Gulfton, Houston  Gulfton is a community in Southwest Houston, Texas, United States that includes a group of apartment complexes that primarily house refugee and immigrant populations. It is located between the 610 Loop and Beltway 8, west of the City of Bellaire, southeast of Interstate 69/U.S. Highway 59, and north of Bellaire Boulevard. In the 1960s and 1970s Gulfton experienced rapid development, with new apartment complexes built for young individuals from the Northeast and Midwest United States. They came to work in the oil industry during the 1970s oil boom. In the 1980s, as the economy declined, existing tenants left, resulting in a significant drop in occupancy rates in the apartment complexes and forcing many complexes into bankruptcy and foreclosure. Owners marketed the empty units to newly arrived immigrants and Gulfton became a predominantly immigrant community. Beginning in the 1980s Gulfton's crime rate increased and schools were increasingly overwhelmed with excess students. "Houstonians" (Houston citizens) nicknamed the community the "Gulfton Ghetto." The city of Houston responded to the sudden demographic shifts by increasing police presence, and the school district responded by opening more schools to handle the influx of students. After the 1980s demographic and socioeconomic transitions, Gulfton gained a community college campus, two additional elementary schools, added public bus routes, a park, a community center, a public library, and a juvenile detention facility. By 2000 Gulfton was the most densely populated community in Houston, with 71 percent Hispanic residents, including many recent immigrants from Mexico and Central America. Although traditionally a Salvadoran and Mexican neighborhood, many immigrants began coming from different Latin-American countries, particularly from Venezuela, Honduras, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guatemala and Colombia. Before 1950, Gulfton consisted of farm land and much of the area belonged to Westmoreland Farms. In the mid-1950s, the Shenandoah subdivision was established; consisting of sixteen city blocks of ranch-style homes. Shenandoah was located adjacent to the land which would later become the site of the Gulfton apartment complexes. Decades later these communities would clash as the apartments surrounding Shenandoah deteriorated and property values became threatened. Due to the large parcels of land available and the grid road pattern, Gulfton was well-suited for the construction of large apartment complexes. In the 1960s, a number of large apartment buildings were built. More complexes were added during the 1970s as Houston prospered from the oil boom.