Northwest Freeway Shoney's Inn

Picture from Google, appears to be the official picture when it was Comfort Inn
Much like the Shell off FM 1488 we covered at Numbered Exits the other day, this entry is also part of the Northwest Freeway entries but taken off the main page, with this one being removed from the page as of "Version 8.1" (and originally added in "Version 5.0").

Built as a Shoney's Inn (adjacent to the Shoney's off Northwest Freeway, though by that time, the chains had officially separated) in 1995, this became a Days Inn around 2003 and was converted to a Comfort Inn between 2005 and 2007. Around 2023 it became a co-branded Comfort Inn/MainStay Suites before becoming Sonesta Essential (Sonesta Essential NW Houston around 2024, which repainted it white with blue trim. The two-story motel has 115 rooms.

The Redevelopment of Pinebrook Apartments

Ad for Pinebrook Apartments shortly after opening. From Houston Chronicle, 1973.
Welcome back to The Houston Files! For the last few years I've been adding Houston-related entries to Numbered Exits but there were so many Houston-related entries (especially as they've gotten taken off Carbon-izer) that I decided to revive this site again.

While I've discussed on my Northwest Freeway page in the past, 5201 West 34th Street currently houses a Jimmy John's and Origin Bank these days, but it wasn't always like that. It was originally a much larger lot with Northwest Freeway frontage and housed Pinebrook Apartments (stylized as "PineBrook", at least in the early days of the apartment complex) was a 232-unit apartment complex built in 1971 (and started advertising in 1972) as one of the many apartment complexes with clubhouses, swimming pools, and shag carpeting in the early 1970s, though PineBrook was always open to families (and pets).

The apartment complex suffered issues leading up to its official closure in November 1990 (transients moving into vacant apartments and starting fires), with (apparently) another fire happening after it was closed before the city tore it down in early 1992. By early 1995 it had been redeveloped into new sites, a new building housing a stand-alone Payless ShoeSource (using the old address, 5201 West 34th Street) and the Pine Hollow Shopping Center at 5215 West 34th Street, which was also near Northwest Freeway.

From what I can find, there was Jason's Deli in suite A (1995 to eviction in the early 2010s), Pro-Cuts in suite B (might've changed its name before closing/eviction), and Blockbuster in suite D (1995-2008). (If there was anything in Suite C I couldn't find it). I did get a bit of the Street View here.

In 1996, Boston Market was built at 5195 West 34th Street, and in 2005¹, another building was built next to it (5185 West 34th Street) with Lenny's Sub Shop, a vacancy, First Cash Advance, and RadioShack (which moved from across the street). 5175 West 34th Street was developed as a Wells Fargo in 2008.

Of course, all of these have changed over the years. Pine Hollow was demolished with the widening of the freeway, with Jason's Deli (which was closest to West 34th) going last². Payless ShoeSource closed in 2006 and was replaced with Purpose Money (later Check into Cash, by 2011) but only in half of the building. By late 2014, Jimmy John's opened in the other half but the west half was empty, and finally filled in 2016 with Verizon, though that only operated for around four years. By summer 2024 it was replaced with Origin Bank.

Boston Market closed around 2000 and was replaced by Sonic Drive-In (featuring an eat-in area) in 2001 which closed around 2026 (though the sign had been smashed out for a few years at that point).

The strip center next door had tenants come and go, with Lenny's Sub Shop getting replaced by a Little Caesars and the RadioShack becoming a Sprint RadioShack, then converting to a regular Sprint store before closing entirely. Tenants as of January 2026, from east to west (left to right) include Little Caesars (100), Fred Loya Insurance, Total by Verizon (200), Studio 34 Barbershop, and Wingstop.

Wells Fargo closed between 2024 and January 2026.

Additionally, here's an adver-article from 12/31/1972 from the Houston Chronicle that talks more about the apartments.

1. It appears the tenants moved in proper around 2006.
2. Presumably waiting until their new location on Northwest Freeway could be completed.

H-E-B Pantry Foods #309

Not an H-E-B Pantry anymore, unfortunately.
In July 1992, the ribbon-cutting for H-E-B Pantry Foods #309 at 5815 Antoine Drive was held and continued on until around 2003 when the store closed (it's possible, but unlikely, that it became branded as a regular H-E-B by this time).

A few years later, it was expanded and reopened as "Harris County Annex 38", a government building with a variety of services and offices inside. (HHR mentions it was "expanded prior to closing", but this is incorrect, it expanded AFTER closing). The above picture is from Google Maps Street View, a crummy-quality picture of the store when operating as an H-E-B can be seen here.

Originally seen on the Other Houston Roads - Outer Loop and H-E-B Stores of Houston, both on Carbon-izer.

Railhead

Postcard from the early days. (Source unknown).

The first reference to 6400 Richmond appears in 1974 as the Railhead, a steakhouse themed to the golden era of American railroads. From what I've heard it had two portions of the restaurants, one focusing on steakhouse dining (serving a menu of prime rib and seafood) and the other toward live shows, which got increasingly more nightclubby as time went on. A January 1983 show with Dan Berry of Jan & Dean invited women to come in a bikini (and get their first drink free). Later that year it closed and the building received a large expansion to become Fizz, a popular nightclub, opening in spring 1986.

Fizz closed in October 1986 for a renovation, with a new theme and name, Hippo, opening in December. Hippo featured "a pseudo-artsy decor" where "abstract acrylics, animal murals and bad Picasso-esque paintings line the walls". By June 1988, however, the location had transitioned into a new concept, simply called "6400 Richmond" with alternative music (the new slogan - "Top 40 - We Ain't Playing It!"). This was done slowly, with some nights as Hippo and some as 6400 Richmond with black plastic covering the walls. You can see some of what was the nightclub in this video. It mentions a private club-within-a-nightclub (Wolfgang) with a quieter, more discreet atmosphere (this was likely the old Railhead portion) and you can see guests dance on the floor (note the very drunk man at five minutes) to Dead Or Alive's "My Heart Goes Bang" (Live in Japan).

"6400 Club" as it was known by late 1988, was destroyed in a fire in January 1989 and appears to not have reopened. The most extensive damage was at the former Railhead building, which was essentially rebuilt as a covered patio. The rest of the building was repaired/rebuilt and reopened as Back Alley in August 1991. Just over a year later, the club was closed and reopened around December 1992 as Texas Live, a new country western club, but it closed after four months, citing an oversaturated C&W nightclub scene. In mid-1993 it reopened as Rockefeller's West, a spin-off of Rockefeller's in the Rice Military area and designed to be primarily a performance hall rather than a dance club. Operations changed hands and eventually the "original" Rockefeller's managed to get exclusivity rights to the name back and Rockefeller's West was changed to Bayou City Theater (aka Bayou City Theatre) in December 1993.

In July 1994, Peter's Wildlife opened, turning it back into a nightclub. In November, the club faced some bad publicity with "Slash 'N Dash", to feature "was to feature a straw poll on [O.J.] Simpson's guilt or innocence; free valet parking for customers driving white Ford Broncos; free Simpson masks and a gift certificate for a hunting knife as a grand prize". Not only was the grand prize a knife but the winner was to "win an O.J. Simpson 'Slash N' Dash' night on the town to include dinner at McDonald's, a black stocking cap, a gift certificate for a hunting knife, a pair of sunglasses and a limousine ride to the airport". After there was an outcry from local womens' shelters about this, the club announced that the party would instead be "An Evening of Extremely Poor Taste" and "did not mention prizes". At some point around this time, there was a club-within-a-club, Florida Keys. Peter's Wildlife closed in mid-1997 shortly after a lawsuit was filed by a woman claiming she "almost choked to death" in a hot dog eating contest Peter's Wildlife had hosted in 1995. T-Town 2000, a Latino-themed nightclub opened in September 1998, not long after 6400 Sports Cafe made a brief appearance in the building. T-Town 2000 was successful enough to last seven years (something that every club, dating back to Fizz, couldn't manage) before closing/changing to Planeta Bar-Rio around 2005 (probably because "2000" anything became quickly dated after the year 2000). Around 2010 it was reformatted once more to Stereo Live, a live performance venue, which has remained since.

The billboard-esque sign for the club dates back to the days of the Railhead.

This post is researched through Houston Chronicle and Houston Post archives and expanded from what originally appeared on Carbon-izer.com at this page.

Former Joe's Crab Shack on Northwest Freeway

Picture by author from September 2018, when it was BrickHouse Tavern + Tap.
The restaurant at 12910 Northwest Freeway first opened in 1997 as Joe's Crab Shack, which was a growing chain under parent company Landry's (you can see it in Google Street View as Joe's). After Landry's sold Joe's Crab Shack to investors in 2006, in 2008, the restaurant was closed with other underperforming locations to be converted to a new restaurant concept, BrickHouse Tavern + Tap, with this location being first to open in January 2009. By the picture above was taken, Joe's Crab Shack was back in the possession of Landry's having purchased JCS Holdings (renamed as Ignite Restaurant Group in 2009) in 2017 after Ignite's bankruptcy. Despite surviving the bankruptcy of Ignite and the re-acquisition by Landry's, this particular location was shuttered in March 2022. In early 2023, it reopened as a Cajun-California cuisine restaurant concept called "Cali Kitchen & Bar", though this has since closed around early 2026 (that's when their social media accounts stopped posting); I think I noticed it when their parking lot was empty and all the other restaurants nearby were full (except for the defunct Fuddruckers, of course).

UPDATE 06-26-2026: The most recent update rewrote a good part of the post and renamed it from "Brick House Tavern + Tap (290)". This is part of the changes to help integrate it with Northwest Freeway.

Former Albertsons #2766

In the years since this picture was taken, the logo has been updated with the Albertsons-era "Food" and "Pharmacy" signs removed.
One of the more popular posts¹ on Albertsons Florida Blog (a site I still follow regularly) is their look at Albertsons #4466, located in St. Port Lucie, Florida, which closed in 2012 despite a recently renewed lease and supposed profitability (it's possible that it did well right before the recession, where the PSL area was hit heavily with foreclosures). Well, PSL did have a twin store (more like a multiple birth), #2766, located at 9125 West Sam Houston Parkway North. Unlike #4466, which was mauled for a Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market, #2766 closed a decade prior but remained remarkably intact under Kroger.

Despite being updated with the same Kroger décor ("Bountiful") that had swept the chain by that time, Kroger #739 as it is numbered now², still held remarkably true to the 4466 layout. It had the same ceiling style and bore enough of a resemblance that I was able to look at the map with my phone and more or less follow it through. I could probably look at the pictures in AFB and visualize the "Grocery Palace" (Albertsons' official name for the package—this is sometimes called "Theme Park", a term Acme Style coined). The Starbucks was in the same place, the deli and meats were in the same place, and while the center store probably saw a rearrangement at some point, there were a few notable changes in the front. The old camera center had been converted to offices with the pet supply area converted to HBA, with the pharmacy next to it (it also added a walk-up pharmacy), and a bank space as well (this may have been part of the original layout), as well as a few other changes. The area around the florist was downsized (didn't see evidence of the former laundromat, though I wasn't looking too hard), as the customer service desk was moved either next to the restrooms or in front of the "Albertsons Reading Center" area. This store opened in 1999 (September 1999, if my notes are right), spending about two and a half years as an Albertsons before being sold to Kroger.

Very Albertsons-like in center store.
This part of town is very Kroger-concentrated due to them purchasing a number of Albertsons locations in town. Just two miles west on West Road is another Kroger (a Kroger Signature built around the turn of the millennium), and at that point, it's where you can find four Kroger stores within a three mile radius, two of which were former Albertsons (the other, of course, is 2790) and two of which were older stores on Northwest Freeway, one of which was a former Safeway/AppleTree. There was a period of about three years when all of these stores operated.

I didn't get a lot of pictures of the store, unfortunately, but the former Albertsons Express is still in business as Kroger's "Kwik Shop", which is run by their convenience store division (a full Kroger-run and Kroger-branded convenience store was opened in College Station in 2016, and that made industry headlines) before they sold off the division, at which point it was run by the supermarket chain thesmselves.

Not a good picture. This was later rebranded as a Kroger convenience store after the division was sold off, but the "Snacks" and "Beverages" signage still stands.
This was the current Street View when this post was originally posted in 2018, with the pictures here taken in summer 2016 by author. It also was an updated version of a 2016 post of Safeway and Albertsons in Texas Blog.

1. In 2016, anyway. I don't have access to recent metrics.
2. In the Houston/Southwest Division of Kroger, #7xx stores were acquired from Albertsons.

UPDATE 07-29-2026: Updated for integration to Carbon-izer with new name (formerly titled as "Kroger #739"). The original post is now almost a decade old.

290 / Beltway 8 Demolition - Taco Bell

15950 Northwest Freeway

This is the third of at least three posts on a small collection of fast food restaurants which the author has taken a personal interest in, to be further explored in a future post on the Northwest Freeway site (this link will be updated soon to reflect that). Along with McDonald's and Wendy's, a Taco Bell was also among the three fast food sites and others on the south side of Highway 290 to be leveled for road widening. According to HCAD, the Taco Bell was built in 1993 and had red, green, and yellow striping outside. Like the other restaurants it closed around fall 2012, and was demolished within months of when these pictures were taken in March 2013 by the author. (The above photo is one of the only ones I have of the building, and the photo below shows the back of the restaurant). Previously, these photos appeared on Carbon-izer and Brazos Buildings & Businesses.

Street View of Taco Bell still in operation

Mambo Seafood (Northwest Freeway)

13485 Northwest Freeway

This was built in 1993 as a Shoney's and still shows up as such in some 1995-era listings. However, Shoney's did not last long and a small addition was built to the north side of the building being recorded in 1997, likely after Shoney's closure. In 1998, it reopened as Yank Sing (possibly relocated to 2005 Mangum later). Little exists of this location on the Internet, but it was listed on this list of Chinese restaurants in America. This second incarnation appeared to have a rounded red sign from Google Earth. In 2004 ownership transferred to Mambo Seafood, which has a neat neon sign that failed to be captured in the photograph above (taken the week this was posted).

Northwest Freeway Center

All the pictures here are by author and from 2018.
This shopping center began construction in September 1993 as the Northwest Freeway Center (though it was never referred to as such), a $10.5 million 247,000 square foot shopping center developed by Smith & Co. with Tom Moughon of Resource Development Group. The land (18 acres) was acquired that same year from Vickers Trust. The main anchors, a 104,800 square foot Venture discount department store and a 51,252 square foot Service Merchandise store were to open in July 1994. By 1995, a second phase was built facing Northwest Freeway but with 43rd Street addresses, anchored by Toys R Us. All of the anchors have changed hands at least once, and the roadside signage was replaced when the highway widened (it was originally with reddish brick like the center).

This page serves as a companion to the Northwest Freeway - Inner Belt and West Crosstimbers Street / West 43rd Street / Clay Road pages on Carbon-izer, and both link here.

It wasn't really the fact that all the anchors went out of business in short order in the late 1990s and early 2000s, or even the widening of the freeway that did the most damage to Northwest Freeway Center, it was the opening of Brookhollow Marketplace at Dacoma Street.

If we start at West 43rd Street and work our way around, the first thing is a Papa John's Pizza at 6455 West 43rd Street. This dates back to 1995, meaning it has been here all this time, through thick and thin. 6453 West 43rd was "Hair by Tiffany" as of 2007 and became Hair Clips in the late 2010s before closing in 2023 or 2024. Xtra 1.45 Cleaners at 6151 West 43rd Street's facade simply reads "1.45 Cleaners" as it has since 2007.

6445 West 43rd Street at the corner is Clinica Hispana Omega Care and reuses part of 6439 West 43rd Street, which was a larger restaurant space. The restaurant space was "The Original Pasta Company" (part of a chain from approx. 1994 to 2003), then Forno's of Italy (2003 to approx. 2013, tax records indicate that it simply disconnected from the chain), then LA Crawfish from 2014 to 2024. It was already closed in June 2024 despite Google Gemini insisting that it's still open.

6433 West 43rd Street was originally Toys R Us (#7042) from 1994 to 2005, with Fallas Paredes taking up residence in 2007. This store closed in the 2018 bankruptcy of the company. Fallas Paredes used the rainbow facade (the tiles), but its replacement, Rainbow Stores, did not. Rainbow replaced Fallas Paredes not long after it went under, and was still operating in October 2024, but by January 2026 had vacated the premises.

Continuing to west there's Northwest Beauty Supply (here since at least 2022 and still here in January 2026, this was The Avenue from 2012 to 2019, from 1994 to 2012 this was Sizes Unlimited. 6425 is Q Tee Nails (since at least 2016). 6421 is The Smile Club (dentists, though it more replaced Dino Dental, which was here at least in the late 2010s). 6417 has been Leslie's Pool Supplies since 2001, and that wraps it up for the West 43rd Street addresses.

12009 Northwest Freeway was originally Service Merchandise and closed in early 2002 when the chain finally went bankrupt, but it sat vacant for close to a decade. In 2011 it became a Joe V's Smart Shop, a discount grocery format for H-E-B. This is kind of an interesting choice. Joe V's is a bit disliked as a format as it goes into low-end neighborhoods where H-E-B doesn't want to build full-line stores (even C-grade H-E-B stores), namely areas where H-E-B had promised they'd build 10+ years ago, but didn't (a store on the Southwest Beltway is an example of this). This Joe V's is the first of its kind to wedge itself into a strip mall. I'm pretty sure confidence that they were not planning on an H-E-B here originally. When Joe V's opened in 2011 opened, the facade was red but around 2018 was painted brown. The Service Merchandise facade was much more interesting and looked like a real department store, with a brick entrance and a red arch over the entrance (presumably glowing red at night). This I don't have a ready picture of, but you can see it on the older Google Street Views and similar Service Merchandise facades.

Directly next to Service Merchandise was originally Venture #135 at 12005 Northwest Freeway and opened in July 1994. The store was never successful and closed in 1997 when it was sold to Kmart, reopening within a few months as Big Kmart #3878, closing their store at West 34th Street. It closed in January 2003. It was unprofitable when Venture sold it to Kmart, and Kmart wasn't able to turn it around. In 2005 it was reopened as Burlington Coat Factory, which featured departments like Baby Depot and eventually rebranded as Burlington around late 2017 or early 2018 before fleeing in 2020 for Brookhollow Marketplace. Even before Burlington moved to the smaller store as per their current model, the 105,000 square feet store was too much for the clothing store, and leased some space to a store called Affordable Furniture, which opened in 2008 (I'm not sure if Burlington tried to use the 100,000+ square foot space initially). After Burlington packed up in 2020 for Brookhollow Marketplace, Crazy Boss, a similar store, moved in to the space in 2023.

Continuing around counterclockwise and now facing Northwest Freeway, Petco #469 (12017 Northwest Freeway) was a tenant since 1995. It did replace the upper-case logo with the newer lower-case one by 2016, and stayed after Burlington left, but it too left in late 2023 for Brookhollow Marketplace. While the mascots, Red Ruff and Blue Mews, were part of the new sign (they weren't standard after the 2020 logo refresh), they weren't colored in the Brookhollow Marketplace store (that store opened with the "The Health + Wellness Co." logo, during a time when Petco only carried all-natural products and stopped carrying popular brands of pet food).

There isn't much of the shopping center after that. 12025 is currently vacant and has been vacant since Starbucks moved out of it during the redevelopment of the center in 2015. The original Starbucks Coffee was in a strip center with no drive-through and opened in 2001 (there's a few pictures on StarbucksEverywhere, note the reflection of Toys R Us).

Most of the shopping center was demolished at this point. The current Starbucks opened in 2016 at 12035 Northwest Freeway. It also added a drive-through in some of the space. Previously, this was 12037 Northwest Freeway, home of Old Towne Kolaches (which dated back to 1995 and closed in 2015, did not reopen).

Next, at 12041 Northwest Freeway, was Red Onion Seafood y Mas. It was a sister restaurant to the now-defunct Cafe Red Onion, and part of the same restaurant group.

Next, at 12043 Northwest Freeway, was originally Blimpie (1995-2003). In 2004, it became Red Onion Seafood y Mas with a new address (12041). It was a sister restaurant to the now-defunct Cafe Red Onion, and part of the same restaurant group. Both Cafe Red Onion and the Red Onion restaurant group were on Northwest Freeway (see the aforementioned Northwest Freeway link).

At the end was C&S Chinese Cafe (12047 Northwest Fwy.) operated from 1995 to 2013 in some form or another.

Last but not least, the Chase Bank was built at 12017 Northwest Freeway was built in 2006. This replaced another building, but I'm having trouble finding what it replaced.

That about wraps it up! Below are some additional pictures I took in 2018...

UPDATE 07-08-2026: After its initial posting in 2014 and major update in 2018, this has been fully updated to integrate both with the Northwest Freeway pages and West Crosstimbers Street/West 43rd Street/Clay Road pages.