New Stores in Willis, TX at I-45 and FM 1097: Open and Upcoming

Between May and the end of this year, six businesses will have opened or be on track to open along a short run of I-45 frontage in Willis. The addresses go from 12030 to 12264 I-45 N. Three are already open. LongHorn Steakhouse, Planet Fitness and Lowe's are next, and their latest public timelines all fall in November or "this fall." Once they open, the corner at FM 1097 will cover a broader range of everyday trips than it did at the start of 2026.

Here's what's open, what's coming and how firm each date is, along with where the road work around the interchange stands as of early October 2026.

The address numbers tell the story

The new openings follow the frontage road in order. Going by street number:

1. Mavis Tires & Brakes, 12030 I-45 N. The company announced the Willis opening on May 27, 2026. The store sells tires from the major brands along with Mavis's own service line.
2. LongHorn Steakhouse, 12140 I-45 N. LongHorn's official new-locations page lists the Willis restaurant as "Opens November 2."
3. Chuy's, 12160 I-45. A company representative confirmed to Community Impact that the restaurant opened May 25, near the I-45 and FM 1097 intersection. It's open daily from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
4. Lowe's, 12220 I-45 N. USA Today's Sept. 25, 2026 update on Lowe's openings lists Willis as "opening in late November."
5. Planet Fitness, 12260 I-45 N. The club's official page says "Opening this fall."
6. PetSmart, 12264 I-45 N. The $1 million store held its grand opening Sept. 19. It offers grooming, training and pet adoption.

That's tire service, a Tex-Mex dinner, a steakhouse, a home improvement store, a gym and a pet store, all in the same corner and all within one calendar year. Chuy's opened May 25, and Mavis announced its opening two days later. PetSmart followed almost four months after that. The latest public timelines for the next three point to November or "this fall."

A center that was already the main stop

The new openings are joining a corner that was already busy. The three highest addresses on that list sit inside the Market at Willis Shopping Center. Developer Fidelis Realty Partners places the center at the southeast corner of I-45 and FM 1097. Fidelis announced the groundbreaking on the H-E-B-anchored center in September 2021, so this year's openings are adding to a project that started five years ago.

On its current property page, the developer lists nine anchors: H-E-B, Ross Dress for Less, Five Below, Burlington, Academy, PetSmart, Planet Fitness, Lowe's and Ulta Beauty. The center directory adds First Watch, McAlister's Deli, MOD Pizza, Great Clips, Memorial Hermann, Aspen Dental, PNC Bank and Mattress Firm. The directory ties Lowe's to 12220 I-45 N and Planet Fitness to 12260 I-45 N. Its I-45 addresses start at 12206 and run north.

Mavis, LongHorn and Chuy's have lower numbers, at 12030, 12140 and 12160, and the directory doesn't list them as tenants. They're best described as neighbors on the same frontage. For anyone running errands, all of them sit along the same frontage near FM 1097. The distinction does explain why the center's own directory won't list every new business on this stretch.

The developer's description of the center explains why so many openings landed here. Fidelis calls the Market at Willis "the predominant retail shopping center in Willis and surrounding areas." It says the closest shopping center is more than five miles away, and that "retail shopping, personal services, and casual and fast-casual restaurants are vastly lacking in the immediate vicinity."

That's leasing copy written to attract tenants, so it reads like a pitch. It also explains the tenant mix. Each 2026 arrival fills one of the categories Fidelis named. Mavis is a personal service, and Chuy's and LongHorn are casual dining. Lowe's and PetSmart are the kind of big-box retail that usually sits in a larger shopping center.

More space is still under construction

The center isn't finished. Fidelis says construction continues in Phase II. It lists inline and endcap spaces of 12,712, 9,600, 8,912 and 6,405 square feet, all of which can be divided. Space also appears in a second list on the same page that gives 7,600 square feet instead of 9,600. The rest of the figures match.

Those spaces are why a list of this corner's businesses won't stay current for long. Divisible inline space usually goes to smaller tenants such as a salon, a quick-service restaurant or a medical office. None of those spaces has a named tenant in the sources reviewed for this post. When new signs go up in Phase II, they'll be additions to a center that already has its anchors.

How firm each date is

The three upcoming openings come with different levels of certainty. Each source words its date differently:

LongHorn gives the most exact day and month, but its page doesn't print a year, so the listing on its own doesn't confirm a 2026 opening. Check LongHorn's page before planning a dinner around it.

Planet Fitness has a construction filing behind its date. In May 2026, Community Impact reported a state filing for the 12260 I-45 N club with a $1.3 million estimated cost and a July to November 2026 construction window. If the build stays on schedule, the club would open around the time that window closes, which fits the company's "this fall."

Lowe's is the biggest of the three. A state filing lists a 107,136-square-foot store at 12220 I-45 N, with construction dates of Oct. 1, 2025 through Dec. 31, 2026. The company's careers site is already advertising part-time jobs at the Willis address. USA Today's late-November estimate falls about a month before the filing's end date. Willis is one of only two Texas Lowe's stores on that list still marked as upcoming.

If all three open on the timelines listed, a single stop at this corner could cover lumber, dog food, a workout and a steak dinner.

Getting there on FM 1097

All of this sits at the I-45 interchange with FM 1097, so the condition of FM 1097 matters to anyone coming from the west side of Willis or the north shore of the lake.

Community Impact's Sept. 24, 2026 road roundup reported that the widening of FM 1097 from two lanes to four, between Blueberry Hills Road and Lake Conroe Hills Drive, was 96% complete as of TxDOT's Sept. 4 update. A separate project at FM 1097 and Atkins Creek, which replaces a culvert and adds shoulders, was 95% complete in the same update. Both schedules end in the third quarter of 2026, which closed Sept. 30. Neither had been reported finished when the September update came out, so some lane closures or final striping may still be in place.

The rail crossing is a longer-term issue. At an August 2026 town hall, TxDOT said no further FM 1097 widening project was funded. A possible railroad overpass was described as preliminary and unfunded, and a TxDOT official said construction would be at least 10 years away even if a design were chosen. As Lowe's, LongHorn and Planet Fitness open, more traffic will head to this interchange, and the rail crossing on FM 1097 isn't scheduled to change for at least a decade.

Also on the Willis calendar this month

The new stores aren't the only thing happening in Willis on Oct. 31. The City of Willis's October/November newsletter lists a Fall Festival & Pumpkin Patch that day from noon to 11 p.m. It takes place in the agriculture area of Charles Traylor Memorial Park, 13551 Rogers Road, with a farmers market, games, prizes, photo stations and food.

If you're trying to decide whether a home is close enough to the I-45 and FM 1097 corner to make the new stores part of your routine, or whether your home's value reflects the retail that's moved in nearby, Aqua Terra Real Estate can walk you through what has opened near your address and how buyers are weighing it.