The Newer Shell at Villa Maria and Its McDonald's

Picture from June 2019 by author. The McDonald's sign looks significantly worse now.
We are back in business in 2026. There are many things that are yet to be covered, and there are many things that have already been covered. If you look at the picture for the Map, it's substantially emptier than what it looks like today, which for future-proofing purposes is illustrated below.

This picture doesn't show how anemic the Bryan posts were until a year or so ago. Like many of the posts from last year, we're doing another Bryan post. I've talked about fast food restaurants in the area that have since passed on, last year I covered the following former fast food restaurants: Taco Bell, Roy Rogers, Zaxby's, Pizza Hut, Popeyes, Wendy's, and Bush's Chicken, plus an unusual "gas station Wendy's" and the Long John Silver's before it was rebuilt. Today's post is on a McDonald's, a subject that has been previously explored It hasn't closed yet but is on the list to be replaced, which makes sense as the sign is falling apart and despite often playing up the nostalgic angle, is a "mansard roof" McDonald's which the company is trying to eliminate.

The new location is already drawn up to be at the currently-undeveloped wooded northeastern corner of Villa Maria Road and Harvey Mitchell Parkway. It's not the first thing to be drawn up in the corner, in 2017, it was slated to be a 36,000 square feet Lidl store before they aborted their Texas expansion plan a few years later.

The current gas station as-is hasn't changed much in the almost twenty years it was built (all references say 2005, I'm guessing McDonald's had a ground lease that was for 20 years), with Shell gas, Space Liquor, a convenience store, and of course the McDonald's. I've mentioned this gas station on an old page called "Stories of the West Loop" or something along those lines, and in a comment someone said that Space Liquor was delayed for several months due to some issue by the TABC but their "Public Enquiry System" suggests their license was secured in a timely manner with the other stores.

It's not a good picture but it kind of shows the McDonald's facade (and prices before post-COVID price gouging). Picture from June 2019 by author.
I do remember when it opened, though, it felt less of a modern complement to the "other" Shell which at the time was not actually located at the intersection at the time, and felt more like a direct competitor to the Exxon across the street (which felt different enough than the nearby "La Brisa" Exxon). The McDonald's there at Greens Prairie Road and Highway 6 South had a "two-pronged" sign like what I had seen on road trips (if significantly shorter) but the one at 2818 did not, likely owing to sign restrictions (the older Shell and the older Exxon had taller signs). Even the Highway 6 one was shorter than what I had seen on trips.

Chipotle on University

1984 advertisement celebrating the newest owner at the time.
As I mentioned in a recent post, most of the University Drive part of the FM 60 page has been covered (very unlikely A&M United Methodist Church will be discussed—churches only get on here usually due to special circumstances). Only 815 University Drive has not been covered yet. While the address hosts a Chipotle today, it replaced a gas station that was a "garage"-style gas station, with a full service auto repair center (mechanics, state inspections) but not so much a convenience store (not that Northgate was lacking in convenience stores). The earliest reference I can find was in 1959 for University Mobil at 815 Sulphur Springs Road. The station changed hands a few times (but remained a Mobil) before finally being closed as late as 2002, at which point it was torn down for a Chipotle Mexican Grill. It was perhaps fitting that Chipotle was next to McDonald's as McDonald's corporate owned some 90% of Chipotle at the time, though by the time the College Station store opened in 2003 McDonald's was re-thinking that strategy and by 2006 had sold it off entirely. It retained its original facade until around 2024-2025 when it was changed to reflect Chipotle's current design standards (and the 2009 logo).

Anyway, much like we did last year and the year before that this is the last post of the year. This year, we spiked at over 43k visitors in a single month (August), the busiest time ever (usually this site averages 5000, which jumped up from 2000 a few years ago). Oddly, despite 10k in September, the site cratered to less than 1000 in October, numbers so badly that they haven't been seen since 2011.

As far as top posts go, Former Fitzwilly's takes the #1 spot (it was #3 last year). Skipping sub-pages (the Post Oak Mall sub-pages don't count, though no doubt they were bolstered by the big Post Oak Mall page I made on Carbon-izer), Manor East Mall will take the #2 spot despite the page needing a major rewrite. Going down the list, newcomer Blinn Bryan Campus featuring Schulman 6 takes #3...though I have a feeling that people found it through searches for Blinn and not because of the movie theater. Campus Theater took #4 and Café Eccell's Former Domain takes #5.

This year, more Bryan posts than ever were produced. Of the (numbers from 11/9 here) 50 posts produced this year, almost half were in Bryan. The long gap between the last post and this one proves I can't consistently month after month keep producing content, but that's not what this blog is for. I don't know if I'll be living in the area a year from now. There were times I weren't or got burned out. It's unlikely I'll hit 50+ posts in a year anytime soon, possibly ever, and with 52 posts it's second only to 2013. I'd also like to take the time to share my own personal top five posts, that I think you should check out, with the top 5 starting with my 5th favorite.

5. Wendy's Tiger Town. Wendy's served nachos and pitas in addition to hamburgers, and the signage is still original.

4. Post Oak Village had a spread of several stores, and it hosted a few chain stores over the years, including Color Tile and Catherine's.

3. The Veggie Garden was fun to research. It was a long-standing mystery and while I think that the location is underused, I've always had a bit of an affinity for buildings in that stretch (Barry Pool Co., Sunset Gardens).

2. Finfeather's 7-Eleven. This post allowed me to take another look at the crossing at Villa Maria and Wellborn Road. The underpass is much nicer in many aspects (unless you really wanted to access Finfeather from Villa Maria, and vice versa), but I still sort of miss the old crossing.

1. Winn-Dixie on 29th Street: This post celebrates the other Winn-Dixie and a 20th anniversary of the bankruptcy. It was even a bit brighter than originally planned as investors and C&S Wholesale Grocers had bought the company back from Aldi, sparing it from complete destruction.

Several posts also got significant updates...Krispy Kreme of course burned down but updates to the article talks about Grandy's in more detail. I updated 110 College Main with more former tenants as well as adding a new page to Post Oak Mall to discuss all that in more detail. Boyett Businesses was retooled as a new post with some new tenants unearthed. The Lost Buildings of Villa Maria Road and Texas Avenue also had substantial updates added to it with information on El Caribe and Pizza Inn.

The only bummer is that my Ko-fi was a bit of a bust, but if you could throw in a few bucks...

We'll be back next year, returning January 7th.

Former Boston's The Gourmet Pizza

This was taken in June 2015 (by author) not too long before Razzoo's opened (but before the old Boston's signage was cleaned off and new signage installed).
As the "FM 60" directory on Carbon-izer.com is soon to be dismantled (see this archived version), I should discuss the next restaurant just to the right of 830 University Drive East, this time 820 University Drive East. It's current tenant has been Razzoo's Cajun Cafe since August 2015, but opened in August 2006 as "Boston's The Gourmet Pizza", an export version of Canadian-based Boston Pizza (I believe it was to prevent conflicts with Boston Market, but as Boston Market's star fell, the trademarks eventually changed). This closed around summer 2014.¹

This post as currently written may have an update forced before year-end, as earlier in October, Razzoo's parent company has filed for bankruptcy, and while the restaurant chain may live on in some form, most of its locations won't. (It already closed three locations prior--Oklahoma City, Pasadena, and Corpus Christi, a store in Winston-Salem closed last year).

1. Boston Pizza closed their stores in San Antonio and Houston, but in Dallas, it lives on and you can see it retired the "Boston's The Gourmet Pizza" for just Boston's Pizza in around early 2018 if not the tail-end of December.

UPDATE 01-01-2026: On December 29, 2025, Razzoo's Inc. was acquired by M Crowd Restaurant Group (owner of Mi Cocina...no, not the ones here locally) and while they moved forward with 11 restaurants, nine of them weren't, including (according to online sources), Burleson, Far North Dallas, Garland, Irving, Lewisville, Lubbock, Spring, Tyler, and College Station. These restaurants were shut down immediately.

Former T.G.I. Friday's

A harbinger of things to come chain-wide. (source)
My first and better choice for today was unfortunately cancelled due to lack of photos but this is similar enough, plus it's themetically on point (sports bar that would probably air the Super Bowl). It's TGI Friday's, which opened late 2005 when the chain was hitting its peak (600 U.S. restaurants in 2008, now dropped to just 125 domestically).

The College Station T.G.I. Friday's at 940 University Drive East opened late 2005 and closed in May 2013. It appears the franchisee, LBD 2001 Inc., shut down the previous year and was taken over by corporate; however, the College Station location wasn't one of the ones they moved forward with. It was replaced with Willie's Grill & Icehouse in 2014.

Editor's Note: I know I've been churning a lot of posts lately, but a lot of these are stuff I've written previously. (I dare say that a good number of new posts you see now were started/partially written a few years ago). Part of the problem with the current posts is that some of these posts just aren't that thematically exciting. Looking at some of my output from 2011-2013, although most of them have been rewritten from their original drafts (and more than a few got permanently removed), it's noticeably different than the later output, it's very different than 2014 on, especially when I ran out of ideas of stuff that I really wanted to cover.

Rockfish Seafood Grill

Regrettably we'll have to go with Street View on this one today, and the replacement building at that.
Having added both new and retroactively a new tag for posts, "Death by Fire" covering the likes of Sunset Gardens, Olive Garden, Krispy Kreme, and a few others, there's another addition to that, Rockfish Seafood Grill. Rockfish technically didn't close because of fire, but it did burn down.

In any case, Rockfish Seafood Grill opened in December 2001 at 1611 University Drive East as the tenth restaurant in the Dallas-based chain. There wasn't an official review for the restaurant, only a blurb about its opening, though a now-defunct website gave a review as an advertisement. (That would be a good strategy for this site....if The Eagle wasn't virtually defunct). In the summer of 2005, Rockfish closed and was quickly sold to the franchisee of Cheddar's Casual Cafe next door to open as Fish Daddy's Grill House, a new seafood concept owned by the corporate parent of Cheddar's, which had two other locations.

During renovations, the building caught fire and was instead torn down to the foundation and rebuilt, opening sometime around spring 2006. Since then, Fish Daddy's disconnected from the Cheddar's chain (probably around the time they were bought by Darden); the Austin location became "FD's Grill House" and Tulsa's location has a substantially different menu than the College Station location.

Editor's Note: In addition to the newer articles, several older articles have gotten significant updates. Check out Ardan Catalog Showroom / Rolling Thunder / Gattiland / Thunder Elite / Planet Fitness, Putt-Putt Golf & Games, and Former Taco Cabana.

Changing Faces at University Town Center

This picture is by author, June 2015. It looked nicer in person! Another post, just coming so soon after yesterday? It's all to help fill in "a post for every day", that soon there will be over 365 posts and a post lines up with every day in the calendar (I missed my opportunity for 2/29 last year, but that's a special occasion).

I've written about some of this initially in some capacity on Carbon-izer (in fact, some of this is taken from that page) and wanted to discuss some of what has gone on at "University Town Center", the circa 2006 development near Tarrow Street East and University Drive East. Already we've discussed the old Abuelo's Mexican Food Embassy (now Casa Mangiare); now it's time to look at the next building at the "Fountain Plaza", 830 University Drive East, which is now fully vacant. Sôlt occupied suite 400 and takes up half of the space. It opened as Veritas Wine & Bistro in January 2007 and adopted its current name in 2020 after a closure and menu revamp (same ownership) before permanently closing in November 2024 following the end of the lease. The other half of the building has been vacant for a longer time. This last operated as Boneheads, a restaurant that specialized in grilled fish, Piri-Piri Chicken, and rice. It was good but never seemed busy and operated from November 2013 to summer 2016. They had other locations in Georgia, but the last one closed in January 2019. Boneheads itself occupied two older sites, a Ben & Jerry's (suite 200) that operated from January 2007 to November 2011, and It's a Grind (ste. 100), a coffeeshop at suite 100 that operated during the same timeframe.

UPDATE 10-03-2025: In February 2025, Zake Noodle House opened in the spot. The last paragraph discussing the changes at posts has been removed.

Lost Retail at the Lofts

The stoplight at Holleman and Dartmouth I want to say was erected in 2002 or sometime around that time, formerly a four-way stop. I know I haven't been doing much to the website recently, and part of that is the photos issue. I don't have a great source for photos and even then some of them are lacking. I have to watermark everything these days and my scans and stuff still turn up in places, even commercially published books (I'm not naming names, but stuff like the picture for Cattlemen's Inn & Steak House had its watermark cropped out.)

I've also been planning a big Post Oak Mall project but that's mostly stalled out, so let's move onto something else not too far from Post Oak Mall, namely the The Lofts at Wolf Pen Creek which stands out because it is one of the first mixed-use apartments in College Station. It opened in 2009 and while it contained all the trappings of high-end student apartments at the time (including an "Internet cafe", something I'm sure was repurposed fairly early on), it had several ground-floor tenants that all came and went. It was never fully leased, but at the most prominent of the corner started with Tutta Pasta Italian Market & Ristorante in January 2011, and after getting some bad reviews folded within six months. There was another restaurant, Arbano Cafe, that opened in April 2014 but also closed in six months; the signage remained up for a few years afterward.

Red Mango, a frozen yogurt place next to it, was arguably more successful and opened in late 2009 but closed at the end of 2015. A location of Honeybaked Ham & Deli also existed from around 2009 to 2011 as a third tenant but that closed and was replaced with Sabi Boutique, which ran for about six years before moving out as well.

The only tenant currently (and has been for the last several years) is "The Texas Bucket List Store and Studio" (associated with the "Visit College Station" facade but actually in Sabi Boutique's space). (A fourth tenant space was never developed. There were rumors Abercrombie & Fitch wanted to move to it from the mall but I can't confirm that).

TX Burger

This isn't my picture, unfortunately, it's theirs—source I've been sitting on this post for a long time, and one of the reasons was that I didn't have a picture of my own. However, there's nothing really special about it, something where I have to take a picture because it's going to change soon. (There is something I did for a future post; that will have to wait).

One of the things I did a while back was dedicate a lot of resources to the "open source" Wikimapia, and while I've described the reasons why I don't deal with it anymore has been described here (March 31, 2022) and I have to admit that much of this post is going to be adapted from what I wrote on Wikimapia, which I worked a lot on before I moved focus back to this blog. The building at 14895 FM 2154 has seen several incarnations come and go before its current incarnation as TX Burger, which re-did the facade and paved the parking lot.

Starting chronologically, the first tenant here when the building was constructed in 2004 was Junek's Barbecue, which moved out from the gas station just north of it. Junek's folded sometime around 2011 or early 2012.

After Junek's folded, for several years, the building was tenanted by a series of restaurants, none of which lasted a year. The second restaurant here was Outlaw Jack's Brew N Chew which featured hamburgers, barbecue, and fried seafood. It opened early 2013, closed, reopened a few months later, and then closed again. The third, Country Cafe, opened up in 2014, but was gone by January 2015. There was "Chubby's Meat Wagon" (late April or early May 2015 but closed September...as it lasted three months I know almost nothing about it) as the fourth restaurant.

The fifth restaurant here was Cajuns Bayou Grille. It opened February 2016, giving the exterior new paint and enlarging the parking area, but closed just five months later, partially because of new City of College Station ordinances that prohibited the expansion of the restaurant without additional improvements. This is the only restaurant in the spot that I actually ate at, getting some crawfish and having enough for some leftovers (though properly re-heating crawfish is something I have yet to master).

Finally, the sixth restaurant opened in July 2017, a branch of Madisonville-based TX Burger (formerly Texas Burger until around 2010 or 2011 when the chain rebranded, possibly to avoid confusion with a Midland-Odessa chain of the same name). TX Burger did a significant re-do of the front facade and paved the parking lot for the first time, and as a result it has been here since.

Editor's Note: Want to go beyond the limits of Bryan-College Station? Visit my new blog, Numbered Exits, featuring Waco, Dallas, and even out of state spots.

Southwest Parkway East Shell

Evening shot by author, May 2021.
This was another post that I wanted to get to back in 2021-2022 but I decided to put off indefinitely because a good number of the posts I made in that time were gas station or convenience store posts and I didn't want yet another one. Including and between Christmas 2020 and Christmas 2021, there were 25 posts, 20% were on gas stations. Sure, some of them had restaurants inside, but it was just too much at one time. The gas station here, legally "Express Stop" at 450 Southwest Parkway East and built around 2000-2001 as a Texaco (converted to Shell in early 2003) has two sub-tenants. The one on the left (452 Southwest Parkway East) was, from 2004-2005, Cool Beans (legally "TC's Smoothies & More"), which left its sign up for a few years after it closed. From 2008 to 2011 it was Southwest Cleaners, and most recently, Salon Christiana which opened in 2012 but shut down due to COVID in March 2020 and never reopened. On the right side of the gas station was Casa Rodriguez Express from 2011 to 2014 and Master Donut since 2015). Before "Casa Rod" it was the fourth location of Mi Cocina (later Polly's Cocina). This was one of the "two additional locations in College Station" mentioned in this post.

One of the other reasons this never got posted was I had located on Flickr a picture of Cool Beans' facade. It was the side view and I even think it may have been in grayscale, but it got lost somewhere along the way, I think when new owner SmugMug purchased Flickr from Oath (Yahoo!) and cracked down on storage space. Here's the Street View for the site as of 2007. Less-blurry pictures are available but this one is the only one where you can make out the red-and-green Cool Beans facade.

Former Abuelo's Mexican Food Embassy

This restaurant is out of service, but hopefully not for long.
Ah, it's great to be back! I've been updating Carbon-izer's city directory for the city chock full of things that will probably never see a full post, and I've been updating the Facebook page weekly with retreads and occasional new updates of posts but it's been a while since we had an all-new page here.

As outlined last November, only businesses that have turnover are covered, making it a bit more like Columbia Closings in that regard.

"Abuelo's Mexican Food Embassy" opened its College Station location at 840 University Drive East in May 2006, and sometime in the early 2010s (2013-2016) became just "Abuelo's Mexican Restaurant". It shut down in April 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, with two others closed around this time, a location in Plano (3701 Dallas Parkway, open since 2001) and one that had been open since 2003 at Barton Creek Square (as an outlot, not in the actual mall itself). Do check out that link, it's one of the things I've been working on recently...and because I live in the Austin area now (it's true...) you'll probably see more along those lines.

Anyway, I can't say much about Abuelo's. I never did go there and the restaurant chain itself is alive and well, just not in the Austin or College Station areas anymore. I'm not sure about the Austin or Plano locations, but on University Drive East, the space is already signed for a new Italian restaurant, Casa Mangiare. Otherwise, enjoy the pictures! All of them were taken in May 2022 by the author.  

A bird flexes its wings on a sign for the curbside service. I'm not sure if these were put up shortly before its closure or pre-existed.

Despite signage up for the next restaurant, older "For Lease" and rent lockout signs still exist on the doors.

Inside, Abuelo's has been gutted, but a mural on the back still exists for now.
UPDATE 05-13-2023: Casa Mangiare opened in May 2023, almost a year after these pictures were taken. Also, for those curious, the Barton Creek Square reopened as Polvos, and the Plano location is now Sixty Vines. (Removed [defunct] from post).

Masfajitas

Masfajitas, menos Dickey's. (Picture by author, 8/2021)
Masfajitas (aka MasFajitas) has been listed in the local phone book for years, with (initially) a single location in Caldwell. Only very recently has it opened a native College Station facility, with this one opening in July 2020.

The building was built as Dickey's Barbecue Pit, a hot "barbecue as fast food" franchise that opened many Texas stores around the same time frame. The last commercial development at the old Boriskie Ranch site (see "'At Home' at the Boriskie Ranch", the post this one spun off of) and opening in May 2009 (another article), Dickey's never did particularly well and closed May 31, 2017 (though this website, which tracks closed stores, incorrectly lists it as "4/31/17").

After Dickey's closed, it sat vacant before MasFajitas, which by this time had locations in the Temple-Killeen and Austin areas, announced it would renovate the building and open a store. The renovation ultimately expanded out the building and left very little of the Dickey's facade (at least in front), only the brick part with the stars is original. You can see the original facade at Google Maps Street View and a side view of the building at the aforementioned At Home post.

UPDATE 10-03-2021: Forgot the address: it's 2297 Earl Rudder Freeway South.

Holiday Inn on Earl Rudder Freeway

This is indeed my photo from July 2020. It's a far cry from the glossy evening shot for the official website, but whatever.
Two posts in two days? You bet! If you haven't checked it out, visit the new Kyoto Sushi page. Last year, the the Four Points by Sheraton, at the old Holiday Inn on Texas Avenue, closed down. While it is up for redevelopment (no hard evidence of anything yet), let's turn to the last Holiday Inn in the city we need to cover (excluding the Holiday Inn Express locations on University Drive East).

The modern Holiday Inn & Suites College Station - Aggieland at 2500 Earl Rudder Freeway opened around 2006 (looks like it was still under construction in October 2005, but it might've opened in some capacity by the end of 2005) and contains about 116 rooms and 48 suites (per a 2005 directory, and based on my experience writing for The Houston Files, no room count is ever 100% correct), and briefly was branded with the 1980s-era Holiday Inn logo before receiving the modern 2007 one shortly after it was announced (unfortunately, I can't find a picture of the Holiday Inn before re-branding).

Kem's Restaurant & Bar, named after the hotel chain's founder is open for breakfast and dinner these days (lunch appears that it was cut even before March 2020). In talking about the old Holiday Inn this one replaced, I assumed that Holiday Inn's restaurants were only advertised due to a relative lack of other competition, but now I'm thinking it was a corporate decision at some point in the late 1990s to stop advertising their restaurants (or have unique concepts). I don't know if Kem's was the restaurant since day one, though.

As the hotel has gone through no new flags, nor has interesting restaurants documented, and of course, is still open, it makes it less interesting than the old Holiday Inn. Then again, there aren't many interesting motels/hotels in the area left worth writing about. We've already written about hotels in sixteen other entries, and covers 19 hotels in total, including the Hilton, both of the older Ramada hotels, Days Inn, and a few others. Well, 20 hotels, including this article you're reading right now.

The hotel has the address of 2500 Earl Rudder Freeway but its parking lot is at the intersection of Holiday Inn Lane (from Southwest Parkway) and Holiday Inn Drive (from the frontage road), and more recently, a large, multi-story storage center was built between the hotel and the highway.

UPDATE 06-17-2024: Kem's has some light snacks available in the evening but it does appear that dinner was permanently cut during COVID-19 and has not returned. I added [restaurants] to the post anyway.

Former Bud Ward Volkswagen

From John Ellisor comes this picture of Bud Ward Volkswagen. I think I see the old Holiday Inn in the background.
The pad site where Hancock Whitney bank (at 1912 Texas Avenue South) is today has its own history that's set apart from the large H-E-B store behind it. The water tower that stands guard over the H-E-B replaced a smaller water tower almost directly at the corner of the intersection, where the H-E-B gas station is today.

The first reference I can find to the address is Harry Dishman Mazda (which moved from 603 Texas Avenue) and in 1975 that was sold and became Richard Barton Mazda-Volvo. It became simply Richard Barton Mazda (the Volvo line was terminated around this time) in early 1977 before changing hands to Bud Ward Volkswagen in 1977, which still carried Mazda cars (as well as Subaru). A 1978 article from The Eagle mentions that Ward also added Porsche and Audi lines (but did not stock top-of-the-line Porsche cars) when the facility expanded. In December 1988 Bud Ward sold the dealership to University Toyota of Bryan, which announced it would close their location in Bryan and move. What ended up happening instead was that after the Bud Ward inventory was cleared, University Toyota instead opened University Mitsubishi on the site in mid-1989. This closed in 1992, with Charlie's, a nightclub, announcing opening by year-end. Charlie's failed within a year, and in 1994 the building was torn down for El Chico. In 1994, it opened as what I remember the corner being, El Chico opened in 1994. El Chico is still around in some form and despite a logo and image update, there's only 5 locations left in Texas from what was once dozens.

It was maintained as a pad site when the lot was redeveloped as H-E-B, but closed in late 2005, citing declining popularity and access reasons (by that time, construction on widening Texas Avenue had begun). A few years later, the building and its parking lot was demolished entirely (including the old parking lot) for MidSouth Bank, which was rebranded as Hancock Whitney in late 2019.

UPDATE 10-06-2025: Update with new post title and clarifying existing content.

Former Academy Sports + Outdoors

From March 2019, by author. Yes, I know I covered this over a year ago.

In February 2002, Academy Sports + Outdoors opened a new location at Horse Haven Lane and Earl Rudder Freeway, either just prior to or after the closure of College Station Golf Center, a driving range off of the highway (for more information, see "At Home" on the Boriskie Ranch).

Academy was where I purchased much of my clothes and shoes over the years (never was a sharp dresser) but there was nothing particularly nostalgic about this location, especially given how much the new Academy resembles the old store on the inside.

For years, the store "competed" against the Gander Mountain next door, but eventually would close just as the Redmond Terrace location before it, with the store closing in June 2017 (a new store, about three-quarters of a mile south, replaced it). The store remains vacant, except for the occasional Halloween store that occupies it.

Editor's Note: A reason this post is spinning off from the At Home post is to separate the posts and partially so MasFajitas can have its own page someday.

Jimmy Jackson's Enco, 3000 South Texas Avenue

Nothing remains of the first Jimmy Jackson's Exxon but a rather standard Eckerd-turned-CVS. (Photo by author, 3/20)
Built in the 1960s at 3000 South Texas Avenue, "Jackson's Enco" eventually became Jimmy Jackson's Exxon (in the early 1970s, Standard Oil of New Jersey renamed to Exxon to unify the Esso and Enco brands), and by the early 1980s, gained a second entrance when Restwood Drive was rebuilt as an extension of Villa Maria Road. The gas station was eventually sold to focus on the College Station location and in 1998, an Eckerd was built at the site and eventually converted (around late 2004) to CVS/pharmacy when parent company J.C. Penney decided to liquidate the chain.

Olive Garden's Original Location

In real life Italy, unlimited breadsticks are not a thing.
Besides marketing its food products in all the area grocery stores, General Mills brought two restaurants to the Bryan-College Station through its General Mills Restaurant Group subsidiary, Red Lobster in 1983 and Olive Garden a decade later. (The other two significant concepts at the time, Good Earth, and China Coast, never made it to the area, though the latter briefly saw Waco and Houston).

Neither my articles on Hastings or H-E-B Pantry mention Olive Garden, which sat at the corner of Texas Avenue and Holleman Drive from 1993 to 2004. The old Olive Garden met its fate when it burned down in a fire, and what was left of the building was declared a total loss.

In January or February 2005, a new Olive Garden opened at University Drive East and Earl Rudder Freeway, and by October 2005, two new buildings rose at the former Olive Garden site, a Chase bank (replacing the 2000 Texas Avenue South address), and a second building (2002 Texas Avenue South) holding Jimmy John's and Men's Wearhouse (Google Street View link). The Jimmy John's closed in late summer 2019 for reasons unknown but by that time, a Jimmy John's was operating at Rock Prairie Crossing and near Texas and University Drive East. Of course, Jimmy John's at the latter location has a somewhat interesting backstory, and that will be covered soon enough...

The ad is from the mid-1990s, before it introduced its newer logo (dropping "The" and adding what appeared to be a bunch of grapes to the logo) around 1999 (replaced in 2014 but still seen on many restaurants).

UPDATE 10-05-2025: In 2021, Pizza Hut replaced Jimmy John's.

Former Red Lobster

It wasn't a red, it was a Red Lobster! (Picture by author, 6/20)

The current COVID-19 pandemic has done a number on local restaurants, and one of the victims appears to be the local Red Lobster at 1200 University Drive East. Opened in spring 2008 at the corner of Lincoln and University Drive East and replacing their 1983 location at Lincoln and Texas Avenue, the Red Lobster updated their logo in the early 2010s (2013) to their 2009 logo instead of the one they've had since the mid-1990s.

The restaurant was reported in late June 2020 to be locked out for non-payment of rent, and while some barriers have been put up to prevent vandalism/theft, I don't see the restaurant reopening. Also I apologize for the quality of the photos, it was taken when the sun was at a low angle, and I had to do some weird things to the photos to make them viewable.

All of the handicapped spaces were converted to to-go spots. I'm not sure this was actually legal.

GMRI Inc. is the corporate name of the original Red Lobster/Olive Garden group, descended from the original Red Lobster Inns of America, Inc. and named after the General Mills Restaurant group...though Red Lobster was spun off several years ago.

UPDATE 05-04-2022: According to KBTX, Austin-based Trudy's Authentic Tex-Mex is coming to the spot, confirming after two years that Red Lobster is gone for good. Parts of the original post have been touched up.
UPDATE 10-06-2023: Rumor is that Trudy's has unfortunately fallen through.
UPDATE 04-23-2024: Reports that Tyler-based Javi's will be opening in the spot.

Abandoned Quality Suites

The direct sun hurt this photo, but I think it gets the point across.

I first stumbled upon this hotel (at 3610 Highway 6 South) in fall 2019 to find it closed despite being a fairly modern-looking hotel (it was built in 2005) and on the highway. All the signage was up and graffiti had not yet hit the building, but the high weeds and tattered entryway said otherwise, nor any sign that the hotel would be opening soon (it was removed from the Choice Hotels website). Apparently, the hotel closed by early 2018 (mentioned on Yelp's "Tips" which seem to have disappeared in a recent redesign) due to a flooding problem and it never reopened. At this rate I can't see it reopening as a Quality Suites any time soon, and even without a virus decimating tourist trades, there's a lot of hotel competition that didn't exist when Quality Suites first went up. Despite being on the freeway as well, its access is a bit difficult, either requiring the southbound exit to Texas and staying on the frontage road, or working around Longmire and going back to Ponderosa. There's a good chance that it was planned before the new Rock Prairie exit was made, not only did the old Rock Prairie exit actually allow access to the hotel very easily (even southbound) in 2005, it did not visually obscure it.

According to one of the old Choice Hotel locators I have (from 2007), the hotel has 81 rooms, a swimming pool, exercise room, meeting room, and a few other modest features (like guest laundry).

Even if the hotel industry was better (overbuilding had gotten to be a problem), Quality Suites shows no signs of reopening anytime soon. The card reader on the south entrance has been ripped out, exterior maintenance is slipping, rooms have been dismantled (mattresses leaning up, etc.), and the lobby is trashed. It would not take much to reopen it under a different name, but it requires some work that the current owners have not put in yet. Personally, I'm surprised the high weeds have not gotten the pressure from city code yet.

In terms of placement, this is the very first address (apart from Veronica's Country Corner, an outlier in every sense of the word) that focuses on a Highway 6 address that isn't on the Earl Rudder portion, and the first hotel covered in a while (not since La Quinta).

UPDATE 10-24-2023: In early 2023 this hotel reopened as Wingate by Wyndham. ([defunct] removed).
UPDATE 12-25-2023: I wanted to mention that the hotel is dual-branded as a Hawthorn Suites as well.

Brake Check

Brake Check, pictured here in 2014 (by author).

It's Thursday, and there's no more posts in the backlog to feature. Time to make a new post, luckily there's source material to whip something up. In this case, it's Brake Check on University Drive East (only Brake Check in town as of this writing). Originally, when it opened in 2007, the text above was different ("Alignment" was originally "Shocks & Struts", for instance). Before Brake Check opened, it was a Sonic Drive-In, one of the first in town (the other was at 914 South Texas Avenue in Bryan, which remained open and was completely rebuilt in the mid-2000s). It was open even according to the 1980 phone book, likely opened in the 1970s. This location closed around 2004 (possibly 2003) and stood vacant for a few years before it was torn down. (There was a gap of a few years before a new Sonic at Cooner and Texas opened).

The new Brake Check did not have access to Poplar as Sonic once did, as Sonic was once part of a 1970s-era "restaurant row" with Egg Roll House (now Jimmy John's) and the Pizza Hut.

Exxon Rock Prairie and Wellborn

There was another Exxon located on Rock Prairie's other end. More on that another time. (Picture by author, Apr. 2020)
Sometime around 1997 or 1998, Rock Prairie Road was extended from Victoria Avenue to Wellborn Road, eliminating the need to trek back on North Graham toward Victoria. Within a few years, an Exxon station was built and later, a stoplight (I'm pretty sure the stoplight came before the railroad crossing--which upgraded and extended Gandy Road into a full extension to North Dowling Road).

This Exxon station (at 12727 FM 2154) anchors the southeast corner of the intersection, with the Shell station coming in about 3-5 years afterward.

Brazos CAD isn't all that clear when everything was built, indicating the car wash was built a full two years before the convenience store was in 2000. In the first year or two, the Exxon featured an A&W restaurant, which had returned to College Station-Bryan after a 20+ year absence (there was a location near the modern-day intersection of University Drive and Texas Avenue, but that's for another post). A&W's attempt at what was then south College Station didn't last long at all, and I had to make sure of it through some digging on Project HOLD to make sure it wasn't just the power of suggestion getting to me, but by early 2001 A&W was gone, and a Sonic took its place in the summer of 2001. The addition of Sonic added the traditional Sonic canopies to about seven parking spaces, and evidence suggests these were functional carhop spaces.

In 2008, the Sonic moved to a new space next door and the space was abandoned. By early 2009, it was operating as Taco Casa, which reused a lot of Sonic's infrastructure by painting the red trim on the canopies orange to match Taco Casa's branding scheme. But it too closed after a few years (sometime in mid-2011). It didn't help Taco Casa's case that 2009 and 2010 were plagued with major construction. The Exxon actually lost about a dozen parking spaces in the front, with an entrance to Rock Prairie also closed (though that became three new spaces). Sometime within this same time frame, the signage updated to electronic numbering.

Finally, around early 2013, the space was filled with Little Caesars, which ditched the interior seating for a walk-up counter and the only Little Caesars in the area with a drive-through.

The main "Tigerland Express" food mart was there from the start, with a third tenant serving as a liquor/tobacco store (but is only accessed from the inside, despite the presence of an exterior door). Finally, the car wash is next to the convenience store.