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 Atlantic seaport cities, both have an Inner Harbor and both economies morphed from industrial to “eds and meds” which is to say both have highly ranked research universities and medical facilities. Both want to be centers of life science, Boston, though with far more success. Both played a major role in the Revolutionary War, both have similar looking historic frigates as a tourist attraction in their harbors, cherish crabcakes, have a little Italy, famous baseball fields and 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 while Bostonites might look down their noses at Baltimore for their plagiarism and provincialism, Baltimoreans think Boston is stuck up, too white, too rich and just nothing Baltimore should aspire to. Boston always sought to be open to the world while Baltimore remained Smalltimore even while briefly the second largest city in the US. This is especially obvious in the financial sector where Baltimore lost all global headquarters whereas Boston remained a global financial center with Fidelity Investments as the leader.

Performance Metrics

Its probably not 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. Being more cosmopolitan by habit is more likely a cause.

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 explains 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 which isn't provincial at all. While Boston's port is regional and does little international trade, Baltimore is a national leader in automobile shipping (mostly imports) and has large "bulk" cargo 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. Both have a less than stellar reputation and suffered from lack of State funding. 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 their 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 unhappy 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.

Boston's Logan airport includes a great number of international destinations, providing a steady stream of international tourists; Baltimore's BWI is a successful center of budget airlines with very limited international destinations and a much smaller but still growing passenger volume. 

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 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. It has an observation deck for the general public, though. In Boston the observation deck is located in a large complex away from the water in the Prudential Tower complex which includes a still thriving mall and sits partly over top of a highway. The owners just spent $50 million to update their three observation decks and began charging an obscene $35 entry fee. Baltimore had intentions to do an upgrade of the observation deck, 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. Baltimore's Inner Harbor used to attract millions of tourists with the  HarborPlace pavilions, but they were left to languish and completely fail , more on that later.

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 neglected 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. 

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

Just beyond the city limits are two lovely places, Cambridge and Somerville, 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 got a big hit during deindustrialization. Left behind were many less educated former workers stranded in a new economy that is heavy on academics. This transformation caused a lot of trauma. In that Baltimore is more like the rest of formerly industrial America than Boston which recovered mostly graciously without leaving behind a large proletariat.

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 being a city of neighborhoods that has 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"