USPS NOW SAYS IT WILL CLOSE AND SELL THE HEIGHTS POST OFFICE 
A new public notice taped to the door of the Heights Finance Station post office at the corner of Heights Blvd. and 11th St. last Friday indicates the U.S. Postal Service has moved on from “considering” moving out of the property and is now prepared for a full-on “disposal” action: “This property has been determined by the Postal Service to be excess and is no longer necessary for Postal operations,” reads the notice, which also indicates that “Postal Service policy requires the property to be sold at Market Value.” Though public comments are still being encouraged, it typically takes more than a few discouraging words to prevent a local post office from shutting down. The 6,161-sq.-ft. building at 1050 Yale St. sits on more than an acre of land. [Previously on Swamplot] Photos: Swamplot inbox (post office); Nick Panzarelli (notice)
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So we’ll end up with more poorly-constructed half-million-dollar townhomes. They can go to the gas-station-turned restaurant next door and overpay for brunch.
Great.
Sometime last year, I read that they were going to close and sell the post offices on Timmons, Richmond (near Montrose), and Greenbriar, but I’ve heard nothing since. I can’t imagine they can close that many post offices, all of which are busy, especially the Timmons location. Of course, all of them are sitting on prime Inner Loop land.
The Brooke Smith post office on Cavalcade is closing, too. I thought they were closing it because this one was still operating, but they’re both closing?
This sucks! The Heights always had a small town feel and having it’s own post office on the boulevard, just down the road from the library, helped further that feeling! The one on West 18th doesn’t have the same cache and it’s not like we need another faux-mansion or crappy strip center……….
@ brian:
The good news is that this corner isn’t really conducive to single-family residential.
The bad news is that what we’ll probably get instead is a parking-lot-fronted strip center like the one across the street.
it sounded all but certain that the heights location, richmond and greenbriar were being sold. Don’t recall hearing anything about the Timmons location and kinda wierd since that’s been the only location open on Saturdays for as long as I lived here.
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regardless, i can’t help but support all of this. the USPS has had it’s hands tied up for way too long by congress and it needs to start being able to act like a real company that’s entering bankruptcy and consolidate it’s resources.
Good. That post office is a massive waste of space.
I for one am hoping for a CVS with vast surface parking. Nothing makes me happier than angry hipsters and liberals coupled with the destruction of a government building.
A row of townhomes may actually be an improvement on this awful building. I know the closing will be a hardship on some old folks who live nearby, but it is not nearly enough to warrant keeping this incredibly inefficient and otherwise unnecessary branch open. Now if we can just take down that awful telephone building on 8th and Heights we will really be getting somewhere.
Well they are doing a fantastic job with my mail. Which is always barely in the box, often on the ground and if raining, soaked. And that location (which is my post office)….i went to drop mail in the box last week, it was overstuffed with mail on the ground and in the parking lot. The mail carriers in the Heights are awful. I have been complaining for years. Anything is an improvement of that waste of space.
sad to see the post office go; very convenient. Seemed to have steady traffic. Whatever comes next won’t leave a tree standing.
Paging Sheila Jackson Lee…where is the “this is so racist” crowd?
This post office is the heart of the Heights. Generations of Heights families and businesses rely on this location. From young mothers, countless businesses to elders of the neighborhood– from sun-up to way past midnight–this location is a lively gathering place. For the past three years, this location accepts deliveries from UPS and FedEx. I receive huge cartons of product for my studio– track on line– and the minute the huge cartons arrive, we stop by and receive effortlessly. I am sick of the “fast-buck” mentality permeating our culture– what happened to good sense and keeping institutions that serve our whole community to be a vital and healthy neighborhood. Short sided bureaucrats ought to step away from antiquated google maps– and visit the vital post office at Yale & 11th and meet the real people that populate our great neighborhood
The City of Houston talks about creating walkable, vibrant “urban neighborhoods†and this Post Office is the perfect, successful working example of that vision.
@Angela, this has nothing to do with the City of Houston and everything to do with the failing business model of the USPS. It would be great for every post office to stay open, but who is going to pay the costs?
This USPS facility has been a clusterf*** of biblical proportions for a decade. Interested in standing in line for close to an hour while one person works the front counter ? This facility is/was right up your alley. Not concerned that the outgoing mail you were looking to release via the drive through box may not make it entirely in the standing unit ? Check ! Looking to take a trip via the Time Tunnel to the machinations of days gone by ? Just walk through the door.
Living only a couple blocks away from this place, I have no nostalgia for it – I’ve successfully avoided walking in the doors for years [except when I had to ’cause the box outside was spilling it’s mail guts out over the parking lot]. Not a hateful person, but I don’t care what’s erected in it’s place. The employees who worked there ought to be ashamed of providing such shitty service for years.
@Ross , this has nothing to do with a failing business model and everything to do with Republican policies forcing the USPS to go bankrupt. Look up the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act.
Whoever it is at USPS probably did their cost vs benefit evaluation and determined to sell the property. Location and timing. Sellers are selling their property now for a reason . Look at little ole 2 lane Yale St. The city keeps issuing permits for Yale street, with the failing Yale street bridge. Will all these stores, restaurants and in the Heights / Washington area stay profitable in 10, 20 yrs. Who knows.
I’ll spend $25 at Fedex to send a package, rather than stand in line at the post office. Not once has my local PO been able to properly execute a hold mail for me: I return home and my mail slot is openly bulging with stuff (crap, mostly) that was supposed to be delivered the next day. The mail carrier seems like a really nice guy, though.
Some post offices, like the one referenced on Richmond are being relocated, and the terms of bids usually include the person buying the property agreeing to build the new post office. Since this one is simply closing, I would expect to see some developer interest in another midrise apartment building like 6th/Yale. Also, mail delivery in the Heights isn’t handled by this post office – it is handled by the post office on 19th Street near the nexus of 18th/19th/20th/TC Jester.
Finally, the Yale Street Bridge of Death is scheduled for replacement.
http://blog.chron.com/advocate/2014/02/5-houston-post-offices-closing-but-not-southmore/#19523101=0. Granted, this article is nearly a year old, but the Timmons P.O. is on the list. Say it ain’t so!
NotCommonsense: Okay, you’re posts are getting better. They started to slip a bit come the end of 2014
Superdave, the Heights doesn’t have enough voter rich “vonables” at this “destinated destination”
Uh, OK. Hope the UPS store on 19th doesn’t mind having their already overwhelming volume of outbound packages further increased by Priority packages. Hope they don’t stop doing that as a courtesy, being Heights people have not a single other f#&$ing place to mail Priority packages. They should have revamped that unit, not sold it. This is BS.
P.S. Ross and associated Republi-geniuses, explain to me again how we can afford $800bn/year on war, fail to tax $100bn in church revenue, allow trillions in US earnings to be couched offshore.. but god forbid USPS serves the taxpayers while operating short of a profit. It’s not a for-profit, it’s a government service, and a cheap one at that.
Ian, just note that the USPS is indeed a for-profit business and operates entirely independently of gov’t handouts, but at the same time is blocked by congress in being able to act like an actual for-profit business. they need to dramatically downsize and utilize partnerships with large chain stores to maintain effective penetration in rural areas. if you want better service from the USPS then you should fully support their efforts in retiring inefficient branches and laying off employees so they can finally re-focus cost on better customer service and more modernized branches. don’t think i’ve seen a single dollar invested in a postal branch in my entire lifetime except for those little machines that still can’t post everything you need.
Post Office boxes all around have been super full lately. I know it was the holidays, but if it is in the parking lot of a USPS office, can’t one expect it to be able to handle a stamped envelope? I had same issues as others above. I don’t mind seeing this one go (and yes, USPS is a business and so I am ok with one we citizens pay for no longer having that subsidized-small town appeal) but Timmons is heavily trafficked. I’ve had to go to that one for everything from holiday letters to shipping eBay to my passports over the years.
We have 3 po boxes at this location and other than the notice of sale on the door, we’ve been told nothing about it. I have paid for all three through the year as well.
@Laura. And that’s surprises you how? ;)