The Growth Of Houston

[IronTiger]

I've recently wondered how Houston has grown over the years and expanded. I think it's fascinating how Houston has grown from the inside outward, like a rapidly multiplying organism. To my knowledge, the way Houston has developed has gone like this:

Downtown was built in the mid-1800s or before.

Surrounding Downtown were the Wards, developed in the 1860s.

Surrounding the Wards were the streetcar suburbs, which includes Montrose and the Heights, in the early 20th century.

Then came the first automobile suburbs, like Sharpstown (in the 1950s). This and the previous three were incorporated into the Inner Loop.

The edge cities came next, and are also part of Houston. This was 1960s and 1970s, post-Interstate. Highly automobile oriented, these included things like Greenspoint and Uptown. That was when the second loop started to get developed.

The border cities came into play in the late 1980s to the present, cities that were and are independent of Houston city limits, including Cypress, Katy, Sugar Land, and more. These were highly developed with new master planned communities, and are definitely outer loop. The Grand Parkway will supposedly go through all of these, assuming it gets completed.

I don't know how other cities developed, but that seems to be the way Houston has. What do you think? Did I get anything completely wrong?

[Earlydays]

I've recently wondered how Houston has grown over the years and expanded. I think it's fascinating how Houston has grown from the inside outward, like a rapidly multiplying organism. To my knowledge, the way Houston has developed has gone like this:

Downtown was built in the mid-1800s or before.

Surrounding Downtown were the Wards, developed in the 1860s.

Surrounding the Wards were the streetcar suburbs, which includes Montrose and the Heights, in the early 20th century.

Then came the first automobile suburbs, like Sharpstown (in the 1950s). This and the previous three were incorporated into the Inner Loop.

The edge cities came next, and are also part of Houston. This was 1960s and 1970s, post-Interstate. Highly automobile oriented, these included things like Greenspoint and Uptown. That was when the second loop started to get developed.

The border cities came into play in the late 1980s to the present, cities that were and are independent of Houston city limits, including Cypress, Katy, Sugar Land, and more. These were highly developed with new master planned communities, and are definitely outer loop. The Grand Parkway will supposedly go through all of these, assuming it gets completed.

I don't know how other cities developed, but that seems to be the way Houston has. What do you think? Did I get anything completely wrong?

....Houston also annexed land to surround existing towns so they could not expand.

[TheNiche]

....Houston also annexed land to surround existing towns so they could not expand.

Real estate is not municipal government. Municipal government is not real estate.

[LTAWACS]

Real estate is not municipal government. Municipal government is not real estate.

The city didn't by the houses... Just the land, right?

[LTAWACS]

or rather... Annexed. I meant to say annexed.

[nm5k]

You could probably call Bellaire a street car suburb too.. They had that electric

line from Main to Bellaire back in the day. To me, downtown has been built twice.

You had the original downtown which contained lots of Victorian style homes, which most

all were eventually torn down to build the second mostly skyscraper/business downtown.

Of course, I wasn't old enough to see the original downtown. Only in pictures. But

there were a lot of homes in the downtown area around the turn of the 18th to 19th

centuries. Main street downtown looked a whole lot different then, than it does now

for example.

[TheNiche]

The city didn't by the houses... Just the land, right?

...

or rather... Annexed. I meant to say annexed.

The OP was primarily concerned with the physical development of a metropolitan region. This was evidenced by his citing development patterns withing both incorporated areas such as Houston and Sugar Land, but also unincorporated areas such as Cypress. This was also evidenced by what he did not discuss, for instance the political process of annexation (which has had practically no influence on development patterns of the sort that the OP had described).

[LTAWACS]

The OP was primarily concerned with the physical development of a metropolitan region. This was evidenced by his citing development patterns withing both incorporated areas such as Houston and Sugar Land, but also unincorporated areas such as Cypress. This was also evidenced by what he did not discuss, for instance the political process of annexation (which has had practically no influence on development patterns of the sort that the OP had described).

Ah...

[nm5k]

>Only in pictures. But there were a lot of homes in the downtown area around the turn of the 18th to 19th

>centuries.

Er.. I should have said 19th to 20th century.. :/

Not many homes on Main Street in 1800..

[dbigtex56]

....Houston also annexed land to surround existing towns so they could not expand.

Real estate is not municipal government. Municipal government is not real estate.

I had never considered the possibility that Bellaire, West U, Bunker Hill, etc. had purposely been hemmed in by the COH.

While I understand that real estate and municipal government are not the same, municipal government seems to prefer annexation of property which will add to the tax base. Obviously, if one's taxes increase without a corresponding increase in services, it's a bad deal. On the other hand, establishing a Municipal Utility District (MUD), police and fire departments and EMS might incur problems for developers.

In other words, I'm still unclear on the annexation process - how it comes about, who benefits and who doesn't.

[TheNiche]

In other words, I'm still unclear on the annexation process - how it comes about, who benefits and who doesn't.

In a post-oil-bust world, the City mostly just annexes commercial properties on a one-off basis that would add to its tax base without requiring them to provide services. The City of Houston does not want to be responsible for paying down MUD debt, does not want to cope with more demands for its services, and does not want to have to deal with the influence of a larger and relatively conservative suburban voter base; simultaneously, voters within various suburban MUDs remain paranoid about losing control of their minor feifdoms. The paranoia runs so deep that The Woodlands would agree to pay tribute to the City to avoid an annexation that was highly unlikely in the first place. People within the City of Houston win financially and politicians from the status quo retain their status quo.

But in just the last five years or thereabouts, the State has empowered special districts commonly referred to as Management Districts to take on pretty much all of the powers that a municipality would normally have (but with a much more streamlined and less democratic leadership with far less public accountability). These taxing entities can have boundaries that overlap with existing municipalities or MUDs. By way of Management Districts, there really is no need or incentive to incorporate any more municipalities anywhere in the entire State of Texas.

The answer to your question is this: The true winner is the legal profession. As per usual.