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Episcopal High School At 4650 Bissonnet St.


plumber2

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I was driving on the West Loop last week and noticed construction at the Episcopal High School campus. I was going too fast to actually look closely, however after checking their website, it appears a new building is being erected on the northwest corner of the property. Does anyone know what the fate of the original 1955 Marian High School building is? Looks like the 1930's convent and chapel are safe......for now.

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You have to remember the history of the property. Marion and the Catholic Convent was originally sold to a developer in the 70's that wanted to tear everything down and build a second Galleria type shopping center. Despite the fact that the development would have brought in a whole lot of needed tax money the good citizens of Bellaire were worried about the traffic congestion and what-not and blocked his repeated attempts to develop the block. Finally as a way to get back at the city he sold the property to Episcopal (at a great loss from what I heard) so the city would end up with a large trac of land they had to provide services for but not be able to tax. Episcopal just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

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Yes, and the Incarnate Word Academy students downtown were the inadvertent benificiaries of this sale. The sisters were able to fund the much needed improvements to the downtown campus with the proceeds from the Bellaire campus sale.

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It's ironic because ultimately Bellaire realized that it needed to increase its tax base rather than stay stagnant... but by then it was too late to reverse that sale...

You have to remember the history of the property. Marion and the Catholic Convent was originally sold to a developer in the 70's that wanted to tear everything down and build a second Galleria type shopping center. Despite the fact that the development would have brought in a whole lot of needed tax money the good citizens of Bellaire were worried about the traffic congestion and what-not and blocked his repeated attempts to develop the block. Finally as a way to get back at the city he sold the property to Episcopal (at a great loss from what I heard) so the city would end up with a large trac of land they had to provide services for but not be able to tax. Episcopal just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

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It's ironic because ultimately Bellaire realized that it needed to increase its tax base rather than stay stagnant... but by then it was too late to reverse that sale...

Very true. Of course Bellaire was a different town back then. Still mostly blue collar and despite being surrounded by Houston it still had a small town feel. They were afraid to progress then. It's a whole different make-up today although still stagnant in growth.

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Very true. Of course Bellaire was a different town back then. Still mostly blue collar and despite being surrounded by Houston it still had a small town feel. They were afraid to progress then. It's a whole different make-up today although still stagnant in growth.

Bellaire sure was different. In terms of real population numbers it has been stagnant. In terms of economic growth and wealth of the residents, it went way up.

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  • 6 years later...

Watched the latest addition, the Hildebrand Athletic Center by Ziegler Cooper go up.

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Now Studio RED did an addition for them? Very generous donors for this school!

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I believe the original posting, dated so long ago, was regarding the Jack T. Trotter Academic & Science building.

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  • The title was changed to Episcopal High School Renovations
  • The title was changed to Episcopal High School At 4650 Bissonnet St.
  • 9 months later...
  • 7 months later...

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