Greenway Plaza Mall

[IronTiger]

Yes, I know this still exists, technically, but from what I could tell it's little more than a collection of subterranean food court options (if this is inaccurate, please tell me). Anyway, there was this book called Houston Today, which you may have heard of since I posted scans of it (and later publicized a link of the whole scan), and it discusses developments of Houston in the early 1970s (not exactly "Today", but the whole thing is rife in such detail and optimism it's still fun to look at). One such development was Greenway Plaza, where it showed how the plans would look and all that. There were a number of facets of that development that apparently didn't get off the ground (high rise apartment buildings were discussed, I don't think they exist there).

 

But there was also plans for a rather extensive shopping concourse, with 70 to start to stretch up to "several hundred" as the Plaza developed. Anyone know how far along they got with this, and if it was ever as good as they said it would be? (Obviously, it wasn't supposed to be THAT big, as The Galleria had opened by this point and was about to expand with Galleria II)

 

[mollusk]

Even back in the day it was little more than a food court with a movie theater attached, and I think a card shop or something similar.  Notice it says "space for" ~70 retail establishments, not that they actually were there.

 

When they built the Summit Towers and the other things west of Edloe they went with conventional garages instead of the partially underground/bermed pedestal parking model used in the original section.

[9075]

I was told that Kenneth Schnitzer originally wanted to buy out the homeowners in Afton Oaks and extend Greenway Plaza all the way to the West Loop.

 

That did not happen, due to a variety of reasons, but it is interesting to think of how different that area of town might be, had his plans come to fruition.  I imagine in this scenario, most of the high rise development would be on the East side of 610, rather than the West side.  I wonder if that would have had any effect on the chronic vehicular access and traffic problems around the Galleria?

[Highrise Tower]

Someone at the bank today told me there was another underground story below the Greenway 3 Theatres.  There used to be a department store/retail store and there were conveyor belts to move the retail product around.

Is that true? I've never heard of this.