October 2, 2009 – 3:50 pm
Swamplot reader ms. rosa reports on tonight’s scheduled demolition of the 1906 Savoy Apartments building (later the Savoy-Field Hotel) at Main St. and Pease Downtown: “Just spoke with Cherry [Demolition]. They will start tearing down the building tonight (Friday, October 2, 2009) at 7:00pm. It will not be imploded (as hoped!)” [Swamplot; previously]
Read more about: 77002, Apartments, Demolitions, Downtown, Environmental, Hazards, Vacant Buildings
September 24, 2009 – 11:17 am
City officials have decided to give the owner of the original 1906 Savoy Apartments building on Main St. Downtown an extra week to knock down the structure before going ahead with their own emergency demolition plan. The building’s owner — listed in Harris County records as Michael Nassif — will now have until midnight next Friday, October 2nd, to have a contractor of his own choice begin dismantling the structure. If that doesn’t happen, the city-selected contractor will complete the demo that weekend — and leave the property with a lien for the $448,600 cost.
While negotiations have focused on how quickly work can begin, residents of the Beaconsfield across Pease St. may be more interested in how long the demo will take — and how it will be done. Architect David Hall, who has studied the building for several developers, spoke to abc13 reporter Gene Apodaca about the asbestos embedded in the building’s crumbling interior plaster:
“It’s full of environmental issues. There are pathogens that are a result of the pigeon droppings, there are areas of the building I measured where pigeon droppings were six inches thick,” said Hall.
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Read more about: 77002, Apartments, Demolitions, Downtown, Environmental, Hazards, Vacant Buildings
August 17, 2009 – 12:23 pm
The old Bruce Elementary School on Bringhurst St. in the Fifth Ward — featured on Swamplot just last week and apparently just about ready to go up for sale — went up in flames last Friday night, reports our neighborhood correspondent. A story featured on Abc13 news says the building did suffer major damage from the flames, and makes it sound as if arson is suspected. Did any of the asbestos do its job?
Photo of former Bruce Elementary School, 713 Bringhurst St.: Vaughn Mueller
Read more about: 77020, Commercial Real Estate, Development Strategies, Environmental, Fifth Ward, Fires, Hazards, Land for Sale, Schools, Superfund-Sites, Toxic Sites
August 10, 2009 – 11:17 am
Swamplot’s new “Bottom” of the Fifth Ward correspondent Vaughn Mueller reports from the site of the old Bruce Elementary School, where a sign indicates the property is for sale. A source tells Swamplot that a few details need to be worked out before it’s “officially” on the market, but an HISD web page provides some information about the property.
The school, which was closed at the end of the spring 2007 semester, sits along Cage and Bringhurst on the I-10 feeder road, and comprises a little more than 2 blocks. Mueller reports that the new Bruce Elementary (built by a 2002 HISD bond) less than a mile away on Jensen opened its doors in the fall of 2007.
Why the move?
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Read more about: 77020, Commercial Real Estate, Environmental, Fifth Ward, Hazards, Land for Sale, Schools, Superfund-Sites, Toxic Sites
Good news for the residents of Grace Ln. who back up to that Griggs Rd. waste treatment and disposal facility run by CES Environmental Services! It’ll probably be a while before another thermal oxidizer ruptures and sends four-foot-wide metal pieces flying over their back fences again:
“I mean, this was metal that could have decapitated people,” [Grace Ln. resident and salon owner Kimberly Sadberry] said. “It was sharp. We had to put it on a dolly to take it back, it was that heavy.”
CES assured residents nothing like that would ever happen again, but less than two weeks later, another explosion occurred, she said.
Why the grace period now? Responding to complaints about intermittent explosions and noxious smells emanating from the plant — as well as the fiery death last month of a CES employee as he attempted to clean a tanker truck — police officers and federal agents raided the facility yesterday morning. And figuring out what’s really going on there might take a while:
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Read more about: 77021, Environmental, Explosions, Hazards, MacGregor Terrace, Odors, Riverside-Terrace
December 29, 2008 – 8:59 am
Environmental attorney Jim Blackburn gets religion: “At AA, they told me that that I had to admit that I was powerless over alcohol. They also told me that I needed to acknowledge a ‘higher power’ which was described as a power greater than myself that would provide me with spiritual strength sufficient to give me the ability to change. Well - I fought both concepts, particularly that of a higher power. It seemed like capitulation, that I had to return to the religion within which I was raised and from which I had fled. And then at a meeting one day, a young man said that his higher power was a METRO bus. The METRO bus as a higher power made me smile and it allowed me to loosen up and think more creatively. At this time, I was doing work on Galveston Bay and had a good feeling about the bay, so I chose Galveston Bay as my higher power, a truly life-changing event.” [Blackburn & Carter, via OffCite]
Read more about: Environmental, Galveston Bay, Metro, Transportation
December 11, 2008 – 1:23 pm
Neighbors of a permitted, non-hazardous waste treatment and disposal plant less than a mile south of Riverside Terrace have been upset by the stench that regularly rises from the new facility. And last weekend there was a bit of an eruption at the CES Environmental Services plant at 4904 Griggs Rd.:
No one was injured in Saturday’s explosion, but it was the latest in a series of incidents involving the treatment facility, which is permitted to handle non-hazardous industrial waste, such as used oil.
The city has received more than 135 complaints about the plant this year, mostly related to the odors.
So what exactly landed in the yards along Grace Lane in McGregor Terrace? Exploded waste?
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Read more about: 77021, Environmental, Explosions, Hazards, MacGregor Terrace, Odors, Riverside-Terrace
December 8, 2008 – 2:43 pm
An awful stench has been wafting through the homes of Golden Glade Estates, just west of Hobby Airport and south of Sims Bayou. There’s also been backyard flooding after every rain, a constant din from trucks, and generator-powered lighting beaming into local Living Rooms during the night. The cause? Huge piles of wood debris, brought into the southeast Houston neighborhood after Hurricane Ike:
Their problems started when Federal Emergency Management Agency contractors began trucking in hundreds of semi truckloads of pungent smelling, steaming mulch. Local 2 Investigates cameras and Sky 2 helicopter footage show some mounds stacked taller than nearby homes, covering acres of land less than 100 yards from some homes.
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Read more about: 77048, Disaster Aftermath, Environmental, Flooding, Golden Glade Estates, Hazards, Hurricane Ike, Mulch, Odors
September 25, 2008 – 5:23 pm
“So far, regulatory officials have identified 228 sites potentially poisoned with gasoline, industrial chemicals, feces and other contaminants from Greater Houston to Lake Charles, La. But none of the reported spills is considered major, authorities said. Cmdr. Virginia Kammer, who leads the U.S. Coast Guard’s cleanup efforts along the Texas coastline, said the largest spill was about 3,000 barrels, and the responsible facility moved quickly to get the problem under control.” What about the region’s 28 Superfund sites? No word yet, but the EPA has “started to investigate.” [Houston Chronicle]
Read more about: Disaster Aftermath, Environmental, Hazards, Hurricane Ike, Pollution, Superfund-Sites, Toxic Sites, Water Quality
September 24, 2008 – 4:41 pm
“The city and its environs rest on barrier islands, which are made of sand, low-lying and prone to significant geological shifts. In Galveston’s case, even before Ike’s landfall, the island was both sinking slowly and becoming sharply eroded along its west end. Moreover, a couple of years ago, the city itself commissioned University of Texas geologist Jim Gibeaut to create a geohazards map for the island, that is, where should development not occur? The research study found that nearly all the development along the beach front west of the seawall, which protects the core of the island, is in ‘red’ or ‘yellow’ zones, where Gibeaut says development should not occur.” [SciGuy]
Read more about: Development Restrictions, Disaster Aftermath, Environmental, Flooding, Galveston, Hazards, Hurricane Ike, Insurance, Redevelopment
September 23, 2008 – 3:16 pm
“Ever since the hurricane, a number of the city’s waste water treatment plants went without power. As a result, the city was forced to actually dump raw sewage straight into the bayous. First of all, it smells awful. There have also been some oil slicks along the waterways. And you can’t miss the dead fish.” [abc13]
Read more about: Bayous, Disaster Aftermath, Environmental, Hurricane Ike, Public Health, Toxic Sites, Water Quality
September 18, 2008 – 6:36 pm
A note from the City of Taylor Lake Village:
Taylor Lake is closed to recreation - swimming, boating, fishing, and water skiing. The Gulf Coast Waste Disposal Authority industrial wastewater treatment plant on Port Road was inundated during the storm and its ponds of untreated industrial and sanitary waste overflowed into Taylor Lake. The Lake may be contaminated with industrial pollutants (volatile organic and other compounds) and bacteriological contaminants. Residents should avoid all contact with Taylor Lake water until further notice.
Any other area industrial pollutants gone AWOL after Ike? Where did they end up?
Photo of house and damage on Taylor Lake: Flickr user Linda Railsback
Read more about: 77586, Disaster Aftermath, Environmental, Hazards, Hurricane Ike, Industrial Pollution, Lakes, Public Health, Taylor Lake Village, Toxic Sites, Water Quality
September 9, 2008 – 11:15 am
“[Sunday] night for about two hours, BP’s refinery released an estimated 2,725.59 pounds of sulfur dioxide when the pressure spiked during a planned shutdown — so if you were cruising through Texas City and noticed a suffocating smell that may have been it. Meanwhile, starting [Monday], and continuing for the next week, BP has three more emissions events scheduled that are related to maintenance and the aforementioned planned shutdown at the refinery. Through the magic of the Internet, you can determine the substances involved in the releases, which include benzene.” [Hair Balls]
Read more about: Air Quality, Environmental, Pollution, Texas-City
September 9, 2008 – 9:35 am
Read more about: Environmental, Hazards, Parks, Texas-City, Toxic Sites
City Council voted earlier this week to relax restrictions on the construction and renovation of homes in frequently flooded areas. The restrictions had been enacted quietly 2 years ago and protested by floodway residents ever since. “Under the revised rules, permits for construction on vacant land in floodways will be issued only if the building uses a pier and beam rather than a slab foundation, and if the applicant pays for any necessary mitigation, [deputy public works director Andy] Icken said.” [Houston Chronicle]
Read more about: Development Regulations, Development Restrictions, Environmental, Flooding
