Katy residents living near a pool supply company got breathtaking views of the spectacular black plumes emanating from the RAM Chemical and Supply warehouse at 4949 Greenhouse Rd. during last weekend’s fire.
But the fun wasn’t entirely over: A separate episode yesterday resulted in a shelter-in-place order for a few hours last night — for downwind neighborhoods east of the Windstone Colony subdivision, stretching from Greenhouse Rd. to Barker Cypress. Fire officials warned of toxic clouds billowing out from a supply of hazardous chemicals still housed in the singed remains of the warehouse.
The ravages of the Katy Prairie have taken their toll on the models and unburied treasure at Forbidden Gardens, reports Brittanie Shey:
In 1996, when the museum first opened, it must have been an amazingly detailed sight. But [Forbidden Gardens founder Ira] Poon and his builders didn’t account for the Houston heat and humidity, which ruined a lot of the hand-painted details. Each terra cotta soldier used to hold a wooden weapon in his hand, but reckless children would climb into the display and take the swords to play with. When the soldiers started to break or peel, it was impossible to order more because the molds had been destroyed. [Weekend manager Alicia] Mendez said she and coworkers spend a few hours each summer having at the displays with Gorilla Glue to fix what they can.
Spurred on by family members waiting patiently at the Carrabba’s on Kirby — and the promotional whizzes at GM and CBS Radio, who’ve furnished her with a brand-new vehicle to drive for 8 weeks — mommy blogger and new Chevy Traverse spokesmom Stephanie Click ventures out from her “own little world” in Katy to . . . the scary and purportedly trafficky Inner Loop!
Will she make it? How will her blogger-swag loaner car stand up to the rigors of multi-lane Houston driving?
Those long-lingering plans by the Simon Property Group to build a mall called “The Grand” on 134 acres wedged between I-10 and the threatened Grand Parkway — catty-corner to the Katy Mills Mall — appear to be uh . . . “in question.” The Houston Business Journal’s Jennifer Dawson reports:
The circular acreage surrounded by a mall ring road has at various times been earmarked for an outlet mall, regional mall, lifestyle center and mixed-use center.
Simon recently began marketing the vacant land for sale through local retail brokerage firm Page Partners.
Former Halliburton unit PathFinder Energy Services, now a part of Smith International, is building a new $20-million, 225,000-sq.-ft. tilt-up campus on 25 acres in Katy. “The center will be located near the northwest corner of Colonial Parkway and the Grand Parkway, next to the highly visible, 800,000-square-foot 99 Cents Only warehouse along Interstate 10. PathFinder’s site is across I-10 from where Houston-based KBR Inc. planned to build 900,000 square feet of office space to house most of its 4,500 local employees. The KBR project, which would have extended the Energy Corridor farther west, has been put on hold for economic reasons. PathFinder intends to consolidate hundreds of employees from four buildings it leases in Northwest Houston into the Katy-area site, which was acquired in December 2007 from an Interfin Cos. partnership.” [Houston Business Journal]
The Katy real-estate rush spreads to the insect world:
Neighbors say bees are nothing new to the Settlers Village subdivision.
One homeowner just down the block had a similar infestation about a year ago and had to remove the siding from his home to get the hive out, said Rowhan Cummings . . .
“They’re traveling,” Cummings says. “Once they got rid of those, they came back here.”
The 12-year-old subdivision is surrounded by open fields, and Cummings says the bees simply appear when the flowers bloom, then look for a place to settle down.
“Those bees were probably here before we were,” he says.
“What I see on my bike rides,” writes 2-wheeled real-estate observer Lou Minatti, “is that construction has ground to a halt in Katy.” A few more louminating observations on the cycles of West Houston real estate:
The main upscale neighborhoods in the Houston metro area lie between downtown Houston and Katy, in the corridor south of I-10 and north of Westheimer/FM1093. Houston residents know what I am talking about. That narrow 30 mile x 8 mile corridor contains the trendy new “lofts” near downtown, expensive new condo towers in the Galleria area, River Oaks, Memorial, the Villages and Cinco Ranch. . . .
Me? I live north of I-10, the crappy side. It was a nice quiet place when we moved out here in 1995. It’s still an OK place, no real problems. But property values have been flat since 2000. The houses on this side of the freeway are between $100k-$150k. Here’s the thing: Long-time readers here have seen my videos and have seen the inventory and foreclosures from my bike tours. The new houses in these videos [both featured in this Swamplot post from last fall] have all been sold, and this is AFTER the shady lending was stopped. I did a video update three weeks ago [above] and didn’t post it on YouTube because there’s almost nothing on the market! In my subdivision of 900 houses there are two houses for sale and one foreclosure. That’s it.
“Houston is the largest home-building market in the nation, according to the Greater Houston Partnership and Builder and Hanley Wood Market Intelligence, with 42,697 building permits. Population trends, job growth, home prices and the rate of building permits all factored in to rank the top 75 markets in 2008. Assisting the numbers, no doubt, was Katy. Business Week magazine ranked Katy as the second-fastest residential community in the U.S. in a study published this month titled ‘America’s Biggest Boomtowns.’ The study was based on new home growth from 2000 to 2008.” And what will next year’s numbers say? [Houston Business Journal]
Ready to see some fun pix from around town? Here’s the guardhouse for the loading dock at the Igloo plant in Katy, as captured a while back by blogger Donna B.
Azzarelli’s Restaurant has fled the Tuscan-styledVillagio Town Center in Cinco Ranch, reports InsideKaty blogger Helen Eriksen — leaving behind a delinquent-rent notice on the front door . . . and some sort of lawsuit:
Inside the spacious eatery, napkins, bread plates and wine glasses are neatly arranged on the tables. Christmas decorations are also still in place but it’s unclear if the closing is permanent.
Efforts to reach [owner Frank] Triola were unsuccessful as of this blog posting. The person who answered the phone for the leasing agent, Villagio Partners, said she would have to check to see if someone could call me back because there is ongoing litigation in the matter.
Meanwhile, commenters have sighted a new Azzarelli’s just off the Katy Freeway:
However, driving down 1-10 heading west from Houston, the Barker Cypress exit has a new strip center and what do you know… Azzerelli’s is opening up a new restaurant! I think that the rent was very high at the Villagio Town Center and they are moving to a lower cost building. ??
Tuscan theming doesn’t come cheap. Another giveaway: the flashing “I-10 Location Coming soon!” notice on the Azzarelli’s website.
Just line that short central driveway through your new power-center parking lot with a small number of stores and head-in parking. Fortify the freeway frontage with an FM-1960-worthy strip of more than the usual number of pad sites, and build the whole thing next to a mall! Next problem?
Introducing the new Katy Main Street, a just-announced 86-acre shopping center named for the short strip of 4 retail buildings meant to line its gullet.
The mixed-use development is designed to include 485,000 square feet of retail space, 500,000 square feet of office space and a full-service hotel and convention center at the southwest corner of Interstate 10 and Pin Oak Road in Katy.
All this . . . just across the street from the Katy Mills Mall!
Readers obsessed with the Katy house designed by Wylie W. Vale that was featured in last week’s Neighborhood Guessing Game will be interested to see these additional views of the 1952 home — in all its original “little bit country, little bit Mod” glory. They were taken by architectural photographer (and yes, game winner) Ben Hill on a quick visit early last year.
Swamplot covers real estate, home design and renovation, architecture, and the landscape of Houston, Texas. Swamplot did not flood during Allison — or Ike! Honest! Read more
