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IronTiger

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Everything posted by IronTiger

  1. IronTiger
    The HCAD listings for buildings I assume are still extant buildings, because that's what I've gotten the impression of when browsing around HCAD. For example, looking at the current 1407 South Voss Road listing only mentions 2014 buildings, you would have to look at the listing a few years ago for the original 1973 structure that was the home of Randalls Flagship. However, a far better piece of evidence against 1978 construction was that it's an old Amtrak car, but if it was added in the late 1970s, that car would still be in commission. In 1982, however, another aerial (from historicaerials.com) has no restaurant, and in 1989, the restaurant is there that clearly is the outline of Goode Seafood Company. However, if we take 1986 to be the opening of the restaurant, that rules out the "spur delivery" because the townhomes were built in 1985. That said, it would still be a clear distance of less than 300 feet from the mainline because that would've been likely a blank lot in 1986 (it was in 1989), and of course, by that time, the rail was being increasingly shortened (the railroad would've cut off at about Wakeforest if my HAIFistory is correct) and serving less and less businesses along the line.
  2. IronTiger
    I would've looked it up on the Chron archives but my library card expired. Anyway, it looks like the spur was used. The railroad spur has been townhomes since 1985 (possibly address with 2628 North, but that just appears to be one "block" of them), but in 1978, the spur was still active, and it looks like Goode Seafood is being built (as per Google Earth), and indeed, HCAD says it was built in 1978!
  3. IronTiger
    Question on the Kirby location: it's named Goode Co. Taqueria today (since 2011 at least), but a lot of references have it as "Goode Co. Hamburgers & Taqueria". Did it change names at some point twice to transition to the current name it is now?
  4. IronTiger
    I thought they implicated a shady smoke shop that was the source of a lot of it?
  5. IronTiger
    5625 Richmond and 9120 S. Main are now Popeyes restaurants. 401 Richmond is now a Shipley Do-Nuts (I believe this been discussed). 5919 S. Braeswood is now a lube center, though it looks like the lot was reconfigured, originally it was a Del Taco with a large parking lot with a gas station on the corner, and at some point in the past, both lots were demolished for a much smaller 5919 (where the lube center is) and a larger lot at the corner for a McDonald's (at 5911). The McDonald's itself was torn down and rebuilt a few years ago.
  6. IronTiger
    I know in Los Angeles, a similar concept called Ice Cream Lab did the same thing, and there are numerous other clones. Liquid nitrogen is fun, you can shrink balloons (by turning the air inside to liquid), shatter rubber balls, and do all sorts of other fun stuff. Too bad it's hard to acquire, though.
  7. IronTiger
    Not in Houston, but one of the buildings in the College Station Northgate area (actually a converted apartment building originally built in 1930) was a Two Pesos for a while, but it never converted to a Taco Cabana. I always thought the "cotton candy colors" were extremely gaudy-looking.
  8. IronTiger
    MarinersGuide, which has helped in ID'ing old restaurants from the 1990s, has stated that it was a Grandy's restaurant. Do a Google image search for Grandy's, building shape checks out.
  9. IronTiger
    I'm pretty sure there will be more than one. The set-up will probably ultimately share guest privileges at both hotels, like possibly sharing a restaurant/bar area, which aren't found in Holiday Inn Express units. Actually, I don't know how they'll end up doing it.
  10. IronTiger
    Well, they have a solid structure up and there's nothing inherently wrong with it, but finishing it in six months seems like a stretch unless they have a near-unlimited supply of labor that can work round the clock.
  11. IronTiger
    Internet records show that 9600 Old Katy Road was "West Houston Auto Sales", and indeed, by 1995, the lot is filled with cars.
  12. IronTiger
    Running rail between highways is a sexy idea in theory but the stations make it difficult, because frontage roads or not, you have to put the station between the tracks, and to do that you have to have access, either tunneling under the freeway or building a bridge over it, and usually that requires a tower for stairs and elevators. The third option is to build a connection from the road overpass in which case frontage roads don't matter and actually would help as frontage roads intersect with highways in stoplights with manageable frontage roads instead of ramps that directly turn onto other roads with yield or merging lanes. Specifically, I'm thinking of part of the LA light rail (in Pasadena, CA) that has that sort of thing. As for converting lanes, that's problematic because the public transportation and freeways are funded differently (METRO would have to buy ROW, basically), and METRO had already made a somewhat expensive mistake by insisting that the HOT lanes in the Katy Freeway be made "rail ready" (basically paying money to over-engineer the roads, which is another "conversion" problem) even though there was never a guarantee or promise about the Katy Tollway being reduced to use for rail.
  13. IronTiger
    It definitely looks like a Walmart, and that's what I'll tell Swamplot.
  14. IronTiger
    Chi-Chi's was based out of Louisville (and before that, Minneapolis). However, the company that operated the Houston franchises was based out of Houston. Seemed it disappeared in the late 1980s: http://newsok.com/article/2211531
  15. IronTiger
    Yeah, but local businesses don't scrutinize location the same way national chains do (that goes for everything). Best case scenario is an ALDI or a specialty gourmet grocer the developer has coaxed in, and even those are doubtful (remember, no confirmation that there WILL be grocery).
  16. IronTiger
    Vargo's has been discussed here (including someone here who paddled in from behind to find a wonderful landscape, then shooed off the property), it closed in 2012 and was demolished for an apartment complex named after the restaurant.
  17. IronTiger
    Like I said, if Trader Joe's ends up locating in downtown Houston it would require some serious string-pulling on the part of the developer, because it requires education levels AND high population counts, which I doubt downtown has. If you don't count the population currently incarcerated (believe it or not this will skew demographic counts), then the population count won't work at all given the relatively slim amount of people living there (downtown gets pretty dead on weekends), and if you DO, then the education level (which Trader Joe's looks at) will plummet. If the square feet is small, and it is a grocery store, then maybe I can see Aldi locating there, though.
  18. IronTiger
    You won't find grocers that small, ever, unless they're a specialty grocer or a rinky dink operator in smaller towns (Arlan's Market has a 15,000 square feet grocery store in Navasota...I think they have a meat area but that's about it as far as specialized department go), and I still think it's a hard sell for a Trader Joe's unless major strings were being pulled. H-E-B did open a 12,000 square feet store in downtown San Antonio, but that was the first downtown grocery store in S.A. and I'm not sure they're ready to attempt to replicate the store in the near future. 365 by Whole Foods average 30,000 square feet, and everything else just goes up. "Real" supermarkets tend to go for 40k-60k square feet, even in urban areas. The Randalls in Midtown is a little over 60,000 square feet.
  19. IronTiger
    Like I said, the "restoration" at the JW Marriott wasn't a "restoration", it was a re-creation. The original facade of that building was so messed up that they had to strip it down to the frame and rebuild it to a facade similar to the original. I suppose that the Marriott could've done a full restoration without just stripping everything and starting over, but it would've been uneconomically expensive.
  20. IronTiger
    I think that exterior architecture is something less considered, especially if people know it's an older building. If it looks like a flophouse from the outside, then yes, I think it would drive people away. The hotel at 59 and Kirby (Crowne Plaza River Oaks) isn't exactly a looker, but still commands high prices for a night.
  21. IronTiger
    I would have said no before, since from what I've heard they were primarily a northern chain. Is it possible the Humble location wasn't part of the chain but rather a similarly named one-off?
  22. IronTiger
    Eh, I don't know how the current facade was done, but remember, the renovation at 806 Main was not restored, but rather a completely new facade patterned after the original facade. At 806 Main, the building was gutted to the riveted frame.
  23. IronTiger
    Something else occurred to me...it looks like the proposed re-route will add about a full mile to Interstate 45's length. Now, disregarding all the other problems about this (I'm sure the "phantom congestion" problem will become worse with all the twists and turns in the new plan), but wouldn't adding an extra mile throw off the mileage on mile markers and exit numbers?
  24. IronTiger
    Yeah, it looks like they lasted until 1997. The Chron mentions that L&C went bankrupt in 1995 so Grocers Supply Co. took it over, and in 1996, the Randalls at Town & Country Village opened, causing the older Lewis & Coker to lose money hand over fist (about $3500 every week) until it was sold to Rice Epicurean in May 1997, which quickly reopened it as its own name. With the closure of The Fresh Market, it ends a legacy of the 50+ year grocery legacy at that location.
  25. IronTiger
    What was the address of the facility? It looks like in 1944, the one building on the property that appears to have later been integrated into the complex has an address off of Silber Road, not Old Katy Road. Also, does anyone have any photos of the place?
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