Tag: 77023

East End
05/08/14 1:15pm

Where 173 New Homes Are Going in the East End, Next to the Railroad Tracks

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Homebuilding, Proposed Developments, Redevelopment, Simms Woods
34 Comments

Simms Woods Homesites, 5401 Lawndale St., Simms Woods, Houston

Simms Woods Homesites, 5401 Lawndale St., Simms Woods, HoustonDevelopers are planning to put in a 173-home subdivision on the 11.93-acre former site of the All Woods Schroeder (and later, Woodlands Mill Work) warehouse adjacent to the HB&T rail line near the intersection of Jefferson and Hackney in the Simms Woods subdivision, west of Idylwood. The official address of the not-just-yet-subdivided property is 5401 Lawndale St., but only a small leg of the land fronts Lawndale — between Telephone Rd. and Wayside Dr., across from the KIPP Explore Academy. Demolition permits for portions of the former warehouse buildings were approved back in 2011 and 2013, but a reader reports that the last structure was cleared just recently (see photos).

On May 15th, the city’s planning commission is set to consider the layout for the new subdivision, which includes 11 new streets, 173 new homesites, and 25 “reserves” — to be used for guest parking and bits of open space. Here’s the proposed layout:

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Clearing Simms Woods
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East Downtown
05/01/14 2:15pm

Can This Eastwood Duplex Make a Quick Flip?

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Eastwood, Homes for Sale, Interiors
16 Comments

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Over in Eastwood, a corner 1940 property that sold in the middle of last month has reappeared on the market. The fresh listing last week, pitched as a duplex or single-family home, has an asking price of $415,000. The seller bought it in April for $334,901.

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More Pease, Please
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Featured Posts
04/11/14 5:00pm

Closeted Secrets of a $270K Home on the Wayside Side of Idylwood

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Homes for Sale, Idylwood, Interiors
3 Comments

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Somewhere upstairs in this updated 1939 Idylwood home, a hidden staircase leads to the upper level’s “extra room.” The property’s listing this week, asking price $269,995, appears to keep the secret, however: No photos of the access or space are included.

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Bedecked Front and Back
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Attractions
04/01/14 12:30pm

How a Botanical Garden Would Fit on the Gus Wortham Golf Course and Other Tidbits from Last Night’s Hullabaloo

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Country Club Place, East End, Idylwood, Proposed Developments, Simms Woods
86 Comments

Public Forum on Gus Wortham Golf Course, E.B. Cape Center, 4501 Leeland St., Houston

A reader sends in a report from the “spirited debate” at Monday night’s public forum at the E.B. Cape Center on Leeland St., covering proposed plans to convert the Gus Wortham Golf Course at Wayside Dr. and Lawndale St. in Houston’s East End, just north of Idylwood, into a new botanical garden: “Councilman Robert Gallegos, Mayor Parker, and many other politicians were there, as well as a standing room only crowd of those for the botanical garden (wielding the provided flowers), and for saving the golf course (fanning themselves with provided Gus Wortham fans). The crowd was encouraged to be quiet to keep things running smoothly, but this didn’t always happen, as many folks were pretty passionate about their opinions. Those wanting to save the golf course had at least double the presence of the garden folks, and were admittedly louder as things went on.”

Our correspondent, who claims to support renovating the existing golf course and putting a botanical garden elsewhere, notes that an earlier proposal in which the 150-acre site just west of Brays Bayou would have been shared by a 9-hole golf course and a new garden in the northern half has been scrapped. Houston Botanic Garden president Jeff Ross showed the latest “rough draft” of the proposed garden plan. Here’s a screen-shot photo:

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Tee’d Off
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Featured Posts
02/06/14 4:45pm

Through the Window Bars of a Well-Fortified Idylwood Redo

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Home Decor, Homes for Sale, Idylwood, Interiors
24 Comments

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Remains of a time-worn neighborhood entry marker (top) set off a fortified corner property on a double lot in Idylwood that was listed mid-January and has a $328,000 asking price. Light walls and dark-stained trim inside the updated 1940 home help highlight the fruit bowl of color pops when they appear, starting with the mango punch of the bar-gated entry door (above) . . .

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Old Ironsides
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Eastwood
12/16/13 2:15pm

The Greening of Lantrip Elementary

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Gardening, Landscape, Schools
9 Comments

New Garden Beds, Lantrip Elementary School, 100 Telephone Rd., Eastwood, Houston

Parents and students connected to Eastwood’s Lantrip Elementary School are showing off a new mulch-covered running track, separate wheelchair-ready path, and set of 12 raised garden beds on a decomposed-granite pad built this fall by volunteers from materials purchased with a $20,000 grant the school won in July. The garden-bed installation, pictured above in front of an older campus greenhouse, will also serve as an outdoor classroom for the school at the northern reaches of Telephone Rd. Also newly installed: a set of 20 new fruit trees with irrigation equipment sent by the Fruit Tree Planting Foundation, in addition to the earlier grant from Keep America Beautiful and the Lowe’s Foundation.

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An East End Greenbelt
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Development Restrictions
10/30/13 10:00am

How Easy Is It To Get Out of Idylwood?

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Idylwood, Land for Sale, Quicklink
17 Comments

HOW EASY IS IT TO GET OUT OF IDYLWOOD? A reader wonders if subdividing lots might get you new subdivision rules: “There is a great big ole sign [pictured at right] in the vacant lot at 6636 Meadowlawn in Idylwood. It is a notice of a request to replat the lot into two single family lots. It is plenty large enough, being one full lot and parts of the two lots on either side. As it stands, I can understand why they’d want to replat. The company that bought the property is Nadco LLC. That in itself is not so strange but what is strange is that the sign also says that the two new lots will create a new subdivision known as Idylwood Partial Replat #1. . . . I’m wondering if the ‘new subdivision’ would be subject to Idylwood deed restrictions or if they could totally disregard setbacks and lot lines among other things.” [Swamplot inbox; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Swamplot inbox

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Country Club Place
09/25/13 4:35pm

Garden Group Looking To Turn Gus Wortham Golf Course into Botanical Wonderland

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East End, Idylwood, Land Development, Parks, Proposed Developments
37 Comments

Board members of Houston Botanic Garden, a nonprofit formed in 2002 that’s been looking to bring a big-time garden to the city ever since, have had their eyes on several properties, including the KBR site in the Fifth Ward. But it’s the 150 acres home to the 18-hole Gus Wortham Golf Course — the oldest in Texas — that they are after now. The course, which includes a driving range, is owned by the city, and Jeff Ross, president of the garden club, explains that the organization hopes to ink a “long-term lease” that would allow it to “repurpose the property,” much like the 55-acre VanDusen Botanical Garden had done with the old Shaughnessy Golf Club in Vancouver. Ross explains that this repurposing could mean reserving as many as 65 acres for a 9-hole course — which could be built from scratch or involve a kind of rejiggering of the existing holes — and setting up the gardens on the remaining 85-90 relatively hilly acres that roll here toward Brays Bayou.

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Bayous and Waterways
09/12/13 2:00pm

Fine, Parks Board Tells Idylwood Residents, We Won’t Build a Parking Lot If You Really Don’t Want One

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Idylwood, Neighborhood Disputes, Parking, Parks
26 Comments

At a meeting yesterday, reps from the Houston Parks Board told reps from the Idylwood Civic Club that the HPB would agree to let alone that grassy knoll, shown here, where a trailhead providing access to the Brays Bayou hike and bike was to have been installed. Described in 2009 documents as “Sylvan Dell Parking Lot,” it appears that the proposed trailhead would have provided 19 off-street parking spaces, benches, lighting, a gazebo, and exercise equipment. Though those specs don’t really matter now: Houston Parks Board rep Jen Powis tells Swamplot that the Idylwood residents “chose to eliminate” the project.

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Bayous and Waterways
09/11/13 11:10am

A Wider Bayou and a Bridge Switcheroo Along O.S.T.

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Gulfgate, New Construction
11 Comments

Just about a mile as the trash floats along Brays Bayou from that sylvan site in Idylwood where the Houston Parks Board is considering building a parking lot, more work of the flood-mitigating Project Brays is underway. Here, near the intersection of Wheeler and Old Spanish Trail, the Harris County Flood Control District is widening the channel to help the bayou along, an act that will necessitate spending about $4.2 million to build a new 2-lane bridge.

According to the HCFCD, the existing bridge on Wheeler — shown in the photo here — isn’t nearly big enough and will need to be demolished. The new bridge, to be built during the next year or so, will extend Lidstone St. up and over the bayou to O.S.T., connecting the Gulfgate and Fonde Park neighborhoods just southeast of the Orange Show. Once the bridge is complete, more hike and bike trails will be installed.

You can see a project map and more photos after the jump:

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Uncategorized
09/10/13 10:00am

No Parking: Idylwood Residents Want Parks Board To Move Proposed Hike and Bike Lot Somewhere Else

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42 Comments

Note: Read more about this story here.

First a Walmart, and now a parking lot? Some Idylwood residents are organizing opposition to a 20- or 30-space parking lot proposed for this site by the Houston Parks Board for the Bayou Greenways Project. The parking lot, presumably meant for users of the hike and bike trail to be built at some point along this stretch of Brays Bayou — which slithers beneath I-45 on its way toward U of H and the Med Center — would replace this sylvan knoll in the bayou-hugging ’hood where N. Macgregor Way curves into Sylvan Rd. But residents have some concerns . . .

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Homes for Sale
09/09/13 4:30pm

A Bayou-View Property Rises in Idylwood

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Idylwood, Interiors
18 Comments

Big shoulders on a 1928 property in Idylwood look as if the muscular house remodeled in 2000 could transform into an action figure, pull itself out of its slab, and head across the street toward a bend in Brays Bayou. As it is, however, the home’s porch, deck, and side-car vantage points will have to do for the bayou view. The double-lot spread appeared on the market at the end of August and has a $325,000 asking price.

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Bayous and Waterways
08/19/13 10:00am

The Next Stretch of Brays Bayou Hike and Bike

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Forest Hill, Parks
9 Comments

Across town from the molten-zinc-dipped pedestrian bridges and Bud Light Amphitheaters going up along Buffalo Bayou, site prep is underway to build a new section of hike and bike trail along Brays Bayou in Mason Park. Paid for by the same federal scratch that will fund a yet-to-be-designed pedestrian bridge spanning the bayou on the south side of 75th St. (or behind that bridge in the photo), this section will connect 75th to Forest Hill Blvd., where the trail picks up and splits, running west to Lawndale and east to Capitol near the Magnolia Transit Center.

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