Growth and Change North of the Houston Sprawl 

This week’s trek begins just north of I-99 and Kingwood on US 59, sections of which were renamed I-69. Cleveland and Splendora were the first places I went through. Since they are so heavily influenced by Houston’s sprawling growth, I did not spend a lot of time and effort there. My gut told me there were richer stories to be found farther north. My instincts proved correct.

Don’t Worry About Bigfoot

Peeling off 59 and entering the Sam Houston National Forest, I immediately felt, as an old Texas tourism ad touted, that I had entered a “whole other country.”  At 163,000 acres, Sam Houston is the largest of Texas’ four national forests—the others being Angelina, Davy Crockett, and Sabine. Most of this treasured preserve lies in San Jacinto County, but it also occupies parts of Montgomery and Walker Counties. Polk County, just to the north, lays claim to the Big Thicket Natural Area. Don’t buy into lingering claims of Sasquatches living in these woods. Have no fear, the only Yetis you will find here are the coolers brought by nature lovers to the 635-acre Lake Livingston State Park.

‘Middle of Nowhere’

On a back road, I arrived at my first targeted destination. Coldspring, about 65 miles north of Houston, turned out to be a delightful gem of a town. Local tradition holds that the town got its name from Joseph Graves who named it for the cold spring water found there.

Since the 1920s, the lumber industry has been important to the town. The construction of Livingston Dam on the Trinity River in 1968 led to further development of the town as well as San Jacinto and surrounding counties.

In 1969, residents voted to incorporate the town. Coldspring is faring quite well these days with sustainable population growth. It has grown by 1.6 percent annually and increased by almost 8.25 percent since the 2020 U.S. Census.

Visitors will be impressed by a well-maintained community. The sign on the façade of the Mason Jar Café Bar and Grill, located on the main crossroads in town, probably extolls the perfect tagline for Coldspring and maybe the rest of San Jacinto County: “Conveniently Located in the Middle of Nowhere.”

It is only a short drive to the dam on the Trinity that created Lake Livingston. Coldspring is the county seat of San Jacinto County and as such, it benefits from the baseline of economic stimulus that county government provides. Timber, agriculture, and tourism remain the town’s other economic drivers. The most current population estimate pegs the county’s population in late 2024 at 29,326.

Timber to Tourism

Rather than backtracking to Shepherd, I went on to Livingston, Coldspring’s bigger sister city in neighboring Polk County. The back roads I traversed to get there were delightfully hilly with dramatic changes in elevation. It was refreshing to see and experience wild and natural places where man has trodden lightly.

Livingston sits at the junction of US 190 and 59 and the traffic, especially on 190, was surprisingly horrific. Even the locals complain about it. That alone told me more was happening in or near this town than data alone reveal. It’s the county seat of Polk County and has benefitted from a variety of economic inputs beginning as early as the late 1800s, including cotton farming and, later, vegetable production, oil exploration and production, lumbering and sawmills, brick manufacturing, and, since the construction of Lake Livingston, tourism and recreation. Its population has grown slowly to an estimated 5,758 in 2025.

Here is the real story for this area. A leading local Realtor I spoke with confirmed that many of the recreation-oriented houses on Lake Livingston—a gigantic body of water (83,000 surface acres) with many lakefront, lakeview, and near-lake homes—became permanent residences after COVID-19. I believe there are at least several reasons that explain this:

1. People left the workforce during the “Great Resignation,” and many retired to live full time at what was once their second home.

2. Remote work was extended for some, allowing them to work from virtually anywhere if they had reliable Internet service.

3. Some found jobs in local or nearby markets.

4. Others started commuting back to jobs in the larger city.

My Realtor contact emphasized the growth of students in Livingston’s school system, requiring construction of a new elementary and high school as further evidence of population growth not captured in CDP (Census-Designated Place) data. A colleague at work reminded me that just east of Livingston lies the 255-space “Escapees RV Park” (the largest in Texas is El Campo Lost Lagoon in Austin with 440 spaces). That project houses somewhere between 400 and 500 people either part- or full-time. They add to the population using services in Livingston.

Unlike what I have seen in other towns this size that are within the orbit of a major metro like Houston, no volume homebuilder has entered the market. What has come to Livingston is just about every fast-food or restaurant franchise, free-standing retailer, or service you can think of—plus H.E.B., Walmart, Lowe’s, and critical care medical facilities.

The U.S. Census reports median commuting times of about 31 minutes, meaning actual commutes can be as much as 50 percent more. I asked my Realtor contact if she knew of residents commuting long distances, like 90 miles or more, and she confirmed this was not uncommon. Texas commuters are a hardy breed as I have encountered evidence of extreme distance commuting elsewhere in my travels.

One other change in small town Texas was confirmed and became crystal clear during this time on the road. Not only have the minimum site selection requirements for many retail entities, eateries, and service providers been changed to bring smaller towns into consideration, but some small businesses that originated in smaller Texas towns have scaled their operations to other small Texas towns. Some even braved entering metro markets, and a few expanded beyond the state’s borders. I’m referencing growing from one facility to 20 or more in new markets.

New Satellite City?

I closed out this trek by taking a quick look at Huntsville, which has grown dramatically and whose businesses and institutions are probably a source of employment for some living on Lake Livingston as well as Lake Conroe.

Enrollment at Sam Houston State University has been growing at about 5 percent per year. The town itself grew from 45,941 in 2020 to almost 48,552 in late 2024. The city estimates it will reach the 50,000 mark by 2026, assuming a growth rate of 5.7 percent, which was the rate from 2020 to 2023.

Huntsville will probably take its place as another satellite—like Conroe and the Woodlands—in Houston’s expanding orbit, reinforcing that mega city’s pattern of multi-nucleated growth.