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Entries Tagged as 'Development News'

Fixing Foreclosures

December 24th, 2009 No Comments

All right, so fixing a foreclosure is sort of like fixing a divorce. Everyone involved might someday end up happier, but there’s no avoiding the damage that’s already been done. The word foreclosure originally meant ‘to prevent escape.’ With this catch in mind: a little good news. Our old friends at the Maryland Department of [...]

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Thoroughfare in Love and War

December 10th, 2009 No Comments

We never tire of saying that city living is better, but there are some ways in which Baltimore living could stand a little citification. Too much of our circulation throughout the city depends entirely on cars, an emphasis that complementarily makes life harder for those on bicycle or foot.
Transportation for America recently put out a [...]

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Development Spotlight – Supermarket, Lowe’s, &c.

December 3rd, 2009 3 Comments

“Busy, busy, busy,” is what Mr. Vonnegut said whenever something started, or finished, or just kept going. Hearing about plans for a large mixed-use development––including a new grocery and a Baltimore’s first Lowe’s –– in Remington and South Charles Village, it comes to mind. Yes, it’s going to need two neighborhoods.
Anderson Automotive, which has held [...]

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Machines for Living: Baltimore Architecture Week

October 8th, 2009 1 Comment

Sir Winston Churchill once said, “We shape our buildings: thereafter they shape us.”  And while that might not be as famous as his tiff with Lady Astor*, it may be just as true.   The environments we choose — be they physical, social, or mental — influence us in ways both small and large.  So, that [...]

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Development Spotlight: Pigtown Properties

September 2nd, 2009 2 Comments

Pigtown, Baltimore made its name and reputation on the steady parade of swine trundling through the neighborhood from B&O boxcars and into the local slaughterhouse. While most days you’re less likely to encounter many porcine residents than you might once have been, Pigtown is still a rich and (despite city-wide trends) growing slice of Baltimore. [...]

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Development Spotlight – Hotel Monaco

August 26th, 2009 No Comments

Development Spotlight – Hotel Monaco
It looks like the bad news was a near-miss. Kind of like when you’ve just almost been t-boned going through a fresh green light and then get the shudders and want to tell someone, but there isn’t anything to tell. Well, remember the B&O building {http://urbandiscoveriesblog.com/2009/05/28/development-spotlight-bo-american-brasserie/} in the Inner Harbor (2 [...]

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The Price is Right Now

July 23rd, 2009 1 Comment

The Price is Right Now
The Baltimore Sun’s real estate blog recently noted {http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/business/realestate/blog/2009/07/price_reductions_in_the_baltimore_area.html} that 25 percent of homes for sale nationwide have had their prices reduced since going on the market. If personal experience is any indication of reality, then this kind of pawn shop score is entirely normal. Both my grandmother’s condo and my [...]

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Development Spotlight: Penn Square

July 16th, 2009 3 Comments

A few days ago, the federal government did something it’s been doing a lot of lately:  it gave away a bundle of our money. But this time they gave some of it to… us! Specifically, the Treasury Department set aside $44 million for affordable housing in Maryland, an end which, in so far as we [...]

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Development Spotlight – Highlandtown Loft District

July 9th, 2009 No Comments

Used to be any serious town was built on a river; then the railroad became the thing as we moved out west. Now, despite recent decades of automobile-enabled sprawl, some developers are returning to the old wisdom with ambitious plans for infill construction in Southeast Baltimore along the route of the proposed Red Line.
The Southeast [...]

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Development Spotlight: Parkway Theatre

July 2nd, 2009 No Comments

This one has been in the works for almost a century now. The Parkway Theatre in Station North (5 W. North Avenue), built in 1915 as a venue for Vaudeville acts, has been reconceived and converted innumerable times. Vaudeville was already on its way out as the theatre was going up, so the original owners [...]

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