A visit from the Material Girl, a long-gone look at a seven-lane I-10 and more make up this month's look at Houston in July 1987.

* Thousands turned out to see Madonna at the Astrodome during the "Who's That Girl" tour. A far fewer, but still sizable, number descended upon Hobby Airport for her arrival, too.

Marty Racine covered the concert for the Chronicle. Here's what he wrote on July 26, 1987.

Dreams do come true for an ambitious material girl in these here United States in the 1980s, and despite the hoopla, Madonna bottled and sold her dreams and pulled it off with convincing style in her much-anticipated Astrodome concert Friday night, the 10th stop of her 16-city American tour. The bigger-than-life show was excellent in pacing, choreography and lighting. Musically, however, this synthesized disco-dance stuff was a hair more interesting than its usual limitations. Pop is a very strange animal these days when a movie star sells this much music.

[...]

It was a look-at-me crowd, all gussied up in sharp haircuts and bright red lipstick and high heels - but outside of the few parental entourages not all that different in age or style than the typical arena-rock clientele. Teen-age girls, dreaming those Big Dreams that do come true, made up a large portion, posing the question: Has there ever been a bigger, more popular female role model to the girls in pop music?

You've got all day to consider.

[...]

She started with "Open Your Heart" and then dealt equally with material from her three studio albums (Madonna, Like A Virgin and "True Blue") and the "Who's That Girl" soundtrack. "Love Makes The World Go Round" was a highlight, as was "Causing A Commotion," "Papa Don't Preach" (done to a disjointed video presentation), "Material Girl," "Like A Virgin" and the double encore consisting of "La Isla Bonita," "Who's That Girl?" and a long, drawn-out Big Ending to "Holiday".

The Marilyn Monroe shtick? Not really evident. Up close, in person and on either of two video screens, Madonna looked - makeup or the strain of success? - quite older than her 26 years. There was a world- weary look about her, something behind the makeup that said: Unlike Marilyn or unlike the fallen victims of '60s rock such as Janis Joplin (this is the '80s, after all) this girl knows what she wants, well, indeed, has obtained it. Without shame. Without rationalizing. We are what we own. Perhaps that headlong plunge into "maturity" is one attraction for teen-agers, growing up as fast as they can, vamping in the mirror.

The result is a respectable naughtiness. Madonna's provocative and wholesome at the same time, nice and naughty, strong and vulnerable.

While she was outfitted at first in a risque black body suit, and while the glamorous - almost unattainable - side of femininity was on display, Madonna refrained from any cheap or low-grade sexual theatrics that could have subverted the show's pacing and its single-minded commitment to Dance. She swirled and strutted like the most glamorous whippet in a disco, coasted on back and forth on the kind of moving sidewalks found in large airports, played with the music, the microphone, the dancers, the boys in the band with perfect timing.

There is a charisma about her. She's a star. Thousands say so. It's the Hollywood Dream for a girl from Michigan. She oughta be in pictures.

*To be honest, I never knew Oshman's owned Abercrombie & Fitch in the late 1970s and 1980s. This month in 1987, the Houston-based company sold it to an investor group.

From Daniel Benedict's July 24 article:

[Richard L. Bockart, Oshman's vice president and treasurer] said Thursday that the sale has nothing to do with financing Oshman's expansion into the Northeast through a new chain of stores to be called Superstores USA, the first of which is to open in Princeton, N.J., next month.

"We had a good offer," Bockart said. He declined to say whether the investors were buying all 27 A&F stores. Three stores are in Houston, and two are in Dallas. Nine are in the Northeast, six are in California and the rest are scattered in throughout the Midwest and West.

Through a licensing arrangement, there are two A&F stores in Japan and one in Canada, but those outlets are not owned by Oshman's.

Oshman's bought the rights to the Abercrombie & Fitch trade name in 1978 from First National Bank of Chicago, which had been A&F's largest lender until the company closed in 1977.

* "Does the future lie in light rail?"

That's what a Chronicle headline asked on July 19, 1987. As Metro leaders weighed a light rail option connecting downtown and west Houston, some wondered if the future actually rested in bus transportation instead.

From Bill Mintz's article:

The average employed Houstonian drives about 15 miles to work each day, and almost 90 percent of the commuters make the trip alone, in their own cars, to jobs spread throughout the city. Others ride in car pools and van pools.

Only 4 percent responding to a recent poll said they ride a bus.

This insistence on staying buckled in private cars limits the Metropolitan Transit Authority's ability to fulfill its objective of helping to improve mobility - especially relieving peak hour congestion.

Metro planners say their proposal to build a 16-mile light rail loop to tie together 69 miles of freeway busways and local bus routes to serve four principal work places is a unique Houston answer to the dilemma of providing mass transit in a sprawling, modern city.

And Metro General Manager Alan Kiepper said the growing patronage of the Metro system shows Houstonians are willing to use a convenient, reliable transit system. As transit patronage declined in most American cities, Metro enjoyed a 52 percent increase in ridership since 1982.

But some political leaders and transportation experts continue to ask if a rail system is the wisest way to spend limited transportation resources.

"I don't believe the taxpayers of Harris County can afford a rail system at this time," Harris County Judge Jon Lindsay said. But he did not rule out rail in Houston in the future - "when the density is there to support it."

Texas Highway Commission member Robert C. Lanier said, "I think we do have a good bus system, and I am not trying to say rail would be of no value. My basic reservation is that nationwide, transit takes a little more than 3 percent of the city trips and the streets and thoroughfares carry a far greater percentage.

"At a time when the city is cutting back on maintenance for streets and thoroughfares, I'm not sure starting an expensive rail system is a wise way to spend money."

[...]

The Metro staff plan is a "system connector" rail line linking Metro's freeway transitways and local bus routes to four major employment centers with a total of about 300,000 daytime workers - downtown, Galleria-Post Oak, Greenway Plaza and the Texas Medical Center.

The proposed route begins at the Northwest Transit Center, planned for the northwest corner of the interchange of the Katy Freeway and the West Loop. The route runs adjacent to the West Loop and on street right-of-way on North Post Oak until it crosses over the Southwest Freeway. It then runs east on railroad right-of-way south of the freeway, crosses the freeway again near Newcastle and runs on street right-of-way on Richmond Avenue to Main Street, where it extends north to Buffalo Bayou and south to the Texas Medical Center.

The connector route - whether bus or rail - will link transitways that are open, under construction or planned on the North, Northwest, Katy, Southwest and Gulf freeways. No rail or busway is planned for the Katy Freeway between the West Loop and downtown because its five lanes are expected to remain relatively free of congestion until 2010 or later.