of the comparatively puny 5-story apartment complex it says it plans to build on the Downtown block bound by Bell, Leeland, Main, and Fannin. That block now is a surface parking lot. The 207 units planned for this complex, if built, might be rather overshadowed by the 30-story Houston House Apartments catty-corner from here and the 24-story SkyHouse that’s under construction just one block to the south. Alliance rep Bart Barrett tells Nancy Sarnoff that construction could begin as early as this fall, once the sale of the property is complete. [Houston Chronicle ($); previously on Swamplot] Rendering: Alliance Residential Company
Hines has confirmed that it’s considering a 20- or 22-story apartment tower for this block in the Museum District. This photo shows the corner of Oakdale and Caroline St., across from the Asia Society Texas Center and a recently cleared corner lot that wouldn’t sell to the Asia Society Texas Center. A source tells Swamplot that 3 of the 4 properties on this block bound by Caroline, San Jacinto, Oakdale, and Southmore have sold to Hines, and that Hines will take those over on July 1.
A few sources are telling Swamplot that Hines is planning to build either a 20- or 22-story apartment tower on the entire city block where this house stands in the Museum District. The house is at the corner of Caroline and Southmore, directly across from Yoshio Taniguchi’s Asia Society Texas Center and that recently cleared residential lot immediately behind it. The block is bound by Caroline, Southmore, Oakdale, and the light rail line along San Jacinto. One of the sources says that 3 of the 4 property owners on the block have agreed to sell, and that Hines will be taking those properties over on July 1. Another source speculates that Hines might go ahead and build around the holdout. As of this morning, there’s been no word from Hines — though a rep in an email writes: “No deal has been closed so it is too preliminary to discuss,” which sure makes it sound as though there is an “it.”
- Previously on Swamplot: What’s Next for That Museum District Never-Was?, A Look Around San Felipe at the Randall Davis Condos and Planned Hines Office Building Site, Hines Plans a Shiny New 18-Story Office Building Across San Felipe from River Oaks, Hines Replacing Cafe Adobe With Apartment Building — Just Not This One, Yoshio Taniguchi’s New Asia Society Texas Center: The Full Photo Preview Tour
Photo: Swamplot inbox
And now that the former Art Institute of Houston at 1900 Yorktown and Inwood has been smashed to pieces, the Finger Companies can get going on these new apartments. Accurately, if not creatively named 1900 Yorktown, the complex will comprise 262 units spread out among 8 floors, whose shape seems to welcome a cat’s cradle of laundry lines hung above its U-shaped courtyard. In Uptown, this is just a few blocks north of the Westheimer bank building where Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse is relocating from Richmond Ave.
MOM’S LETTER LEADS CITY TO RAZE DERELICT FIFTH WARD HOUSING 
Yesterday, this Komatsu finished the job that Hurricane Ike started, taking out 63 damaged units of the Houston Housing Authority’s Kelly Village Apartments at 1119 Grove St. in the Fifth Ward — and at least one of the residents is happy to see ’em go: “Lacrecha St. Jules,” who wrote a letter to the Housing Authority requesting that something be done, reports the Houston Chronicle, “spent plenty of sleepless nights worrying about her four children as drug dealers and thugs made themselves at home in [the] vacant buildings. . . . ‘It was dark, and there were rapes back there . . . It was a bunch of negatives, and I just wanted to turn it into a positive.'” North of I-10 and east of U.S. 59, the apartments, which showed up in yesterday’s Daily Demolition Report, date to 1930; the city says it plans to build an $800,000, 3-acre park in their place, with room for a jogging trail and garden. [Houston Chronicle; previously on Swamplot] Photo: KHOU via Facebook
A plan on the website of Hnedak Bobo Group, a developer an architecture firm based in Memphis, showcases this rendering of a shiny 38-story residential tower named (for now, anyway) “Houston Luxury Apartments,” standing behind the Texaco Building at 1111 Rusk St.
This view shows the lot bound by Capitol, Fannin, San Jacinto, and Rusk, where the 13-story Texas Company Building — said to be the first major oil company headquarters in Houston — and its add-ons has stood since 1915. The few details Hnedak Bobo mentions indicates that that building would be maintained and renovated into age-appropriate apartments, as well.
And there’s more:
A LAND USE COUNTERATTACK FROM THE YALE ST. ALEXAN HEIGHTS Though the variance for unrestricted use that Trammell Crow had sought to make way for the Alexan Heights apartments along Yale St. was denied, other amendments to the existing single-family restrictions on that lot bound by Yale, Allston, and 6th that the developer is now seeking might allow the 366-unit complex to go up after all, reports The Leader. And, besides this play in the land use game, it seems as though Trammell Crow has also responded, in part, to the first round of objections coming from neighbors: “TCR has restricted the project’s driveway on Allston Street to be a service exit, left turn only, to divert traffic away from the neighborhood,” reports Cynthia Lescalleet. “[And] if the city will approve a HAWK signal — a crossing signal controlled by pedestrians or bicyclists — at the bike trail adjacent to the . . . site, TCR will fund and build it.” This revised application will go up in a public hearing Downtown this Thursday. [The Leader; previously on Swamplot] Rendering: Trammell Crow Residential
COMMENT OF THE DAY: NEIGHBORHOOD UPGRADES “. . . right now we have policies that are actively working to get rid of our affordable housing in Montrose (and other places as you point out). They’re just disguised as ‘registration’ and ‘certification’ to make sure places are ‘safe.’ That whole process should be scrapped. If someone has a run-down property people will either 1) not live in it, or 2) decide to live in it because the rent is conducive to the building quality. A ‘smart’ property owner might decide to upgrade the place to raise up the rents, whereas another owner may want to keep his place basic and get lower rents. Renters will decide where they want to go. It’s not the government’s right to force someone to pay more rent because they don’t feel something is at a given level. I’ve said it here before: Almost every building we’ve upgraded and raised the rent on gave us new tenants simply because the previous tenants couldn’t afford it. So who really benefited by our upgrades? Most of our upgrades were done by us outside of government interference (we don’t need to be told to fix things that are obviously not right about the property, our renters, banks, insurance company, etc. do a good job at that) but there have been plenty of times where we’ve done things per city demand that have raised rents and driven current tenants out. I’m sure they’re really stoked that our hand rails in Montrose are now 36″ high vs. 32″ while they now are living in 5th ward rather than the neighborhood they loved and were priced out of . . .” [Cody, commenting on Comment of the Day: Saving Houston for the Next Generation of Newcomers]