COMMENT OF THE DAY: THAT SINKING FEELING 
“At 13 seconds in, those houses across the water at the top of the frame are at the end of my street, South Burnett Drive, in the Lakewood subdivision. The street rises gradually as you travel away from the water, but the low end of the street lost over 20 houses during Hurricane Ike. Some owners have rebuilt on pilings, some have rebuilt at grade, and others have abandoned the property. (My own house is further up the street, at about 31 feet elevation.) The end of the flood debris field from Ike was about three lots south of my house. So, while the name ‘Swamplot’ is amusing, to some of us it is no joke.” [Reeseman, commenting on Flying High Over the Baytown Subdivision That Sunk] Illustration: Lulu
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Tag: Disaster Aftermath
BUILDING A MONUMENT TO GATED FLOOD CONTROL AND TOURISM 
Protecting the Ship Channel during an Ike-like (or worse) storm surge has led some to propose a big dike, others a big gate. But UH professor of urban planning Tom Colbert doesn’t see why we couldn’t trouble ourselves to make such protection a real sight to see too: “Colbert likes the idea of . . . connecting the Centennial Gate and its levees to the proposed Lone Star National Recreation Area, undeveloped land that would both attract ecotourists and slow floodwaters,” reports the Houston Chronicle’s Lisa Gray: “I remembered one drawing I’d seen in [Colbert’s] PowerPoint show: Happy tourists, paddling kayaks past the Hartman Bridge, on one of the byways out of the big ships’ path, waterbirds and wetlands all around. Colbert motioned southeast, toward the Ship Channel’s mouth, toward Barbours Cut, the other possible location for the floodgate. There, he said, the levees would cross the channel’s water, connecting the Ship Channel’s artificial islands — made from dirt dredged from the channel — to the shore. Enough room could be left on top of the levee for a hiking path or even for car access; for the first time, it would be possible for people to get to the Atkinson Island Wildlife Management Area — a bird mecca on manmade land — without a boat. You could even, he notes, build a tourist destination atop one of those islands: He proposes a monument to Houston, the gateway to North America, the place where nature meets industry. In some drawings, just to give people the idea, he plunks the Statue of Liberty atop a Ship Channel island.” [Houston Chronicle ($); previously on Swamplot] Photo of Fred Hartman Bridge: Chuck Wilkson
A new stick frame began going up Wednesday on the corner of Heights Blvd. and E. 2nd St., on a concrete slab cleared of the heap of wood studs, trusses, shear walls, and framed staircases that had landed there with a crash last Saturday night. All remnants of the 2 toppled Keystone Classic Homes 4-story townhouses in the Madison Park development just south of White Oak Bayou have been swept away. The site, pictured above in a photo taken by a Swamplot reader this morning, now looks rather different from the way it appeared last Sunday:
COMMENT OF THE DAY: HURRICANE RITAS “I know there are people who ‘go out for Margaritas’ . . . that is, they are looking for a good ’Rita and don’t care that much about the food. However, I don’t think that means a place can succeed if that’s all they’ve got. No shortage in this town of good ’Ritas or good Mexican food or places that can do both, like Hugo’s or Sylvia’s. On the other hand, I have a fond memory of the Ninfa’s on Kirby because they were open right after Ike when most of the city was still without power. Under those circumstances, I thought the food was awesome.” [toadfroggy, commenting on Out with Mama Ninfa’s, in with Maggie Rita’s]
The city recently bought 2 custom roll-off trailers so it could set up its brand-new fleet of 17 solar-powered shipping containers without having to hire contractors or cranes. And the method of opening the solar panels (or closing them before a hurricane hits the area) is now OSHA-compliant, says Andrew Vrana of Metalab, the local architecture and fabrication firm that designed them. (2 people on a ladder can do it pretty quickly.) The photos above show the unit installed recently at Fire Station 72 at 17401 Saturn Ln. just north of NASA Rd. 1, near the Johnson Space Center. “Yes they do produce a little power on a cloudy day,” Vrana reports.
All the units have now been delivered to their sites. In the event of a major power outage, the 140-sq.-ft. containers will become staffed disaster response centers — air-conditioned information and water-distribution centers: a place to charge your cell phone or laptop, power a medical device, or keep medicines refrigerated. In short, the kind of space it might have been nice to have nearby after Hurricane Ike hit. (As long as the solar panels are folded in and latched, the units will withstand hurricane-force winds.) In the meantime, they’ll provide additional office space and power for the facilities that host them. The container at Lake Houston Park, for example, will become an office for the new woodland archery range.
Here’s a map showing the fire stations, schools, and other locations around the city where you can now find the completely off-grid structures:
GALVESTON ELEMENTARY STILL IN AFTER-SCHOOL DETENTION 
Well into Burnet Elementary School’s third year of post-Ike limbo, a school district spokesman says one idea is to fix the hurricane-ravaged property’s exterior, roof, and air conditioning so it can be used as warehouse space. There’s “a good chance” FEMA would pay for repairs, but no funds have been negotiated yet. Then there’s the other option: selling the campus. But the district doesn’t think it would get a very good price in the current market, and what if they need to open up a new school a few years later? [Galveston County Daily News] Photo: Galveston ISD
What could possibly have been worse than Hurricane Ike? Super Ike, a stronger hurricane aimed 30 miles further west, causing a larger storm surge, more deaths, and significantly greater damage to Houston’s industrial infrastructure. To protect against that hypothetical $100 billion threat, a Rice University team is recommending some bolstered defenses for the region. Included among the suggestions: a “moveable gate structure” just upstream from Baytown’s Fred Hartman Bridge, to block the Ship Channel and San Jacinto River from rising waters in Galveston Bay (pictured above); elevating Hwy. 146 along the west edge of Galveston Bay so that it forms a levee protecting much of La Marque, Dickinson, League City, Clear Lake, and La Porte; a “baywall” to protect Galveston Island’s backside from sneaky storm surge waters; and preserving a 130-mile-long stretch of existing coastal wetlands between High Island and Matagorda as a recreation area and when-needed storm barrier.
How was Seabrook homeowner Brad Gana able to wriggle out of foreclosure proceedings on his home at the last minute? By hiring a lawyer to argue that his house does not exist. And indeed, the visual evidence is compelling: All that’s left of Gana’s waterfront structure at 1910 Todville Rd., which apparently washed away 3 years ago during Hurricane Ike while Gana was working overseas, is an empty slab, protected by a front gate and littered until recently with a few of Gana’s tools and collectibles. (After the proceedings were canceled, KPRC’s Amy Davis reports, Bank of America had those items removed from the property.)
The Sylvan Beach Pavilion, a dancehall and conference hall on Harris County’s only public beach — with a 10,000-sq.-ft. glass-walled ballroom overlooking Galveston Bay — has been boarded up since its pummeling by Hurricane Ike in 2008. But thanks to a $3.6 million grant awarded last fall by the state Dept. of Rural Affairs, the modern building at Sylvan Beach Park is now headed for restoration to its original 1956 glory (above) — with a few tweaks directed by the architects at Kirksey to gussy it up for weddings, quinceañeras, local meetings, retirement parties, and other La Porte events. Construction is scheduled to start early next year and take 9 months.
Something was missing, it turns out, in this brand-new home Mayor Parker turned over to Mary Porras in a “housewarming” ceremony on August 4th. Built by a contractor hired by the city, the single-story replacement house at 4005 Lila St. in the Fifth Ward had no insulation, an inspector from the state’s General Land Office discovered about a week later — after Porras had already moved in.
HOUSTON TREE MASSACRE BODY COUNT 
For full effect, Trees for Houston executive director Barry Ward counts the number of local trees expected to die and be removed over the next 2 years because of the recent drought: 66 million. (Okay, but how many of them will we get to carve up for mermaid and doggie sculptures?) That’s 10 percent of the greater Houston area’s branch-bearing population right there. At Memorial Park, 400 of approximately 1,000 close-to-dead trees have already been removed. More fun urban deforesting facts: Already, more trees have been destroyed by the drought than by Hurricane Ike. [Culturemap; watering hints] Photo: Houston Tomorrow
JACK JOHNSON, STILL DRAWING THE CROWDS IN GALVESTON 
On the agenda for the next meeting of GRACE, the homeownership organization in charge of The Oaks housing development at 4300 Broadway in Galveston: A discussion of Earl Jones’s sculpture of former world heavyweight boxing champion and Galveston native Jack Johnson, carved out of the trunk of a subdivision oak tree killed by Hurricane Ike. Homeowners association President Frank Rivera has been campaigning to have the stature moved. His complaint: That the Johnson statue was bringing a stream of tourists and other visitors to the neighborhood, creating traffic and disrupting the peace. But a canvas of residents over the weekend by 2 housing authority board members turned up only 2 who said they didn’t want the sculpture. [Galveston County Daily News; background; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Click2Houston
Onlookers are reporting that large portions of Galveston’s Flagship Hotel are finding their way into the water below the 25th St. pier. The hotel’s owner, Landry’s Restaurants, is demolishing the building to make room for an amusement-park-style entertainment complex which you might reasonably assume won’t include any under-the pier attractions. The 225-room hotel closed permanently after Hurricane Ike.
Galveston real estate agent Billy Hill has posted an anonymous eyewitness account that a front-end loader operated by the Grant Mackay Demolition Co. pushed several portions of the building into the bay, including the section of framing that disappeared in the interval between these 2 photos:
Galveston Mayor Joe Jaworski now says he will waive the $10 annual permit fees the city had planned on charging 3 homeowners whose dead-tree sculptures stand in the public right-of-way. Homeowner Donna Leibbert started a small local-media firestorm late last week after she received a permit renewal form in the mail for the sculpture of a Geisha that artist Jim Phillips had carved out of an oak tree outside Leibbert’s home at 1717 Ball St. After the Hurricane Ike storm surge killed an estimated 30,000 trees on the island, artists turned almost 2 dozen of them into sculptures. But Leibbert’s Geisha is one of only 3 of the works that sits on city property.
City spokesperson Alice Cahill, who has helped to publicize the sculpture program as a tourist attraction, tells Amanda Casanova of the Galveston County Daily News that the license-to-use fee is normally required for any designed object that occupies a portion of the right-of-way. “A carved tree is treated the same as a cafe table.” Leibbert tells Casanova she was aware of the permit requirement at the time the Geisha was carved — getting approval for the sculpture required a formal application with the city’s planning commission. But she notes that the tree had stood in the same position for about 100 years, and for free.
Over the summer, Swamplot photographer Candace Garcia tracked down 22 of the tree sculptures, including Leibbert’s Geisha. Here’s her photo tour:
A small fleet of modified shipping containers outfitted with adjustable solar panels will soon serve as mobile emergency power supplies for the city of Houston. City officials are currently negotiating a contract to purchase 25 of the units, which are based on a prototype originally deployed as the green-themed sales office of a Montrose condo project. The solar-powered containers, called SPACE (“Solar Powered Adaptive Container for Everyone“), were created by a joint venture of local architecture firm Metalab, Joey Romano’s Harvest Moon Development, and design firm ttweak (best known for the popular “Houston. It’s Worth It.” marketing campaign). City sustainability director Laura Spanjian announced at the opening of the University of Houston’s Green Building Components Expo last month that SPACE and energy company Ameresco had been selected through a public-application process to supply the city with the mobile “solar generators.” Spanjian now tells Swamplot the contract should be complete “in a few weeks.”
