by Zarana Sanghani
Staff Writer
University of Houston students who normally use Calhoun Road to go from Interstate 45 to Wheeler Street may soon have to map out a new route around campus.
When the new Texas Highway 35 is completed, Calhoun may become a campus road - closed to outside traffic - from I-45 to Wheeler.
Highway 35 will block off Calhoun near Entrance 19 at the Law Center, making it inaccessible to cars coming from downtown.
UH would like to close Calhoun past Wheeler, making it a campus road to use for internal circulation and possibly parking, said Jim Berry, associate vice chancellor of facilities planning and construction.
To privatize Calhoun, the Asset Management Subcommittee proposed that UH exchange land with the Baptist General Convention building and the Catholic Diocese of Galveston-Houston buildings, located near Entrance 1.
The Baptist and Catholic organizations gave UH the land extending from their buildings to the Calhoun curb. In exchange, UH gave an equal amount of area from the land adjoining parking lot 20A.
The UH System Board of Regents approved the exchange of land at its April 24 meeting.
Now that the university owns the land on both sides of Calhoun, the street can be closed to the public. "City ordinances are such that if you, as an owner, own both sides of the street, you can close the street to the public," Berry said.
"The advantage of keeping Calhoun closed is it will lower traffic," Director of Architectural Services Ron Shoup said.
UH will also attempt to buy three plots of land so it will own all the land between Elgin and Wheeler on the university side of Highway 35.
While plans for use of the land have not been set yet, Shoup said UH might consider beautifying the area or putting in diagonal parking. Constructing new buildings on the land is not feasible, since Calhoun has many utility lines running underneath it.
Though the Board of Regents approved the acquisition, the actual purchase of the plots is still pending.
The land UH wants to acquire includes the old Rother's Bookstore location, the land rented by Pizza Hut and the surplus of land across from Lot 19B expected to remain after the construction of Highway 35.
Al Broholm of the Pizza Hut real estate offices refused to name the landlord of the Pizza Hut area but did say Pizza Hut recently renewed its lease.
"The university has been trying to buy this land for the past 10 years," Broholm said. "To the best of my knowledge, the landlord is not selling."
UH is not expecting the establishments along Calhoun to relocate any time soon, Shoup said.