Baytown Nature Center is a 450-acre coastal preserve on a peninsula along the Houston Ship Channel that combines public recreation with rich wildlife habitat. The site was once Brownwood, a neighborhood of nearly 400 homes, but Hurricane Carla in 1961, later hurricane damage, and severe land subsidence left much of it flooded and abandoned. Beginning in the 1980s, Baytown and partner organizations transformed the damaged residential area through the Brownwood Marsh Restoration Project, removing infrastructure and rebuilding wetlands, channels, ponds, and native vegetation. The restored landscape now supports hundreds of bird species, serves as a nursery for marine life, and offers recreation, education, and birdwatching.