Let’s knock these down, then go about our business:
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- University of Southern California To Announce Idea for the Astrodome [KUHF]
- BP Named in $1B Emissions Lawsuit [Galveston County Daily News ($)]
- City May Sue BP To Recover Sales Tax, Hotel Tax Revenues Lost After Oil Spill [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Environmentalists Question Proposal To Remove Benzene, Hydrogen Sulfide from Texas City Air Pollutant Watch List [San Antonio Express-News]
- Second Rabid Bat Found at Friendswood High School within 2 Weeks [abc13]
- Video: Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About the George R. Brown Convention Center [Newswatch]
Photo of Reliant Park: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool
“It looks like someone has bought the whole block between Feagan, Westcott, and Knox in Rice Military next to the Commonwealth Title office building,” a reader writes in accompaniment of a series of photos. “There are several old cottages with for sale signs showing the houses as ‘to be moved’ although they don’t look salvageable to me.” What, the reader wants to know, is going to happen here?
Well, that was quick: This bygone apartment complex from the 1950s at 4118 Center St. — which you might recognize from this morning’s Daily Demolition Report — has come down. What was the rush? To make way for Allen Trace, apparently: Last Thursday, the city planning commission approved an application to divide the not-quite-half-an-acre West End property into 10 parcels for single-family townhomes.
A reader sends more photos of the cleansing of the palate:
- 6 W. 11th Pl. [HAR]
COMMENT OF THE DAY: COMPETING VISIONS “Someone from the HOA for the townhomes across from this claims the construction is for a development similar to that on West Ave with high end condo/apts on top and retail on the first floor. I’m hoping it’s a Sonic though. My husband hopes it’ll be a high end strip club.” [Audrey, commenting on The Apartments Behind the Finger Apartments Behind the Montrose Whole Foods]
THIRD WARD’S RYAN MIDDLE SCHOOL TO BECOME MEDICINE MAGNET 
HISD voted on Thursday night to reopen the closing Ryan Middle School next year as a magnet for students interested in the medical field. Though community protests have tried to move HISD to keep the Third Ward school open, a vote a month ago decided that the 263 Ryan students — the fewest at any HISD middle school, reports the Houston Chronicle’s Ericka Mellon — would be consolidated at Cullen Middle School, about 4 miles away on Scott St. The 1926 Elgin St. building that was the original Yates Colored High School, reports abc13, will be reopened as the Baylor College of Medicine Academy at Ryan to “allow more students to compete for admission into the highly selective DeBakey High School for the Health Professions.” Also approved in Thursday’s vote is a second magnet, the Energy Institute High School, though HISD has not yet chosen where that will be. [Houston Chronicle; abc13; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Note: Story updated with new photos.
An update comes in from reader Nicole Sherman, who saw this bare facade-to-be and fruity Sprouts Farmers Market sign at the end of last week and snapped these photos: Filling in for the former Sports Authority in the Kirkwood Shopping Center at 11940 Westheimer, this will be the 4th Sprouts in Houston and the farthest in, only 2 miles beyond the Beltway. In October, the green grocer revealed the first 3 locations it would open in Houston this year:
Swamplot’s Daily Demolition Report lists buildings that received City of Houston demolition permits the previous weekday.
Off with these heads:
- Astrodome Plan May Be Voted on This Week [Houston Business Journal]
- More than 80 Percent of Homes Sold Last Year Outside of Beltway 8 [Houston Chronicle]
- Houston Complete Streets Initiative Aims To Improve Condition, Usability of City’s Streets [KUHF]
- Changes to Chapter 42 Ordinance Could Spur Redevelopment of Blighted Southwest Houston Properties [Houston Chronicle ($); previously on Swamplot]
- Houston Home Prices Expected To Climb at ‘Abnormally High Rate’ [Houston Chronicle]
- Cleanup Begins at Polluted League City Oil Production Site [Galveston County Daily News ($)]
- Lawsuit Claims $1.5M Woodlands Home Built Atop Active Fault [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Metro’s Rail Line Has One of Lowest Operating Costs in the Country [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Joke on Roots Bistro’s Westheimer Marquee Sparks Outrage [Eating Our Words]
- Houston Top Moving Destination in U.S. 4 Years Running, Finds U-Haul Report [Houston Business Journal]
- Artist Finds Inspiration in Houston’s Power Lines [Houston Chronicle ($)]
- Where To See Wildflowers in Houston [KUHF]
Photo of  Greenway Plaza: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool
HOTEL GALVEZ BAR AND GRILL TO BE RENOVATED, RENAMED 
A new look, new menu, and new name are coming to Bernardo’s at Hotel Galvez on Seawall Blvd., says hotel owner Mitchell Historic Properties: To be adventurously rechristened Galvez Bar & Grill, the space will become twice as big after the renovations. The hotel’s lobby will also be redone: Though the wicker furniture isn’t going away, a new floor made out of a tile mosaic will be installed where sandy-footed guests enter. Though Bernardo’s will be shuttered for 2 months for the upgrades, hotel owners are hoping the space will be ready for Memorial Day, when the island’s tourist season begins. [Mitchell Historic Properties] Photo: Flickr user Equina27
COMMENT OF THE DAY: THE RIVER OAKS SHOPPING CENTER’S COMING DOUBLE MOCHA LATTE PROBLEM “Finger is adding 431 units next to Whole Foods, Regent Square is putting up 290 units down the street in their apartment tower, Hanover at W. Gray and Waugh will be 275 units, the Richdale development on W. Gray where the ballet used to be is supposed to be 160 units and this new one on Montrose and Dallas will probably be at least 250 judging from the size of the lot and the economics of apartment complexes. That makes somewhere in the neighborhood of 1300-1400 new units all within about a mile of each other. That will certainly impact traffic in the area. The bigger impact is going to be on retail in the area. A couple thousand more people are going to be living in the area, yet the retail layout is largely going to remain the same. Regent Square may finally get active and save the day with some needed retail and restaurants. But once all the apartments fill up, there will be long lines at Starbucks whether you are on the north side of W. Gray, southside or inside Barnes and Nobles.” [Old School, commenting on The Apartments Behind the Finger Apartments Behind the Montrose Whole Foods]
COMMENT OF THE DAY RUNNER-UP: WHO’S RESPONSIBLE FOR THE WORKERS “As a contractor who does both commercial and residential projects, I can tell you that the worker pay is dictated by the buyer, as is the safety, and as is everything. I can’t advertise that I pay my subs more, that I have a safer work environment, and that I’m more fair than my competitors, so YOU should pay more for my product. Especially if it is essentially the same product. I think I do pay my guys more, and I do have a safer work site, but I still cringe at some of the things that go on and I wish 5 guys didn’t have to live together to make a living. I just make less than my competitors and sleep better at night. If people were REALLY concerned about that we would have union laws like New York and California, and we would regulate the safety aspect more heavily.” [SCD, commenting on Headlines: Financing Williams Tower Purchase; Proposing a Safe-Passing Law for Houston]
COMMENT OF THE DAY SECOND RUNNER-UP: THE NEW SUBURBAN CODES “Developers should ditch the random bucolic-word generators for alpha-numeric names like the luxury car makers already have. Grandma drove her DeVille home to Valley Ranch. I want to drive my LX-450 home to FPF-120 (Former Pine Forest # 120).” [CV, commenting on Grand Parkway Progression a Part of Master-Planned Valley Ranch Master Plan]
This flag-flying 12-story tower planned for the under-development Block 10 West Office Park might end up hiding the renovations underway on the former Great Indoors, which you can see peeking out in the distance in the rendering above. Real Estate Bisnow’s Catie Dixon reports that Hicks Ventures is building out the out-of-business big box into a 2-story, 245,000-sq.-ft. spec office building. Plans include the construction of a 5-level parking garage behind the new building and a 6-level garage between it and this proposed I-10-facing tower.
Here’s an aerial view of the park and its neighbors:
