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.