The Next Time I Take a bunch of LSD I'm Going to...

Presidential Park at WaterLights in Pearland!!!

Where I can ride around in a boat and look at giant heads of all the american presidents!




From the Chron:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/4686544.html


Some developers use skating rinks or even roller coasters as the centerpieces of their shopping centers. Richard Browne is counting on 42 giant busts of the U.S. presidents from Washington to George W. to bring in people.

So far the Houston developer, whose background includes helping plan The Woodlands Town Center, has spent $5.5 million for 50 acres near Pearland and the striking collection of busts, each at least 18 feet tall and weighing 7,000 pounds, by Houston sculptor David Adickes.

The plan calls for an unusual mixed-use development, combining space for commercial, residential and a presidential park, surrounding a 30-acre lake and navigable streams, Browne said.

"This is a natural," Browne said. "We can make this the Venice of Houston."

The location of Browne's WaterLights District and the presidential park is near other new retail development near Texas 288 and Beltway 8, and close to the booming Shadow Creek Ranch community.

But with new shopping centers popping up all the time, location may not be enough to ensure success.

Developers are having to be creative, even gimmicky, with their ideas, said Ed Wulfe, president of Houston-based real estate brokerage and development firm Wulfe & Co. They can't expect customers to come just for the stores anymore. That is why The Galleria added an ice-skating rink and Minnesota's Mall of America has roller coasters.

"It's an unusual approach," Wulfe said of Browne's pro- ject. "But in today's environment of serious competition between different projects and tenants, you've got to do something different."

City officials are excited about the busts going to Pear-land because they expect customers and tourists will follow, said Fred Welch, executive director of the Pearland Economic Development Corp.

"It's going to be a great draw for Pearland," he said. "It'll create a destination where we haven't had one before."

It also provides a Houston-area home for the third and final set of Adickes' presidential heads. The first two ended up in presidential parks near Mount Rushmore in South Dakota and in Williamsburg, Va.

"I'm really thrilled to put these here because people always tell me, 'You've got to keep these in Texas,' " said Adickes, who is also known for the 67-foot Sam Houston statue in Huntsville along Interstate 45, a 72-foot Stephen F. Austin in Brazoria County and other larger-than-life sculptures, including the cellist next to downtown Houston's Lyric Centre and a trumpet in Galveston.

Adickes is currently finishing four 36-foot statues of the Beatles.

Seven of the statues — George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt — are about 4 feet taller than the others because they were, according to a consensus of historians, the best, Adickes said.

Incidentally, there are 42 statues, although George W. Bush is the 43rd president. Grover Cleveland was both the 22nd and 24th president.

Browne declined to say what he paid for the presidential heads. He said he expects more than 2 million people a year, including school groups, will visit the Presidential Park at WaterLights. There will be no admission charge.

In comparison the Presidential Park in Williamsburg, which is near other historical sites, hopes to draw 1 million people this year, spokesman John Hamrick said. The park declined to release past attendance figures.

The other set of Adickes' presidential heads is in a park near Mount Rushmore.

The Houston Museum of Natural Science saw 3.1 million visitors in 2006, according to the Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau. That's high for a cultural attraction but falls short of The Galleria, which drew 25 million last year, the bureau said.

Browne sees the project opening in summer 2008 and expects it to eventually include up to 10 restaurants, several retail stores, two hotels, office space and condominiums.

The Presidential Park at WaterLights would have one feature the parks in Virginia and South Dakota do not: a bust of the 44th president. Adickes has committed to build at least one more statue, whether it's Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Rudy Giuliani, John McCain or another candidate.

"Big is beautiful," Adickes said.

brad.hem@chron.com


(btw kids, don't do drugs, it was a joke)