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SpaceGhost, You are correct in the approximate route. However, the rail was never built, the company was in the process of aquiring the land when the project was cancelled. If you look at the Harris County property maps of the Barker Reservoir you can see the alignment north of the old Westheimer road right-of-way. A friend of mine is the president of the Richmond Railroad Museum, We have discussed this at length and was able to confirm it with the museum historian.

When you sell your house you are required to disclose if anyone died in the residence. You are also required to disclose if a ghost resides in the house. I doubt if most people admit to a death in the house. I'm pretty sure I would admit to the ghost part.

I remember when Sakowitz closed the downtown store and consolidated to the Galleria location. I was a kid and worked to help move the phone system. We got to rumage through what was left downtown. My parents still have a set of silver flatware used in the restaurant. One of my chores was to crawl through the 30 foot ceiling and drop telephone lines to the cashier stations below.

I make brag books for my soccer team each Fall and Spring. Anywhere from 150 to 200 5x7 photos in a season. I use Costco. It is a mat finish and you can choose whether or not to have them auto-correct. I usually tell them not too. I do my own preprocessing. My last batch was 15 cents a photo.

I made some phone calls. You are right Eldridge Parkway was built on top of the old Addicks-Fairbanks Road. The area to the east was a temporary re-alignment used during construction. As a side note...historicaerials.com has some nice aerials of Addicks-Fairbanks Road back to 1957.

Actually the old alignment of Addicks-Fairbanks Road is only a few yards to the east of Eldridge Parkway. Check out my page on the subject http://www.texasfreeway.com/Houston/historic/abandoned/Addicks-Fairbanks/images/Houston-Addicks-Fairbanks-Abandoned.html Ron

Arne's has been open for a while. I went there in December.

TX-6 from I-10 to US-290 was FM-1960. For the most part FM-359 from US-90A to Hempstead was TX-6. (Info verified by TxDOT highway designation database)

Thanks!!! That was a big help. The abandoned railroad right-of-way show on the HCAD maps running next to the old Westheimer alignment (Beeler) is actually from the old Texas-Western RR. http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/topo/texas/txu-pclmaps-topo-tx-clodine-1915.jpg

Here's one for discussion... I am looking for a map of the Barkers Reservoir before the Corps took over the land. HCAD shows a network of "closed" streets as well as an abandoned railroad ROW. SOme of the old street ROW's are still visable via Google maps and others.

I found a photo in the Life photos in Google images which appears to show the turn of the spur to Rice. U. http://images.google.com/hosted/life/f?q=HOUSTON+source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3DHOUSTON%2Bsource:life%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Dactive&imgurl=7636d355e3c3a176

I came across a couple of photos title "Hermann Park Reservior" while on a photo hunt. Has anyone heard of it and have any more info? Here is a link to the page. http://www.houstonarchitecture.com/Building/2779/Hermann_Park_Reservoir.php

In my teenage years I worked contract for a small telephone company. I helped move the phone system from the downtown store to the Post Oak location. As we gathered the phones from the downtown store we rumaged through some of the stuff left over. My parents have some of the silver spoons from the restaurant. One day it became one of my duties to crawl through the ceiling of the Post oak store to drop new phone lines to the counters below, because the knothead cabinet contractor covered up our conduits in the floor. That was scary crawling over and under pipes and A/C ducts 25 feet above the floor below across a stucco ceiling.

I thought I had a photo of a section of rail from the electric railway. It was taken in the area of the brick in the last photo of the essay, but I couldn't find it.

I posted the page on the abandoned Preston underpass. It can be found at http://www.texasfreeway.com/Houston/histor...-Underpass.html Enjoy.

I am building the page now, but I can add other photos later. I will have the page ready to post sometime over the weekend with what I already have. Do you Preston, Navigation or both? Thanks for the help.

I need a little help. I need some good photos of the Navigation Blvd underpass east of downtown. I am putting together a page about the abandoned Preston Street underpass which utilized the same construction. If anyone has photos of the Preston underpass when it was in use that would be great and appreciated. The higher resolution the better. I can provide a place to upload the photos. Credit will be given. Thanks in advance. Here are some photos of the old Preston underpass. http://www.texasfreeway.com/Houston/historic/abandoned/Preston-StCharles/images/Houston-Preston_StCharles-Abandoned-Underpass_LE-B_LR.jpg http://www.texasfreeway.com/Houston/historic/abandoned/Preston-StCharles/images/Houston-Preston_StCharles-Abandoned-Underpass_LSW_LR.jpg http://www.texasfreeway.com/Houston/historic/abandoned/Preston-StCharles/images/Preston_StCharles-Abandoned-Underpass_Air.jpg

German Church in Addicks I read in the Chronicle a while back that this church will be torn down by developers. What a shame.

I made a road trip tracking down the original route of TX35 through east Texas. During my research in preparation for the trip I discovered documentation were indicated the bridge was actually built for TX35 not US59. It took the US59 designation when much of the original TX35 route was resigned for US59. I have some great photos of many sections and bridges from old TX35 north of Houston. I will start working on the pages for TexasFreeway.com when I get back to the states.

This may sound like a very basic question, but do we know if the subdivision was ever developed? It may be on street and HCAD maps. We have seen original plat maps (nice work!). But were any streets laid down? Where any houses built? The circles and ovals were probably a concept for a park that was never realized. Let's look at what we do know. The subdivision was laid out and filed. It was added to street and HCAD maps. Some time not to long after a rail line was laid through the subdivision effectively cutting it in half. Now, how many times have you seen a rail line cut through a neighborhood was has already been developed? I have seen plenty which have grown around rail lines, but not cut afterwards without an existing right-of-way. The northern half of the property was purchased and never developed, but still has its platting in HCAD. The southern half was purchased and replatted and developed. The "new" subdivision exhibits the same curves as the southern portion of the "park" because perhaps an "entrance" to the subdivision was built to entice buyers. Building a "grand entrance" before a subdivision is developed is a very common practice. Guessing if the circles were fountains, walking paths, or otherwise is futile effort if you don't even know if the area was developed. If you feel you can't go through life unless you have answers, try to track down a descendant of one of the people listed on the documents. Heck, some of the people may still be alive. Please pardon any spelling mistakes. I have been working 12 hour days, non-stop for the past four weeks in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad. I am @#$% exhausted, but get to come home on Saturday.

Here are some photos of the old home place taken back in January of 2004. http://www.texasfreeway.com/stock/MeyerHomePlace/

We have plenty of other places to build on. How about tear down Meyerpark and put up a complex.

We don't all share that opinion. I enjoyed walking around the old property. I would to see it become a natural park.

You are close. It is across Braes Bayou from the old Fluor building (now Aramco/condos). It's bordered by Braes Bayou on the north, IH-610 on the west and south, and Willow Bayou on the east. The garage was still standing until the early '80's. If you want to visit the original two gates face the west bound frontage road of IH-610.

I have explorer and photographed the property. The foundation of the house and garage are still there. the house was roughly the same shape as the old Astrohall. The was(is) a fish pond out side the front door (south side of the old house). The old pond mainly grows weeds, but is still full of water. The driveway still circles around through the property. The shower of the main bath had the old baby poop yellow tile on the foundation. I plan to add a small section on TF on the property, because of its relation to IH-610. I will pull some of the photos from storage disk and post them.