Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
You bring up some good points and I wonder if Galveston decided to built a seawall prior to 1900 would cities closest to the Bay have the highest concentration of people in this region? If Galveston were the primary city than I think it would.
Indeed, especially since it's said that Houston itself was originally meant to be built right on Galveston Bay - supposedly, the Allen's Brother's wanted to settle around the Morgan's Point region, but they couldn't come up with enough money to get that land.
Most of the population would probably still be on the western shore - from the Baytown location down to Texas City. You'd then have Galveston Island and Bolivar Peninsula as your beaches. The Smith Point Peninsula, along with the areas inland that now make up much of Houston, would probably either have continued spread of development, or just left over as greenbelt/wilderness for flood control (which would have been far more effective than current efforts due to the more cohesive population).
Quote:
A true urban metropolitan by the bay in Texas would have been something to see. Not that I'm not a fan of what the region has become but Galveston by far was the more attractive looking city in the state in it's heyday.
There's somewhat of a stalled attempt in building just that, in the form of Corpus Christi.
Quote:
I wonder if the refineries and petrochemical plants would have ended up somewhere else in the region.
It's possible then that there would have been a more complete cohesion with the Houston area and the Golden Triangle - all the heavy industry and blue collar work goes east to the latter, while the former would have more white collar urban + recreational presence.
No. The Galveston Storm was just one storm of many that wiped out coastal ports on the barrier islands throughout Texas and the entire gulf coast. Indianola was also wiped out(never to be rebuilt) and Corpus Christi was decimated in 1919.
It was a big enough problem that it got national attention. Congress decided it needed deep water protected ports on the Gulf Coast and would fund dredging projects to make it happen. Houston came forward with it's plan and got funded and so did Corpus Christi. Corpus was able to make the argument that it was ”invincible” due to the bluff over Downtown keeping a large portion of population safe from the hurricane. As a result it survived the storm and was rebuilt. The state contributed 10 counties worth of tax revenue for a decade to build the seawall and Congress paid to dredge the channel. It bypassed Aransas Pass which was closer to the Gulf but built at sea level.
A similar series of events happened in Houston immediately after the Galveston Hurricane where an artificial inland protected port was preferred by Congress over the natural ports of Galveston and Texas City.
I have noticed some good improvement on Galveston in recent years with respect to infrastructure advancements. There have been more good urban planning movements, with more robust biking lanes throughout the city - in fact, there have been rumblings of resuming the original heritage street car/trolley that ran and serviced the island historically. There's also plenty of amazing cultivars on the island, which give it a good wet subtropical-tropical look. While Ike did a number on the original broadleaf tree canopy, there has been decent replanting and regrowth since then, not to mention a good base with the plentiful palms and cultivars on the island.
Location: New Orleans ⏩ Houston ⏩ Seattle ⏩ New Orleans ⏩ Houston ⏹
58 posts, read 43,884 times
Reputation: 139
Quote:
Originally Posted by HookTheBrotherUp
Yes, Galveston was larger, and more prosperous. Also, the main Mardi Gras celebrations on the Gulf Coast were at Galveston, and not New Orleans... if you can believe that!
Of course, this is according to reading about the history of Galveston... I'm not that old!
I really did read that, I wish I could find it again. I think it had something to do with the state of the nation, maybe before, or after a war, but I do recall reading that the celebration was big. For what it's worth, the author made the claim, not me.
Galveston’s first recorded Mardi Gras celebration, in 1867, included a masked ball at Turner Hall (Sealy at 21st St.) and a theatrical performance from Shakespeare’s “King Henry IV” featuring Alvan Reed (a justice of the peace weighing in at 350 pounds!) as Falstaff.
The first year that Mardi Gras was celebrated on a grand scale in Galveston was 1871 with the emergence of two rival Mardi Gras societies, or “Krewes” called the Knights of Momus (known only by the initials “K.O.M.”) and the Knights of Myth, both of which devised night parades, masked balls, exquisite costumes and elaborate invitations. The Knights of Momus, led by some prominent Galvestonians, decorated horse-drawn wagons for a torch lit night parade. Boasting such themes as “The Crusades,” “Peter the Great,” and “Ancient France,” the procession through downtown Galveston culminated at Turner Hall with a presentation of tableaux and a grand gala.
However, New Orleans Mardi Gras celebrations began in 1699, so Galveston was NOT first.
Mardi Gras has been celebrated in New Orleans since the explorer Iberville first set foot here on Mardi Gras Day 1699. In French colonial days, wealthy members of Creole society threw lavish Mardi Gras balls from Twelfth Night (Jan. 6) to Fat Tuesday Eve. In 1857, the first parade rolled through the city streets, courtesy of the Mistick Krewe of Comus. And in 1872, Rex, the king of Mardi Gras made his debut. Today, hundreds of Mardi Gras clubs (krewes) host grand balls and dozens of parade.
Galveston’s first recorded Mardi Gras celebration, in 1867, included a masked ball at Turner Hall (Sealy at 21st St.) and a theatrical performance from Shakespeare’s “King Henry IV” featuring Alvan Reed (a justice of the peace weighing in at 350 pounds!) as Falstaff.
The first year that Mardi Gras was celebrated on a grand scale in Galveston was 1871 with the emergence of two rival Mardi Gras societies, or “Krewes” called the Knights of Momus (known only by the initials “K.O.M.”) and the Knights of Myth, both of which devised night parades, masked balls, exquisite costumes and elaborate invitations. The Knights of Momus, led by some prominent Galvestonians, decorated horse-drawn wagons for a torch lit night parade. Boasting such themes as “The Crusades,” “Peter the Great,” and “Ancient France,” the procession through downtown Galveston culminated at Turner Hall with a presentation of tableaux and a grand gala.
However, New Orleans Mardi Gras celebrations began in 1699, so Galveston was NOT first.
Mardi Gras has been celebrated in New Orleans since the explorer Iberville first set foot here on Mardi Gras Day 1699. In French colonial days, wealthy members of Creole society threw lavish Mardi Gras balls from Twelfth Night (Jan. 6) to Fat Tuesday Eve. In 1857, the first parade rolled through the city streets, courtesy of the Mistick Krewe of Comus. And in 1872, Rex, the king of Mardi Gras made his debut. Today, hundreds of Mardi Gras clubs (krewes) host grand balls and dozens of parade.
I think there's more legitimacy to the claim that MOBILE,AL is the birthplace of Mardi Gras as we know it today in the states.
Mobile is older than New Orleans and was also founded by the French so I tend to believe that's where it started. New Orleans being the bigger port city made Mardi Gras more popular that's for sure. And because of New Orleans demographics, Mardi Gras there probably had more of an attraction than Mobile because of the uniqueness of New Orleans culture at that time.
So I was actually reading up on this awhile back. Houston Public library had a conversation about the impact of the 1900 storm on Galveston's future and what if it never took place.
Basically, if the 1900 Storm never happened Galveston would have suffered a worst fate with the 1915 Hurricane. Why? Because they never would have built the seawall to lessen the damage.
The crazy thing is the city had heated discussions to build a seawall before the 1900 storm but many people choose not to because they believed a hurricane of that magnitude would not strike the Island. Remember they've had several storms before pass by and the Island continued to grow. Crazy to think people were that negligent but than you look at a situation like Hurricane Katrina and realize modern society is really no different then past societies. But because of that storm the Port of Houston position itself as the go to port in the region. Before the storm it was the center of trade in Texas and one of the busiest ports in the nation.
Would we see more of a Galveston-Pasadena-Houston MSA if Galveston took the threat of a hurricane more serious? Considering how prosperous and important Galveston was before the storm it's very possible. Or maybe Houston would still surpass Galveston since Houston being more inland was more built for the growth we see today. Still I think it's pretty obvious that had it not been for the storm Galveston would be much bigger and important than what it is today.
I can imagine Houston-Galveston being more like Dallas-Ft.Worth now or maybe even Los Angeles-Long Beach. Because Galveston had the bones to become a true urban center of Texas. Galveston couldn't sprawl it could only built up. I don't think it would be built out like Manhattan but maybe more like New Orleans.
I could definitely see urban lovers probably wanting to move to Galveston more than Austin just off the urban layout of the city. It's really a shame.
The interesting question here becomes, "Would the additional 15 years of development in Galveston have made a difference in how the 1915 hurricane was handled there?" They did have more warning in advance of the 1915 hurricane than they did for the 1900 one and it would have been a bigger city. I think there's an argument to be made that more momentum might have been sustained if the 1900 hurricane had never hit (but the 1915 one still did) primarily just due to the city having more inertia nationally.
Either way, I still don't think Galveston would be bigger than Houston. I think best case scenario, you're talking maybe 500,000 people in the city itself (I'd be more inclined to say 350-400K). But the 45 corridor between the two would be heavily developed, and essentially the entirety of Galveston County would be urbanized. Either the island itself or southern Galveston county on the mainland just north of the island would probably be the regional CBD.
I think Houston would have been a smaller city today, about the size of Dallas, and would have grown more south and east as opposed to north and west. With that said, there would still be significant suburbs west and north of the city and probably more incorporated towns as Houston wouldn't have been able to swallow them as quickly as it actually was able to historically due to a slower-growing ETJ. Ft. Bend County and Montgomery County would be much smaller. I'll make an assumption that infrastructure to the east would be strengthened in a more Galveston-centric region and assume that Chambers County would see significantly more growth than it has with the current setup.
Also, I think Brazoria County would be the center of suburban development for both Galveston and Houston and one of the largest suburban counties in the nation. It's a giant county (only slightly smaller than Harris) and though it has a lot of low-lying land, the reality of a strong Galveston would likely have led to intense development there anyway. The regional international airport would have very likely been built there between the two cities (as Scholes Field would have suffered the same fate as Hobby at the dawn of the jet age).
Totally agree that regional public transit would probably be much better with a multi-nodal setup, especially considering the high density on Galveston Island and the surrounding area in this scenario.
I'm thinking something like this:
City of Galveston: 400K
City of Houston: 1.3M (in a somewhat smaller area, maybe 300-400 sq. mi.)
The regional power dynamics in such a setup would be interesting. Galveston would likely be richer and better known, but Houston would likely be the economic and growth engine for the region, and of course much bigger as a city. That's not really akin to how the Bay Area operates as San Jose isn't that much bigger than San Francisco, at least not to the extent I would see Houston being bigger than Galveston.
Interesting thought experiment overall. I think it would have been a better region all things considered if things had turned out this way. Especially because the area would have been even more flood prone and perhaps more likely to take flood issues into greater account - its harder to ignore when the coast is right there.
Last edited by Mr. Clutch; 02-02-2021 at 06:15 PM..
Can you'all imagine a Miami Beach type Galveston and a mainland inclusion that may have back-in-a-day became viable reclaimed from the water land to build on as aspects of Miami and a spreading Real..... tropical setting.
Why Houston does not embrace and plant more tropical yards for homes that it can support and Palms it can ... I cannot figure out. Yet wants to be seen as sub-tropical.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Uhmm...
