17 replies to this topic

[RWB]

Hi. I am a blogger who has undertaken a project to ride along every single street in Houston and vicinity, with camera in hand. My MO is to xerox a section of the Key Map, carefully ride along every accessible street and hike/bike path, taking note of anything that interests me, then write up the trip in a little photo-illustrated narrative, which I put up on my blog, http://robertwboyd.blogspot.com/ .

I've recently been posting about my rides down in the Houston Mod forum, because I tend to take a lot of photos of modern and post-modern structures. But that is not my only interest. What I am really trying to do is uincover interesting and/or beautiful sites and sights that are off the beaten path in Houston. I suspect everyone here recognizes that any city contains many fascinating, fairly unknown nooks and crannies. I want to discover them all in Houston! It's not really a project I expect to finish, but it's a nice hobby.

Anyway, since I do take a lot of photos as I ride, I felt that some of the readers of this forum might enjoy these blog posts. Below are a few of the photos I've taken on these rides. Hope you enjoy them.


A house built in 1939 in Spring Valley.


A pueblo revival house in Hilshire Village.


A lawn sculpture in Piney Point Village.


A faux bunkhouse in Piney Point.

[Jax]

Cool project! I look forward to seeing more photos!

[flipper]

Great stuff as usual.

I was waiting for the pic of the cedarspur house. I knew you'd like that one. You also rode past my current project today. I'm one of those lucky one's on a street coming off of Voss.

keep it up,

flipper

[Subdude]

That's quite an ambitious project! Good luck. Good photos too!

[RWB]

Quote

You also rode past my current project today. I'm one of those lucky one's on a street coming off of Voss.

Your current project? Are you a builder? I saw a lot of new houses (and some remodellings) in the works in that neighborhood.

[flipper]

RWB, on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 @ 8:36am, said:

Your current project? Are you a builder? I saw a lot of new houses (and some remodellings) in the works in that neighborhood.

I have a remodel going on Burkhart.

flipper

[RWB]

Subdude, on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 @ 3:35am, said:

That's quite an ambitious project! Good luck. Good photos too!

Thanks. I don't want anyone sitting around thinking I'm going to finish this thing any time soon (or ever, really). It's such a big project that it is effectively endless. As such, it becomes just an ongoing hobby for me--a way to keep me on the streets, so to speak.

[skyphen]

Echoing the others.... very neat project!

[ricco67]

excellent pictures, I particularly am fond of the lawn art.

Do you eventually plan on making the photos searchable?

[RWB]

ricco67, on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 @ 2:01pm, said:

excellent pictures, I particularly am fond of the lawn art.

Do you eventually plan on making the photos searchable?

I wouldn't know where to start, to be honest. I don't think of myself as a photographer in any artistic sense of the word. They are all in my blog in blog entries that represent different rides through different parts of town, and those blog entires are labeled by the part of town they describe, so that should help if someone is looking for photos of Hunter's Creek or Charnwood or whereever. (www.robertwboyd.blogspot.com)

[The Great Hizzy!]

For whatever reason, I really like the Piney Point "bunkhouse". The cactus sitting in front is unique as well. I wonder how they keep it alive with all the moisture here.

[RWB]

The Great Hizzy!, on Monday, January 28th, 2008 @ 11:32am, said:

For whatever reason, I really like the Piney Point "bunkhouse". The cactus sitting in front is unique as well. I wonder how they keep it alive with all the moisture here.

Heh heh. They keep it alive by virtue of its all-metal composition. It's not a real cactus, but a metal sculpture of one.

[skyphen]

RWB, on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 @ 4:15pm, said:

I wouldn't know where to start, to be honest. I don't think of myself as a photographer in any artistic sense of the word. They are all in my blog in blog entries that represent different rides through different parts of town, and those blog entires are labeled by the part of town they describe, so that should help if someone is looking for photos of Hunter's Creek or Charnwood or whereever. (www.robertwboyd.blogspot.com)

Yeah, I was wondering this, too. I had a hard time finding them in your blog without going back through your archives. Can't you make a tag for "photos" or "bike tour" or something like that?

[RWB]

skyphen, on Monday, January 28th, 2008 @ 1:45pm, said:

Yeah, I was wondering this, too. I had a hard time finding them in your blog without going back through your archives. Can't you make a tag for "photos" or "bike tour" or something like that?

I do have the blog posts labeled "Houston Streets", so you can see them all at http://robertwboyd.blogspot.com/search/lab...uston%20Streets

I do have non-travelogue entries under that heading, but mostly the Houston Streets posts deal with my rides throgh various neighborhoods.

I hope this helps!

[skyphen]

RWB, on Monday, January 28th, 2008 @ 7:22pm, said:

I do have the blog posts labeled "Houston Streets", so you can see them all at http://robertwboyd.blogspot.com/search/lab...uston%20Streets

I do have non-travelogue entries under that heading, but mostly the Houston Streets posts deal with my rides throgh various neighborhoods.

I hope this helps!

Oh, okay, thanks!

[RWB]

skyphen, on Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 @ 12:27am, said:

Oh, okay, thanks!

You've given me something to think about, so I've decided to add more labels. I'm emulating the guys over at Swamplot.com (Houston's deeply amusing real estate blog--my favorite Houston-area blog) and adding zip-code tags to my blog entries. So as the number of rides increases, this will hopefully help curious readers locate areas that particularly interest them.

best, Robert
http://robertwboyd.blogspot.com/

[Talbot]

Sounds like a cool project. The bunkhouse is really interesting to me.

[RWB]

Talbot, on Saturday, February 16th, 2008 @ 9:01pm, said:

Sounds like a cool project. The bunkhouse is really interesting to me.

Thanks. I would invite folks who are interested in these houses to go see them for themselves--I'm not the greatest photographer (you may have noticed!) and would love to see other people's photos of some of the same sites.

That "bunkhouse" is especially eccentric. Huge, like all houses on that street, but deliberately immitating a kind of working-man's housing, which is most definitely not like any other houses in the area. An analogy would be to build a McMansion-sized row house!