Here’s a photo of the new construction underway on the now-barrel-bereft lot at 1601 Richmond, future home of drive-thru Vietnamese sandwich shop Oui Banh Mi. The new structure, shown above from Mandell, is currently shrouded in housewrap. (The historical photo of Lucky Burger is taken from the Richmond side.)
The Lucky Burger barrel, which stood on the corner for more than 40 years, was demolished on Halloween under the cover of citywide flood warnings.
The sign isn’t up yet, but sales are already taking off: Fly High Little Bunny commenced regular business hours yesterday at its new location on W. 19th St. and Rutland, following Saturday’s opening for the Holiday in the Heights shopping event. The former Shepherd landmark left its old storefront at the corner of W. Alabama earlier this year to make way for a CVS and pad site.
Photo: Swamplot inbox
Downtown light-rail riders: Your patronage of public transit isn’t enough. A giant billboard covering most of the facade of the 2-story building at 312 Main St. now urges passengers emerging from the northbound Preston stop to get rid of their vehicles altogether. The unassuming Houston Site Acquisitions storefront has scrapped its own above-door signage in favor of a story-high ad for Texas Direct Auto, complete with oversized doggie in the window.
Large-scale advertising for businesses not currently in the building is nothing new for this block of Main St.: Just next door, the sky-high neon above perpetually hungover neighbors Dean’s and Notsuoh still heralds the days of credit clothing retail. But the Texas Direct Auto ad incorporates the structure of the building itself, placing the large image of a small dog behind an actual window visible through a cutout in the wrap:
The strip mall at the corner of Westheimer and Montrose now sports two “Mattress Firm” storefronts right next door to one another, operating independently. The western Mattress Firm, on the right in the photo above, has been converted from a Mattress Pro through the subtle but definitive application of a small banner, filling the gap left by the removal of the word “Pro”. All Mattress Pro stores had until November 6th to convert signage, following a mid-September announcement that Mattress Firm would be discontinuing the subsidiary brand.
What exactly has changed? Not the Mattress Pro logo, which still bounces along in contrast to Mattress Firm’s aggressive yellow swipe. The relabeled store, now styled as a Mattress Firm: Final Markdown facility, will sell Mattress Firm products at a bargain-bin discount, while the regular Mattress Firm next door will continue to sell those products at full price.
You have until tomorrow, maybe, to grab some of the cartographic treasures remaining at the longtime Inner Loop home of Key Maps, Houston’s homegrown map company. Items you buy will be 70 percent off — or free if you fish them from the yellow Dumpster parked out front at 1411 W. Alabama. But it’s a pretty chaotic scene, a reader tells us: Framed wall-maps, Key Map books that used to be found in the back seat pocket of most Houston cars, and other items are being loaded into moving trucks in preparation for a relocation to a new storefront at 5622 Richmond Ave., on the north side of the strip near Chimney Rock.
The new CVS Pharmacy that’s replacing a couple of former veterinary clinics on W. Alabama — as well as the Shepherd Corner shopping center that until late last year housed Roeder’s Pub, Ruchi’s Taqueria, and Oaks Cleaners — is almost ready to show off the 40 shiny new parking spaces that will front the S. Shepherd Dr. corner a block south from the Trader Joe’s-ified Alabama Theater.
Don’t worry that parking will be scarce, though — more spaces will be available along the side and back of the new building, which faces S. Shepherd Dr. behind 2 full parking lanes. If you’re looking for a development that might be a little more street-fronting, you’ll have to wait: Construction hasn’t even begun yet on the fast-food drive-thru planned for the adjacent former site of jewelry store Fly High Little Bunny; it’ll go in where the big pile of dirt is, at the left of this photo:
Zzzzzzapp!! Workers are finishing up construction inside the Houston area’s second Tesla store for its grand opening on Saturday and Sunday. It’s in the DCT Airtex Business Center, a new tilt-up building on the east side of I-45 between Beltway 8 and FM 1960. Like the Galleria storefront that’s been open for a few years now, the showroom is a company store, not a dealership: You’ll be able to order a Model S or Model X online, then take delivery at the company’s maintenance facility in Westchase (and take care of the paperwork at the courthouse yourself to get the title and plates). But of course you won’t be able to buy a Tesla on the premises because Texas laws require cars to be sold through a dealership, and Tesla won’t sell them that way.
Unlike the Galleria store, free juice for Tesla owners is available in the drive-up spaces out front:
The building at 14820 North Fwy. is just south of E. Airtex Dr. If you don’t like what you see, the Tom Peacock Nissan and Cadillac dealerships, Corvette World, and Lone Star RV are perched on the same feeder road, and the DeMontrond complex of Kia, Buick, Volkswagen, and RV outlets and a Lamborghini dealership are just across the highway to the south.
Photos: Matt Musick
MONEY, GUNS, AND WHATABURGER 
“We’ve had many customers and employees tell us they’re uncomfortable being around someone with a visible firearm who is not a member of law enforcement, and as a business, we have to listen and value that feedback in the same way we value yours. We have a responsibility to make sure everyone who walks into our restaurants feels comfortable. For that reason, we don’t restrict licensed concealed carry but do ask customers not to open carry in our restaurants.” [Whataburger, via Houston Chronicle] Photo of Whataburger at 5436 Hwy. 6 North: Jessica T.
Not a whole lot has been going on at the former Chili’s at 1040 West Sam Houston Tollway next to the HCC Spring Branch campus, a reader notes. Last September, Montrose-born Greek restaurant Niko Niko’s announced it would be opening its fourth Houston-area location there, near the overpasses connecting I-10 to Beltway 8.
A reader notes there’s been some construction activity in and around the entrance and rear drive-thru window of the former Eckerd-turned-CVS Pharmacy along the White Oak Bayou Trail at the corner of T.C. Jester and 18th St., on the west coast of Shady Acres. That’s a notable turn of events: The building has been vacant for about 5 years. The standalone structure’s prospective new tenant appears to be another SignatureCare Emergency Center — last week, a note on the website for the local chain of health clinics had listed 1925 E. T.C. Jester Blvd. as the location of its upcoming “Heights” facility, but the address has since been removed.
If something bad happens to you at the Spec’s Liquor store, 369 Oriental Bistro, Half Price Books, or the Mattress Firm or Mattress Pro stores in the Westmont Shopping Center (known back in its Art Deco days as the Tower Community Center) at the corner of Westheimer and Montrose, you won’t have far to go for medical help. A new 24-hour emergency care center is opening up early next month between the mattress store duo and the Chinese restaurant, in a space that’s been vacant for a while.
You can see the “SORRY WE’RE CLOSED” sign on the door at Prince’s Hamburgers at the end of the feeder-road-facing shopping center at 3899 Southwest Fwy. in the photo at the top, sent to Swamplot by a reader. This Prince’s near Weslayan hasn’t been open for about a month, but the local chain still lists the location on its website, and at least one employee at another location was told by a manager that the site will reopen soon. Meanwhile, the Chronicle‘s Syd Kearney appears still to be waiting for a call back from the company’s management for info on the closure. All equipment inside appears to have been removed, a passer-by tells Swamplot.
Photos: Joe Carl White (door); Prince’s Hamburgers (store)
IT’S BEDTIME AT AN ANNA’S LINENS NEAR YOU 
All 19 Houston-area Anna’s Linens stores — and the remaining 233 locations in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, for good measure — will be selling off their sheets, towels, and draperies and shutting down. The company had filed bankruptcy on June 14th, but hoped to sell the stores before a deadline last Friday. Instead, some going-out-of-business-sale conductors will be taking over operations, selling off all inventory and fixtures, and turning out the lights. [Home & Textiles Today, via Real Estate Bisnow] Photo of Anna’s Linens at 8232-A Kirby Dr., across from NRG Stadium and the Astrodome: Edgar V.
A big for-lease sign has been posted to the door of the building at 801 Durham Dr. in Rice Military. Longtime building tenant Camera Co-Op (see above photo) shut down here at the beginning of last month. The camera-lens mural that surrounded the camera store’s front door has been painted over.
Photos: Stephen J Alexander (door); Camera Co-Op (building)
KROGER SAYS IT HAS ‘NO PLANS’ TO CLOSE SIGNATURE STORE ON OST 
Responding to yesterday’s Swamplot story noting council member Dwight Boykins’s report to his constituents that Kroger is shutting down its store at the corner of Old Spanish Trail and Cambridge St., a spokesperson for the grocery store chain tells Swamplot that Kroger plans to “continue operating the store as a leased property to serve the medical center community,” and that “there are no plans at this time to close the location.” Kroger has been operating the grocery store at 1990 Old Spanish Trail since 1994. Photo: Edgar V.
