Photo by Michael Paulsen: Adickes' Obama head.

Roadside attractions are great: The Largest Ball of Twine, The Blue Whale, Wild Bill's Nostalgia Center. Cadillac Ranch, etc. Houston has no shortage of eccentric places of its own, like the Orange Show, Beer Can House, Art Car Museum, among others. But what about the one that might get away?

David Adickes' giant presidential heads were to get a home in Pearland. Imagined as "The Venice of Houston," the giant concrete heads would line a meandering waterway and/or ponds. With its unique aquatic twist, the Pearland park was to be the third such Presidents Park, in addition to ones in Williamsburg, Virginia and Black Hills, South Dakota. The over-sized busts were to be in the dedicated park, residing in the yet to be complete WaterLights District. Unfortunately, the housing-market implosion put a halt to building and sales of the houses, draining the project of the funds that would have built the rest neighboring park.

With little online information, the current status of the Waterlights District and its promise of giant-headed neighborhood landmarks is in unknown. But the idea of a residential roadside attraction is too promising an idea and I am rooting for an economic recovery for many reasons, including this particularly strange one.