Why is Boston Growing and Baltimore Shrinking?

 Similarities

Boston and Baltimore seem to be made for a comparison. They are similar in size, they are both historic seaport cities connected to the Atlantic, both have an Inner Harbor and both economies run on “eds and meds” which is to say both have highly ranked research and medical facilities. Both played a major role in the Revolutionary War, both have similar looking historic frigates as a tourist attraction in their harbors. Both cherish crabcakes, and have a little Italy, both have famous baseball fields and both a  symphony orchestra named BSO.

Boston is teaming with tourists and their guides
(Photo Philipsen)

Interestingly, both, Bostonians and Baltimoreans are objecting to this comparison right away. Bostonians because Baltimore’s Oriole Park was designed with Fenway Park as a model, Baltimore’s frigate Constellation is just a replica many years younger than Boston’s original twin, the Constitution, Quincy Market next to Faneuil Hall is historic and Baltimore plagiarized it with its HarborPlace Pavilions, built by the same developer James Rouse, who rehabbed Quincy Market.

So why Bostonites look down their nose at Baltimore, Baltimoreans think Boston is stuck up, too white, too rich and just nothing Baltimore should aspire to.

Performance Metrics

Its probably not those animosities that cause Baltimore on such a different level than Boston which since 2000 grew by nearly 100,000 people from 589,000 to nearly 680,000 on just under 50 square miles, effectively trading places with Baltimore which shrank by nearly the same amount from 650,000 residents to now 580,000 on over 80 square miles.

Boston’s median household income is just south of $100,000 but with a poverty rate of around 17% which is much higher than that of its State whereas Baltimore’s hovers around $62,200 with a poverty rate of slightly under 20%, also double that of the State at large.

Baltimore’s share of black population is three times that of Boston. In both cities about a quarter of the Black population lives under or at the poverty level.

Boston Frigate Constitution with Bunker Hill
monument in the background Photo: Phlipsen)

Interestingly, both cities have pretty much the same size budget $4.9 billion vs 4.6 billion, which can be explained by Baltimore’s high property tax rate. Both are independent municipalities, even though Boston is technically part of Suffolk County.

Where Baltimore has a leg up is its port. While Boston's port is regional and does little international trade, Baltimore is a a leader in automobile imports and has large "bulk" volumes with a growing share in container shipments. 

Transportation

Both cities don’t run their own municipal transit system. Boston’s MBTA is a regional authority de jure part of and fully funded by the State of Massachusetts, whereas Baltimore’s MTA is fully a part of the state department of transportation. both agencies run light rail, subway, buses and commuter rail while MBTA also runs water taxis. However, what transit hits the ground in the respective cities could hardly be any more different. MBTA serves four times as many riders annually (240 million trips vs 64 million). Its 880 buses provide service on 171routes whereas MTA’s 750 buses serve only 80 but longer routes. MBTA has 5 rail lines, four operating like a subway, although in part using older type trolley cars, transporting 421,000 people a day plus a slightly higher numbers of bus riders. Baltimore has one subway line and one “light rail” line with a combined current ridership of under 30,000 plus about 160,000 that take buses.

Boston's Greenline: Old and crowded, but
they run (Photo: Phlipsen)

A curious detail is that MBTA still runs the Green Line service with a fleet of old trolley cars, some of which were already old when Baltimore bought its first fleet of LRT vehicles. Today Baltimore’s MTA insists that the fleet is so decrepit that they need $450 million for replacement and another staggering sum for adjusting the stations.

Because Baltimore’s MTA has made transit users happy for decades, the City stepped in and runs its own bus service, called the circulator, something that Boston doesn’t provide. The City also runs the commuter portion of Baltimore’s water taxi system, something that in Boston MBTA does. Boston’s most exciting water taxi runs straight from the airport to Boston’s Rowes Wharf, the Seaport District and several more landings.

Tourism

The water taxi was one of Baltimore’s tourism attractions but its services dwindled to weekend and on demand services. The operator is now trying to include an operational on-demand model similar to Uber or Lyft. The dwindling water taxi service (which in a typical Catch 22 came from dwinling demand) is just one example for the nagging sense that Baltimore can’t keep certain things going that once were the foundation of its success. HarborPlace is certainly another example but also small things like the amphibious Duck boats/buses or the hop on-hop off buses. We had those once plying the streets and the water and then they left for more lucrative cities.

By contrast, Boston has dozens of those two services, they are all over the place, all packed with tourists who enjoy the open air guided tours either on land or on sea or in combination.

Then there is Baltimore’s State owned World Trade Center that has nothing global in it except for an observation deck for the general public.. The folks of Boston’s Prudential Tower just spent $50 million to update their three tower observation decks and began charging an obscene $35 fee to get there. Baltimore had intentions to do an upgrade, but nothing came of it. There was even talk about closing it altogether, so our top of the World deck continues to languish in obscurity. Why? It could be a worthwhile attraction.

View from the observation deck of the Prudential
Tower Boston which sits on an air rights deck
over the Mass turnpike I-90 Photo: Phlipsen)

Another example attracting tourists and residents is the Harbor Promenade, 5 miles in length in Baltimore, 43 miles in Boston. A study was done to show gaps and omissions on Baltimore’s waterfront walkway, but nothing was done to address them. Meanwhile Boston’s walk celebrated its 40th anniversary with enhancements and preparations for rising sealevels.

There are lots of reasons why our tourism lags far behind Boston. Some are homemade.

Redevelopment

Ok one final thought on things Boston vs Baltimore. The final comparison is Boston Seaport or The South Boston Waterfront, as the officials call it, and Baltimore’s Port Covington or Baltimore Peninsula as officials now call it.

Seaport and Port Covington were both previously industrial sea to rail yards, seafood in Boston’s case, coal in Baltimore. In both instances developers itched for development there.

The Big Dig in Boston (undergrounding the elevated freeway I-93) finally enabled better access to the underdeveloped South Boston waterfront and the rush began around the year 2000. In Baltimore, it was Kevin Plank’s big dream that started a decade or more later. His desires set off a battle about Tax Increment Financing (TIFs) that were evntually approved in potentially recorde heights noth of $600 million. The TIF's stipulated the SB7 community benefits agreements and careful design mandates for the public spaces. Not so in Boston where the developers pretty much could do their thing as they saw fit.

Rose Kennedy Greenway in Boston sitting on top
of I-93 as a result of the big dig Photo: Phlipsen)

Today and after less than a decade Baltimore got stuck at about 2million sf of development, whereas Boston with its longer timeframe, has developed many more blocks including some projects executed by the semi public Massport Authority which runs the port, the airport and also real estate. One of MassPort’s investments was into the still existing seafood processing pier.

A private developer (WS) took on a full third of all development (7 million sf) including two Amazon HQ office buildings designed by Gensler. (Port Covington’s HQ2 application failed. Gensler also designs MCB’s dream for HarborPlace). In Boston Field Operations designed a privately managed 1/4 mile pedestrian greenway. In Baltimore the same landscape architect designs the public edge of the Middle Branch.

While Baltimore’s Port Covington masterplan was better designed and more scrutinized, it got stuck midways and nobody knows how it will continue or if at all. Boston’s market driven free-for-all advanced and is some 70% or so built out at this point. The place is teaming with people but is quite unaffordable with its high rents and condo prices and deried as too sterile by some established residents with the same arguments that some Baltimoreans make against Harbor East and HarborPoint. Boston’s Seaport has no community benefits agreement to invest into poorer areas.

This gets me back to HarborPlace, the modern clone of Quincy Market. Both of these festival market places (a concept Rouse tried in several places, including New York and Norfolk) were run and

Quincy Market in Boston in its current state. In need of an upgrade 
but far from deserted Photo: Phlipsen)

neglected by Ashkanazy development. The City of Boston exerted pressure through official default notices, demanded overdue payments, and ultimately effected that Ashkanazy sold its lease. Currently, under the guidance of Mayor Michelle Wu public-private workshops are deliberating how to bring back local crowds, curate new small businesses, and revitalize the downtown space which by no means looks as deserted and negelcted as Baltimore’s counterpart. Baltimore’s mayor saw to it that a local developer bought the HarborPlace pavilions and that a public referendum will allow taking parts of the public park for a giant mixed use development which includes nearly a 1000 apartments in two towers and which is currently not funded. Although there were some public input meetings, nobdoy had asked for apartment towers. The developer originally promised to not demolish the pavilions before his financing is secured but now plans demolition for this fall.

So is the comparison justified?

Whether Boston and Baltimore can be compared or are just too different in spite of obvious similarities can be a matter of extended debate. Boston certainly doesn’t have to compete with the nation’s capital just 30 miles away, the nearest larger city within a two hour drive is Hartford and not Philadelphia. Cambridge and Somerville 

Elm Street, Sumerville: Plenty of shops and transit
(Photo: Phlipsen)

just beyond the city limits are lovely places and home to MIT, Harvard and Tufts University that appear to integrate with the city of Boston much better than Towson or Catonsville do with Baltimore. 

Boston was always convinced of its importance, whether as a City on the Hill , The Athens of America or the Cradle of Liberty or as a Global City. Baltimore less so. It is Charm City or the City that Reads. "Lack of self confidence" is probably not a meaningful category since no city has a psychology. Yet, continuing with psychological terms, the legacy of having been once America’s second largest city with a lot of heavy manufacturing industry offering good jobs to freed blacks from the plantations of the south that morphed into deindustrialization leaving many less educated former workers stranded in a new ecomomy heavy on academics certainly left behind a lot of trauma. In that Baltimore is more like the rest of formerly industrial America than Boston.

Boston’s role as a northern city is beyond dispute. By contrast, Baltimore sitting just South of the Mason Dixon Line could never quite decide whether it wanted to be mobtown with a history of riots going all the way to the present time or a place of innovation, invention and prosperity. A bit lamely it settled on authenticity and grit. 

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Under Armour's mass timber  HQ at Port Covington (Photo: Philipsen)

Boston's part of Amazon's HQ2 in Boston Seaport (Photo: Philipsen)

The Key Bridge Saga Continues

The collapse of the iconic over two years ago Key Bridge has pretty much receded into the distant past bunched up with all the other calamities that happened since then. The long detours and the back-ups at the Harbor tunnel have become part of the daily routine but exact a daily toll on the Marylad economy.

But once in a while the topic of the missing bridge jolts back into the spotlight, for example yesterday.  when Governor Moore toured the construction site with Republican Senators to ensure they don't give him a hard time for the delays and cost explosions or revoke federal funding. This March, exactly two years after the collapse, the contractor hired to rebuild was fired, and the "progressive design build" model thought to be so innovative and effective collapsed as fulminantly as the bridge itself. Initially estimated to be around $1.7 to 1.9bn bn the contractor's final cost offer was even double of the already doubled and tripled updated cost estimate of MDTA from last fall. ($4.3 billion and $5.2 bn) The $9bn that general contractor Kiewit presumably had proffered before being fired were just was too much to swallow.  

By comparison, the Gordie Howe International Bridge over the Detroit River connecting to Canada that opened just now cost under $5bn (including soft cost) and has a longer main span, more lanes and a bike/pedway. It has less clearance and, therefore, shorter approach ramps. 

Now, four months after the firing of the contractor what could the Governor tell his sceptical political counterparts?

Moore on a boat tour explaining the Key Bridge rebuild
(Maryland Matters)

“We have to have a transparent process, I want to see why these costs have ballooned and what are the performance measures that are built in … because now, the whole country is paying for this.” (Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va., chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee)

Foremost, Moore was pointing to still ongoing work under the old contract. Driving foundation piles and building construction trestles for the next is work is part of early contracts not affected by the firing. Yet, even the extensive trestle platform work so construction equipment can be placed on them instead of using floating cranes, begs the maybe naive question whether these trestles couldn't eventually be converted to devices that protect the piers from impacts. I am just looking for some innovation that would accelerate things and save cost.

None of the additional work not yet underway has been bid yet, let alone started, not even for the portions that don't depend on the foundation work or trestles.

There is no point in gleefully pointing to early skepticism about the originally proposed approach or the imprecise scope of the original contract which I covered in my earlier posts (More questions than answers). Now it is time to look at the new approach and if it is more confidence instilling. The Governor surely hopes so, he told his guests on the boat that -while a completion date is still uncertain- the divided contracts will give the State better cost control. That is, once they have new contractors on board. In the meantime, construction cost seem to be on a run-away train fueled by general inflation and risen energy cost. 

A big driver in the ballooning cost is that the new bridge is also almost 50 feet taller than the old one, something that slipped through without much discussion and required the demolition of the old still intact approach ramps. As far as I know, this wasn't mandated by anyone and is still a debatable requirement since very tall ships could be served at Trade Point Atlantic's piers currently under construction without passing the new bridge.  

Using a script from the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, MDTA now wants to break the work up into four separate contracts, three as traditional design-bid-build contracts. This version of procurement means that MDTA needs to provide 100% design and construction documents to bidders which then provide a schedule and a commit to a cost. Getting the documents from 70% design which was done by the fired contractor to 100% is the reason why the bid has not yet been advertised.

This approach ensures an equal playing field because everyone bids the same scope of work and it gives cost certainty once a bid has been approved unless new and previously undiscoverable facts would emerge during construction. 

The work bid this way includes the two landside approaches and the remaining demolition. The  ramps  on each side of the bridge over water are almost identical in their scope of work and design with a slight difference in length. It isn't clear what benefit splitting them will provide, especially on the accessory items such as guardrails, liking, signs, pavement marking etc. for which scale is an advantage. Having two different contractors provide the parts of the new construction on which the main bridge contractor rests his bridge has its own set of risks, namely the possibility of delays or pushing responsibilities around between the contractors if something goes wrong. 

These packages are supposed to be advertised for bid this fall with a notice to proceed (construction begin) in the spring of 2027. This would mean that construction of even these very conventional bread and butter parts of the rebuild would not happen any earlier than a full three years after the collapse. No wonder that even the Governor doesn't want to promise completion by 2030, two years after it was originally envisioned.

Parts of the old approach ramps and the pylons are still standing
(WBFF)

The biggest contract is the main span over the shipping channel and the portion of the two approaches  that are over water. This contract will be bid as Design-Build, i.e. similar to the original procurement exceopt that this time around the design documents are 70% complete. Still, the bidder has to verify their accuracy to take full responsibility, complete the remaining 30%, and then provide a firm cost for the construction. Certain innovations or deviations from the 70% design would be allowed as long as they don't violate the main established parameters such as the alignment, the lanes and their width, the required clear height and span, and the necessary pier protection. 

It doesn't help speeding things up that this crown jewel contract will be advertised in two steps, first as a request for qualifications (issued today) and then in a second step in the spring of 2027 with actual proposals received from a shortlisted group. In this manner construction will not begin any earlier than the summer of next year.  Given that Kiewit was fired in March of this year leaving a 70% design package and given that the entire industry has been aware of this project since the first "industry days" that MDTA conducted in 2024, not having a new contractor on board until the summer of 2027 appears to be a long delay. This new contractor for the main spans of the bridge will have to rely on Kiewitt's trestle work, the piles for the pylon foundations and the two other contractors building the approach ramps on each side of the bridge. That's a lot of stuff to coordinate for MDTA and potentially a lot to explain by whoever will be governor when the new bridge will be finally complete.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

The below slides are taken from the MDTA presentation given at the June 18, 2026 "industry day" to potentially interested contractors. 

 

Contract 1: Demolition, $50m -100m

Design Bid Build

Demolition of 8 marine piers and two remaining land piers

 advertised winter 27!! Some of the design will be “directive” sealed by MDTA engineers. 70% design prepared to date will be provided for reference purposes, however it has to be verified by (new) contractor

Final schedule has not been completed.

Approach piers need to be there for the main span.

 

The Reimagined Middle Branch - Baltimore's Top Economic Engine

Ever since Kevin Plank's Port Covington chimera of an Under Armour driven innovation city on the Middle Branch collapsed on its own weight - and the area morphed into a much more modest "Baltimore Peninsula" - the public has tuned out of big visions and returned to the usual cynicism of Baltimore as the place that is forever in recovery. (Former SUN columnist Dan Rodricks). 

Not Brad Rogers, Executive Director at South Baltimore Gateway Partnership. Equipped with some $8 million of annual casino proceeds that are part of a community benefits agreement Rogers is bulllish about Baltimore and has been at work transforming South Baltimore under the moniker Reimagine the Middle Branch. 

As Roger points out, this body of water has been long neglected as a place where all the undesirable stuff could go, not only now defunct industrial uses such as the Carr Lowry glass factory or the Insulator company but also a giant BGE substation, the regional trash incinerator and the giant coal transfer station that carried the name port Covington and the central garage for City vehicles. 

View from the Port Covington Dock (Photo Philipsen)

Even after some developers with foresight, such as Pat Turner (Silo Point) saw the potential of this neglected body of water and invested in demolishing the glass factory and the substation, officials still had only bad ideas, such as a Walmart and Sam's Club or a casino and its giant parking garage all hard at the shoreline. 

But "the City in perpetual recovery" doesn't stand still. The big box stores became temporary Under Armour facilities (now replaced by its new mass timber headquarters), the City Garage became Under Armour's innovation lab and is now a start-up and incubator place and the casino became the money source of equity investments in South Baltimore. (Cherry Hill rec center).

Rogers never tires involving the South Baltimore communities in planning and in showing off the progress that has been made by guiding tours and meetings on land and on the water. 

Last Sunday he invited anyone interested to a free boat ride on Baltimore's water taxi party boat, large enough for a larger group, with a draft low enough to ply the shallow waters of the Middle Branch. The cupholders remained unused, though. 

The tour started at the pier east of Plank's distillery where a new pop-up Biergarten dubbed Seagarten has just been completed. There was a Asian food festival in progress and the area was teaming with life. When the boat took off we passed a large car carrier that brings imported cars to Baltimore's port, a Carnival cruise ship, and the two Navy ships docked in Port Covington. Baltimore certainly didn't look like a dying city. Quite the opposite, it looked more like a gateway to the world. 

Brad Rogers narrating the Middle Branch Tour

Rogers has a law degree and a masters in environmental management, has been on the job for 10 years. He  can easily cover a 1.5 hour narration of the area, including many historical sidebars and answering any questions from the audience. 

He talks about dredging the shipping lanes, the artificial islands that are built from dredge material and become wildlife refuges, rising waters and resiliency, fishing of invasive fish (and getting cash for it), delta wetlands and Patapsco river silt, Mason Cove (completed) and Smith Cove (in progress) between Cherry Hill and Westport, the giant stormwater pipe that delivers dirty run-off there that will soon be filtered by new wetlands, the new waterfront parks in front the new Westport townhomes, the planned monument for Baltimore's former baseball Negro League (Satchel Page), the trail construction and shoreline restoration in front of the Harbor Hospital. 

It all will be part of the new Middle Branch waterfront promenade that will connect all those jewels and will run from the environmental education center at Mason Cove all the way to the cruise ship terminal. If only SHA would allow a pedestrian connection to Mason Cove and CSX the use of the historic rail alignment with the iconic turn bridge sitting idle in the water. Those two connections may take longer, but the rest of this trail system is well underway and in large parts complete and already used. 

But its not all shoreline restoration, trails, wetlands and parks, nor is it all funded by casino money. The Middle Branch - thanks to the now established long-term vision- is now also the focus of investors. Goldman Sachs is still part of the realization of a smaller version of Plank's original dream, the developer Mark Sapperstein

Locke Insulator redevelopment (Photo Philipsen)

has almost completed the transformation of the Locke Insulator campus into hundreds of townhomes and apartments, and the developer Ray Jackson is about to complete the first batch of the Westport townhomes that are replacing Pat Turner's original much bigger dream. Caves Valley is investing in the Paramount a 4,800 seat state of the art  music venue on Ostend Street, and the Warner walk that will connect the casino to the Paramount and the stadia. 

The Ravens are building out their nest with pre- and post-game party areas and the Stadium Authority is planning mixed use between Oriole Park and M&T stadium. 

All in all, a huge pool of investment is rolling into South Baltimore without displacing any existing homes or residents . It will be a huge boost for Baltimore by opening up its second waterfront to a much larger public and to the communities that had been cut off for too long. 

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Fishing at the Middle Branch

The new townhomes at Westport

The new Seagarten pop up event space

Insulator redevelopment at Hanover Bridge

Taking in the tour

The new Under Armour Headquarters (all photos: Philipsen)

See also on this blog:

 The promising new faces on the Middle Branch

Big names and ideas for Baltimore's "second waterfront"

The Forever Shrinking Baltimore Red Line

24 years after planning began for the Baltimore Red Line,  11 Years after then Governor Hogan killed the fully designed and funded $3bn  Red Line transit project and three years after Governor Moore resurrected it with great fanfare restarting the engineering and design to address what has changed in eight years (a small bit of the eastern right of way had been sold to townhome developers near Greektown, the population had shrunk further) I found myself once again in a Red Line Open House at Edmondson High. 

The Red Line will be a high-frequency, high-capacity light rail line for the Baltimore Region, and will be an investment in residents’ access to jobs, education, services, and opportunities.(Official Website)

The current series of Open Houses is the great reckoning. There is no money, what should we do? The public is being asked: Try to stay the course and aim for the full big project, build a small first phase of it as light rail from Edmondson Village to Marketplace on Pratt Street, or build the whole thing as bus rapid transit (BRT)?  In MTA speak this sounds like this:

The Red Line open houses will engage the public in open conversations on ways to continue to advance the project, while recognizing current federal realities and state headwinds. Discussions will include presenting the results of the light rail alternatives analysis, exploring new delivery strategies and reimagining the recommended mode of service that will maintain a realistic path forward to deliver improved regional mobility. Topics discussed will also include the financial considerations for three options:

 

• Proceeding with the full 14-mile light rail project
• Phasing the light rail project by splitting it into smaller portions over time
• Revisiting bus rapid transit
  

Except for the first (fictional) option, none of this represented the study results of all the previous engineering work. The original plans didn't have an alignment on Pratt Street, they had rejected surface options for light rail through downtown because of the space constraints there. Even the second Red Line study had considered BRT as not competitive because it didn't have enough capacity (buses hold fewer riders than trains) and it cost more to operate smaller vehicles (more drivers, the biggest operational cost), plus buses don't last as long as trains, let alone, that they are not known to attract development in the same way as rail.

From the MTA exhibits

But with $950 million federal dollars gone for good (at least under the current government) and State and local governments struggling with structural deficits, money talks, not engineering. 

Even the "cheap" BRT option is estimated to cost anywhere between $750 million to $1bn, money that is in no budget.

So the gathering at Edmondson High (one of five current open houses) was less projecting a bright transit future and felt more like a memorial service with a re-union of many old Red Line consultants, advocates and community organizers which came together to see the project's demise, irrespective of the outreach consultants', current planners' and engineers' and the new young MTA planning staff's chirpy demeanor. As if a truly astonishing new transit future would be on display on the many boards in the cafeteria and the fairly numerous guests would still be in awe of what is in store. 

But transit in Baltimore is not entirely bleak. MTA is still full of plans.

•  There is the Baltimore Raise plan, addressing the same east-west corridor as the Red Line and funded with $50m to enhance the already existing Quickbus 40 traveling the corridor as a bus with fewer stops for accelerated service. Raise pays for more dedicated bus lanes, accessibility of bus stops, better bus stops and signal priority.

  

  From the MTA exhibits

  
  

The Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) Transit Priority Project – or RAISE Project for short – is a collaborative effort between the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) and Baltimore City Department of Transportation (BCDOT) with the assistance of other agencies such as the State Highway Administration ( SHA), and Baltimore County. The RAISE Project proposes enhancements to the CityLink Blue and CityLink Orange lines to provide faster, more reliable transit and improved pedestrian safety along the 20-mile corridor extending from the Western terminus of CMS in Baltimore County through Baltimore City and ending at the Eastern Terminus of Fox Ridge in Baltimore County.

•  There is the $400m exchange of the subway trains which is in full swing and will be completed in 2027. 
• There is the planned and funded Baltimore Light Rail Modernization Plan which also requires a full rebuild of the stations supposed to be complete in 2035. 
• There is the Bmore Bus program which adds a fifth bus division so that more buses can be dispatched and provided overall more reliable bus service. So far $25 million are funded for purchase of land and design of the bus facility.
• There is State guaranteed minimum funding for the the State of Good Repairs, with a recently published ten year capital needs assessment

The legislature passed a bill this year that gives Baltimore a stronger say in what MTA does.

Unfortunately, none of the plans recognize technology progress in the quarter century since the year 2000 Baltimore Rail plan when the Red Line was identified as the highest priority. Increasing electrification and automation have changed the transportation future. Automated "robo-taxis" ply the streets of Atlanta, San Francisco and many other cities, electric buses are the only buses circulating in some large Chinese Cities, fully automatic articulated "galley" trains replaced old style subway cars separated by doors and bridges and increasingly transit agencies consider "on-demand" services where ridership isn't strong enough for fixed schedule service. Baltimore not hasn't seen any of that, it doesn't even plan for it.

The envisioned BRT system on display at Edmondson High is still simply showing articulated "bendy" buses as Los Angeles introduced them 24 years ago.  Meanwhile several Chinese Cities already are already serviced by trackless trolleys,

double articulated low-floor trains, fully automated, and run on batteries instead of overhead wires. These trackless vehicles that look like the most modern light rail trains run on rubber tires and street asphalt, guided by white lines or embedded sensors and, thanks to stabilizers, ride also as smoothly as modern light rail trains. 

It is fairly predictable that this convergence technology of bus and rail will be the future of urban surface transit and finally overcome  the competition between rail and bus. 

So far these vehicles cannot be bought here and wouldn't comply with the Buy-American rules, but in some time they will certainly also be manufactured or assembled here, just as light rail cars are now, a product that the US had once stopped to make. 

Given the reality of funding,  one can foresee that MTA will fold B-more Bus and the BRT option of the Red Line into a single package since the enhanced QB-40 and the depicted BRT are essentially identical.  "Real" BRT, however, would include double articulated buses, ideally with doors on both sides, for center running alignments and center platform stations (Istanbul, Mexico City, Bogota), elevated platforms for level boarding (Atlanta, Denver) and fully rebuilt exclusive lanes with smooth and stable pavement for a more comfortable ride.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

The author was a consultant on the Red Line from 2002-2015

See also the related recent article on this blog: https://communityarchitectdaily.blogspot.com/2026/03/baltimore-transit-prudent-pragmatism-or.html

Clean Streets, Empty Blocks: Is the "Rising" Downtown an Illusion?

This is the Baltimore oriented version of the article. For a more general orientation click here

The State of Downtown, according to its boosters, the Downtown Partnership, is always good or rising. To many Baltimoreans it is a rather sad affair, at least since the pandemic. The Downtown Partnership continues to clean and sweep with the uniformed ambassadors which are now a familiar site in many US cities, but for fewer and fewer people. Retail sales are down, hotel and office occupancy occupancy are scary, and whole office towers can be bought for less than a nice condo in New York costs.

The SUN titled their article about the Partnership's Annual Meeting this way: “Failure to adapt prompts shift in properties: $1B commercial crash, residential spike reshape Baltimore tax burden”. 

More than $1 billion in commercial property value has been erased from Baltimore since 2020 (Baltimore SUN, 4/19/26)

Baltimore SUN: Failure to adapt

Truth be told, though, many cities  all around the US are undergoing similar office tower real estate crashes in their downtown, sinking occupancy rates for offices, hotels and due to less foot traffic, for retail as well. Fewer people out and about also means fewer tourist exploring the area, a typical death spiral. “Failure to adapt” is the title line of  the SUN true?

Baltimore has many plans and ideas but no or sluggish implementation. The Urban Land Institute sent an "Advisory Panel" here that included former Pittsburgh Mayor Tom Murphy and provided a report and a set of strategies.  Still key parcels remain a problem. The Superblock has not moved forward in early 20 years and is half way burnt down by now. The former Mechanic Theatre property and another site owned by Howard Brown sit fallow for 12 years. State Center has continued to empty out without any new investment there and it took a decade or so to begin refilling the former Social Security complex at Greene Street. The Galleria indoor Mall remains mothballed. Famously, the Baltimore Red Line which should be in service by now, was scrapped and transit continues to ail. 

Meanwhile other cities in the US are tremendously active in steering the ship in new directions.  

Denver has a downtown development authority and a 2025 downtown area plan. The authority just finished an idea competition and its third ULI Advisory Panel about downtown. Its once famed Pavilions downtown mall a three-level, open-air shopping center with a movie theater, a bowling alley, 1,000 total parking spaces and a connection to the 16th Street shuttle and RTD. Only 28 years old, the complex is now considered "failing". Before it had to be fully shuttered, the City bought it and is now in the driver's seat. Instead of giving it to developer without any restrictions (like Baltimore did with HarborPlace), Denver's idea competition and ULI Advisory panel brainstormed a framework that will steer the redevelopment. Maybe to the surprise of the Mayor, the proposed use includes a large open space, i.e. something that doesn't create income in itself. The ideas presented last Friday centered around the creation of a "social district". Mayor Johnston found the proposals "incredibly compelling".

Denver Pavilions (Photo: Philipsen)

As the global urban population skyrockets, with estimates suggesting 70% of the world’s people will live in cities by 2050, the traditional Central Business District (CBD) faces an existential crisis. Once seen as the epicenter of economic and professional life, CBDs—characterized by office towers and commercial real estate—are grappling with diminished relevance, a crisis accelerated by the pandemic. With the advent of remote and hybrid work, fluctuating office occupancy rates, and competition from emerging mixed-use districts, urban cores must evolve or risk becoming relics of a bygone era.

In their place, a new model is gaining traction: the Central Social District (CSD). Unlike CBDs, which primarily focus on commercial real estate, CSDs are designed as vibrant, multi-use hubs that blend work, leisure, culture, and social interaction. These districts cater not only to office workers but also to residents, tourists, and visitors, creating spaces that reflect the modern urban lifestyle’s demands(The Rise of the Social District, Urban Design Lab)

Denver also just completed a complete rebuild of the 16th Street main shopping axis originally designed by Ian Pei. The pedestrian mall is a connection between the government district and the tremendously successful Union Station TOD.

Denver refurbished 16th Street Mall

Atlanta, also a city with an ailing downtown, is well underway with investments that aim to reconnect the isolated CBD.  By covering a small portion of a sunken highway with a park on top and hopes for a surge of affordable housing along both sides the hope is to stitch downtown to the disinvested neighborhood to the northeast. This project has not yet started.

 The construction of a 6 million squarefoot mixed use development over 50 acres of deck over railroad tracks (the Gulch) to revive its ailing southern part of downtown is well underway. This new downtown adjacent area will create a connection to the State Farm Arena and Mercedes Benz stadium. An innovation district next door revives the oldest historic core (SoDo) with 25 projects going on all at once right now. Especially the South Downtown project, funded by a local individual who wants to spur start-ups is based on the ide of a "social district". 

Downtown Baltimore: No enough feet on the ground
(Photo: Philipsen)

Both, Denver and Atlanta are cities with a high growth rates in the core city and the region, both have huge land areas that they gained through annexation. So yes, the comparison is not fair.

Still, there are lessons. Even though Baltimore didn’t build as many freeways as Atlanta, our downtown is also choked by multi-lane high capacity streets that act as freeway substitutes: MLK on the Westside, Pratt and Lombard on the south side and I-83 with President Street on the east. We too, have no lack of ideas, plans and dreams about reconnecting downtown back to the neighborhoods at MLK, at State Center, at Penn Station and the East side. Of all the plans only the connection to the west at the bio park is actually progressing. Improvements to Pratt Street are part of MCB’s lofty HarborPlace plans, but only small amounts of funds are available and it is likely that they will be mostly used to fix the promenade, not to make Pratt Street less of a barrier.

To change the DNA of the old financial district from 9-5 office towers to a 24/7 "social district" neighborhood takes more than stitching across barriers to the surrounding areas and even more than adaptive re-use, more than plans, more than adaptive reuse that has brought several thousand  residents in what used to be just offices, there are still too few feet on the ground. It will even take more than bringing visitors to conventions or events or tourists to see our architectural attractions.

Shelonda Stokes speaking to reporters at the 
State of Downtown Breakfast last week at the 
Convention Center

More than anything, it takes that these various elements of revival work in synergy, that there are clear priorities set and investments are made in a strategic and systematic manner that results in key downtown routes be free of large vacant dilapidated buildings or vacant lots that are dreadful or even scary to pass. Baltimore's new Planning Director and now Housing Commissioner Tim Keane (an architect and formerly the Planning Director of Atlanta) likes to stress design and urban form as a driver for planning. He says, a whole bunch of plans don't make a city unless they all aim for the same well defined objective. (He applied those principles to Atlanta's comprehensive plan).

Downtown Rise is Baltimore’s plan is a case in point of a well intentioned plan that lacks focus or clear priorities or a well defined outcome. The plan is mostly focused on better streetscapes and more what planners came to call “walkability”. This laudable, but the document treats all streets the same, shows trees everywhere and does not delineate the most important pedestrian routes that should be given priority. It also doesn't list which strategic properties are must-do fixes to make downtown look less deserted. The former Mechanic Theater lot right at the heart of downtown and adjacent to a subway stop should be a high priority. 

New financial incentives are available now with the close of the legislative session which gave downtown a tax credit option that is supposed to make investment more lucrative. So, no, the City and the Downtown Partnership are adapting. However, in a City that sees no population growth, all efforts need to be even more targeted and linked. To this end the Partnership is now engaging on a 2026-2031 Strategic Plan.

Not much left of the Superblock
(Photo Philipsen)

Nothing will bring the vitality back that downtowns used to have when the offices were filled and shopping happened here and not in malls or online. The idea of a "Social District" may provide an answer, serving new residents and visitors alike. Entertainment, events and tourists must come to the rescue. The Everyman, the Hippodrome and the Shakespeare Theater are already there, so is the very successful Arena. So far , though, people come for the shows and events and leave right afterwards. Same for the sport stadia. For them to stay downtown needs more than electronic billboards. It needs viable, lively and attractive "third places". The privatization of the HarborPlace "third space" could become exactly the opposite of what is needed.

All improvements have to work seamlessly together. Otis Rolley, the new BDC CEO, is revamping the agency to one that leads instead of reacts. He wants to directly develop the long stalled Superblock. It needs a new identity and focus. Over the Rhine in Cincinnati is a good model.

As Shelonda Stokes of  the Downtown Partnership says in the 2025 report:

Change doesn’t happen all at once. It’s built block by block, partnership by partnership, piece by piece. This belief shapes the theme of this year's annual report — Downtown by Design (Shelonda Stokes)

So here we are, waiting for yet another renaissance, hopefully really driven by design.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Baltimore Transit: Prudent Pragmatism or Bait & Switch?

Recently it became public that MDOT is considering to scale the Red Line back from what was presented to the public as the preferred alternative, Light Rail and would consider either a phased approach with light trail first built on the west side with other phases deferred to later or change the mode from LRT to BRT, short for bus rapid transit. At this point these options are not yet an official position.

Governor Moore announcing the revival of the Red Line in 2023 
(Photo: Philipsen)

The online public debate  is hefty. Is this just a pragmatic step that is inevitable in light of the fact that there is no federal funding and that the cost estimate for a tunneled LRT as envisioned and funded in 2015 has since grown from $3bn to nearly 7bn? 

Or is switching to bus just another another step in the long line of underinvesting in transit in the Baltimore region or worse, a bait and switch by a Governor that should have known all along that the prospect of clawing the federal funds back after the ill conceived cancellation in 2015 was dim at best and who should never have promised its resurrection with the big words he used in West Baltimore on that memorable June 15, in 2023? 

 
It one thing to say that currently we can only afford a bus and we will enhance bus service on the Red Line corridor as a "proof of concept" now with the prospect to build later what we really now and it is another entirely, to say "sorry, your Red Line will now be just a bus". The former option keeps it open to build a really efficient east-west transit line later, especially if the proof of concept is successful, whereas the latter will close the door for a long time. People will say: "Redline? Yep, that's that bus! Let's no longer talk about it."

There are a few footnotes needed to give some more context:

• The proof of concept approach was what Republican Governor Ehrlich and his MDOT Secretary Flanagan did in a way when they introduced the Quickbus 40 which largely ran on the Red Line route but was never completed as envisioned and it was later abandoned. It came back as QuickLink 40 in 2023 and operates today. This is to say, improvements on this service would be easy to do by simply completing what was left off before, namely signal priority, designated bus lanes and improved stations. 
• BRT is a chameleon which operates under many colors. Everyone imagines something different. The concept came from Curitiba (Brazil) and Bogota (Columbia) where the mayors there decided that a fully expedited bus network would be much preferable than one or two expensive subway lines. Those systems were a huge success because they radically changed the way buses operate and look. They used double-articulated (longer) high capacity buses, that were boarded from platforms level with the bus. Riders pre-paid their fare and boarded through all doors. Some buses had doors on both sides so they can also serve center platforms. The buses ran exclusively on their own lanes which were taken away from cars and they have signal priority at all lights. There is no system in the US that has fully implemented all these functions, although some came close. However, the system became popular and has been adopted in Mexico City, in Istanbul and several other cities. 

Cleveland Health Line BRT with center platform and doors on both
sides of the bus (Photo: NACTO)

Transportation for America defines a world-class transit system as one that gets people where they need to go and is accessible, frequent, reliable, and convenient. T4A’s new report identifies 17 global cities that meet that standard. None of them are in the US. (Brian O'Malley, CMTA)

• Some transit experts believe that LRT and bus technology converge in a product that ultimately may look and operate almost indistinguishably. This could be so because both could be battery powered (eliminating the overhead wires), both could use long, multi-articulated low floor bodies similar to the most modern subways and both would be automated and able to run on tight right of ways, i.e. a guided bus with rubber wheels on a smoothly paved lane could run almost as if on tracks. (Todays buses need more maneuvering space than track guided trains). Those vehicles are already in service in some cities in China. 

Rubber tire bus/train in Zhuzhou, China (Interesting Engineering)

This sounds like so much transit geek stuff, but these points make clear why it is hard to imagine a true BRT in Baltimore that is supposed to be cheaper than LRT. Fully designated lanes are pretty much fiction in downtown where parking, deliveries  and right turns compete and interfere with those lanes. Baltimore's blocks are fairly short, longer trains on the surface would interfere significantly with pedestrian, bike and vehicular traffic which is why the original Red Line design chose tunnels for downtown and Fells Point. Running buses in the center is pretty much out for many segments. And as bus riders know, running on curb lanes in Baltimore as today is a bumpy journey in no way as smooth as light rail. 

What about phasing?

Not having the money for an end to end light rail system (so far the officially preferred mode) it makes great sense to phase the system. As Governor Schaefer ("do it now") knew, once you start, you create facts. The original light rail was built in phases and Schaefer also managed to build without federal funds using only State and local funds. Initially he used federal funds only to buy the vehicles, a clever trick that worked beautifully. The idea of building the Red Line from Security Square Mall (destined to be redeveloped as a mixed use TOD) to a preliminary terminus at the redesigned West Baltimore  MARC station using State funds has appeal and would be proof  that Baltimore is serious about serious transit. 

It is widely understood that underperforming public transportation is holding the Baltimore region back economically and socially.

An ambitious, sustained investment in transit by 2050 would improve Maryland’s economy, health, and environment. (Brian O'Malley, CMTA)

 Not that the region doesn't have a pretty robust fleet with some 700 buses, 100 commuter buses, 149 Commuter rail coaches, 40 subway cars (currently being replaced with new ones) and some 20 functional light rail vehicles. But the service area is large, fairly dense and full of congestion; the fleet size too small to maintain a reliable schedule in adverse conditions. The MTA is a political football and the Maryland transportation trust fund also funds all the other transportation modes plus, has to contribute heavily to transit in the DC area. It is time to end the wallflower status and instead of aiming for the lowest common denominator we should do something bold for transit. 

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

See also this commentary in Maryland Matters