Roadkill and Transportation Scoring

All the talk about crumbling roads and bridges notwithstanding, Maryland residents find smooth highways and byways with wide shoulders pretty much all across the State, especially outside urban areas. How much that is still true becomes quickly evident when one crosses into Pennsylvania where many back-roads are curvy, have blind-spots, humps and frequently no shoulders. How smooth rural roads are becomes also obvious if one enters Baltimore City where many roads and bridges are truly falling apart.

10% of the budget go to transportation

Not without reason. Maryland spends a larger portion of its overall budget on transportation than Pennsylvania, Virginia, Delaware or New Jersey; more than 10% or more than $2 billion in capital funds. Failing pipe infrastructure that is 100 years old forces Baltimore to dig streets up so often that they resemble moonscapes.

After the Governor redirected funds originally set aside for the Baltimore Red Line to road construction on the eastern shore and Garrett County many Baltimore are residents asked themselves, what exactly are the criteria under which transportation dollars are spent? The answer is not as rational as one would expect in a time of scarce dollars. Expenditure is far less based on needs than on politics and a desire to spread the goods around. For many local politicians, bringing home the bacon means bringing road money into his district.

Baltimore-based Delegate Brooke Lierman co-sponsored bill 1013 introduced by Delegate Pamela Beidle in 2016. It included scoring measures intended to make transportation spending more rational. (the Maryland Open Transportation Investment Decision Act of 2016). The bill introduces metrics such as

• Increased facility life span
• Change in travel time reliability
• Mode connections and choices
• Economic development
• Travel time savings
• Leverage of additional investment
• "Complete Street"

The Hogan administration explaining how the scoring bill kills road projects

Even though the bill stands in a long tradition of similar attempts created by Republicans and Democrats alike, with the closest example right in neighboring Virginia, Maryland's Governor sank his teeth into this bill with fervor. He began dubbing it "the road kill bill" and vetoed it after it initially passed. The veto was quickly overridden by the Democrats.
Now in the 2017 session the Hogan Administration has introduced an "emergency bill", HB402 to repeal the scoring requirements:

Repealing specified State transportation goals; repealing a requirement that the Department of Transportation score the extent to which specified transportation projects satisfy the goals; repealing a requirement that the Department develop a specified scoring system and promulgate specified regulations; repealing a requirement that the Department, in accordance with the specified scoring system, rank major transportation projects for inclusion in the draft and final Consolidated Transportation Program; etc.(HB 402)

The fight seems even more irrational than the transportation expenditures themselves, since the bill wouldn't have the teeth to stop a single project. The Governor is using the bill to cement a populist narrative in which urban liberals are trying to take rural roads away, especially for transit. The reality was exactly the opposite: when Hogan took nearly $3 billion off the table that had been set aside for Baltimore City and County to build the Red Line. (About $700 of which would have been State funds that were re-assigned). The state’s highest-ranking legal officer, the attorney general, says Hogan’s “Rogue One” interpretation of the law is pure science fiction.

A map created by the Baltimore Transportation Equity Coalition
showing the spread of yellow expenditures for roads 

The narrative of urban versus rural mirrors the election results for Hogan and the recent presidential election. It feeds the false notion that large dysfunctional metro conglomerations like Baltimore City and County are feeding off the rural hinterlands that have to fight for the crumbs that are left.

That narrative has nothing to do with reality. The Baltimore metro area alone makes up about 50% of the State's population, add in the urban areas of Maryland around DC (Montgomery and PG with about a million residents each), and one can get easily to about 75% of the State's population living in urban areas even if one discounts the rural portions of the counties located in the metro areas). No matter how one calculates the revenues (via income taxes, gas taxes or Vehicle Miles Traveled - VMT) the urbanized areas put more into the budget than they take out while they bear the brunt of the dysfunction of the current spending priorities: Congestion, air pollution, long commute times, decrepit roads and insufficient transit.

Activist's flysheet about the scoring process (source: 1000 Friends of MD, CMTA)

Maryland's transportation scoring bill has its weaknesses, some of the metrics are poorly defined or hard to measure, and the sponsor herself says "its just a score", meaning it doesn't bind the administration's hands. It was Republican President George Bush, senior, who inaugurated the Intermodal Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) in 1991, a landmark national transportation bill that stressed intermodal connection, allowed transportation enhancement funds to go to trails and bike-ways to promote alternative transportation. ISTEA also required to look at the effects that transportation has on air quality and included Major Investment Studies as a way to ensure that alternatives are compared and evaluated and criteria for projects are met before they get build.   The bill did not prevent Sarah Palin's Alaskan "bridge to nowhere" but has brought at least some reasonable deliberation to federal transportation spending in America.

The time when transportation projects are simply funded because they are wanted by a political buddy should be over. Too many competing needs for money make it almost immoral to widen perfectly fine roads in rural Garret County devoid of traffic for political reasons while urgent needs in dense areas remain unmet.  The new Administration in Washington has threatened to remove some of that progress from their own brand of transportation policy. Governor Hogan should not fan the flames of populist divisiveness. The scoring bill is not a "road kill bill" and he knows it.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA
updated

Transportation for America's article about the Maryland road bill fight
Detailed Republican critique on the scoring bill by Robert Flanigan
Hogan vows to repeal the Road Kill Bill (Baltimore SUN) Dec 2016
Rascovar: Hogan's Hoax
Recommendations for Better Project Scoring (Suggestions for each of the scoring metrics)


A fake news release making fun of the Road Kill bill discussion that was circulated yesterday:

For Immediate ReleaseFebruary 9, 2017Contact: Sean Emerson(301) 858-3649Marc.Korman@house.state.md.us

LEGISLATORS INTRODUCE ROADKILL BILL OF 2017

Bill Would Ensure Roadkill Is Peeled Off Of State Highways
Delegate Marc Korman and 32 other Delegates today introduced The Roadkill Bill of 2017.  Following Governor Hogan’s 2017 State of the State Address,[1] in which he asked legislators to address the roadkill issue, legislators have introduced this timely proposal.  Because it does not include mandated spending, cannot be mischaracterized as a tax, has a catchy name, polls well, is unopposed by big business, and is unrelated to Donald Trump, it is expected that the Administration will not show up to testify and allow the bill to become law.
“I agree with Governor Hogan that road kill wreaks havoc on our entire transportation system.[2]  Like him, I believe it is important we peel the roadkill off our state highways (I may have misheard him),” said Delegate Korman.
Existing state law[3] requires the State Highway Administration to remove “any animal carcass that will impede traffic or substantially endanger the safety of the traveling public.”  The Roadkill Bill of 2017 would require the Administration to consult with interested parties and adopt timely and comprehensive regulations to establish an accessible process for citizens to report roadkill on state highways.
“I agree with Governor Hogan that roadkill is a scourge in our state,” stated Delegate Andrew Platt, the top co-sponsor on the bill.  “Indeed, this bipartisan issue unites rural Maryland, urban Maryland, and suburban Maryland.  When it comes to roadkill, we are one Maryland.”
The bill will be referred to the Environment and Transportation Committee where it will be the subject of a hearing.

Caves Valley pulls out of Cross Street Market deal with City

The South Baltimore Cross Street Market has seen a fair share of victims and terminated deals, lately. First development partner War Horse LLC pulled out as a development partner and split from Caves Valley. Then Caves Valley terminated long time market tenant Nick's Seafood. Then the developer told all merchants that they would have to vacate the market for the duration of the renovation. Now, abruptly and only a few weeks after signing a deal and having been assigned the development rights by the City, the developer Caves Valley is pulling out of the deal altogether. The Market Corporation issued a statement:

"There is a divergence of opinions on the future vision of the market. In light of today’s announcement, BPMC will need time to regroup and consider next steps for developing an action plan that will have the best interests of both the community and merchants in mind."

Just a week ago Market Director Robert Thomas had described the Cross Street Market experiences for Community Architect Daily with these somewhat cryptic words:

I consider the Cross Street disposition an important and informative episode in the history of Baltimore’s public markets. Lessons learned, and being learned, from this experience will inform outcomes of the next two RFPs, along with other factors not totally under control of the Markets corporation. (Robert Thomas)

The episode now gets a complete re-boot. Reactions to the fact that Caves Valley's departure puts everybody back to square one are mixed as the BBJ reports this afternoon. Given that the market has fallen on hard times for quite a while, to have no plan in place now isn't necessarily good news. However, the turmoil that Caves Valley had created in spite of a very long time of negotiating the deal with the City in the first place, wasn't good for the market either.

Back to square one: Caves Valley is out

One can't help but suspect that the developer wasn't quite ready to engage in a complicated situation like this. Caves Valley is a developer used to success but also to getting their way. They have shown in Towson that they don't shy away from bloody battle with communities, a strategy that  doesn't work as well in Baltimore City where developers like Seawall (R-House) or Sagamore Development have set a recent standard that puts a premium on public benefit, long-term strategies and accommodation of community demands instead of taking a hard and combative stand. Whatever was made public about the future of the market did not seem to be in line with how public markets are defined, for example having local merchants instead of national chains.

Public markets have a public purpose. This means they are probably not profit centers for a developer. Caves Valley had engaged in the Cross Street Market knowing that engagement here was complementary to their investments on Light Street, in Sharp Leadenhall and the Casino. As such the developer wasn't dependent on a reasonable return on investment just from the market alone. It will be difficult to find another investor who can take this broader approach across various projects.

Inevitably the question will have to be asked, whether public markets can really be operated more successfully by private entities than by the City itself. To make "the numbers work" that could mean asking whether the Casino benefits set aside for the South Baltimore community could come into play to ensure a market that maintains public interest in healthy affordable food, a diverse community space and remains a business opportunity for truly local merchants.

Without inside knowledge in the Cross Street Market situation, it is hard to tell what exactly went down here, except that one can easily say that what happened isn't the way a development deal that involves City property should unfold as part of a public-private partnership, even though those frustrating terminations aren't unheard of. One simply has to remember the Superblock.  The Baltimore Fishbowl reports that Mayor Catherine Pugh said in a statement that the Baltimore Public Markets Corporation “is reviewing its options” and will again engage community residents “to fulfill the vision” for the Federal Hill location.

“Public-private collaborations will be key, and I want to see Cross Street Market become what the community wants and certainly deserves,” she said.

One can hope that the City takes the experience to heart when it considers the proposals for the Hollins and the Broadway Markets which will be due next week. Likely, the City issued those requests for proposals (RFPs) without enough conditions in place to prevent a similar debacle for those two markets. It isn't too late yet to put those safeguards in place.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

BBJ: Caves Valley Partners pull out of Cross Street Market Deal.

City lights and politics

On the occasion of Baltimore's 200th anniversary of the first gas street light the good old city street light was attributed yet another role, one rarely mentioned: The role of being a beacon of public-private partnerships. That is what James Smith, Chief of Strategic Alliances for Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, said at Tuesday's bicentennial ceremony near City hall where Baltimore's first gas street lamp still stands.

200th birthday: The streetlight (SUN photo)

Smith was alluding to the complicated relation that Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE) and the City have when it comes to street-lights.  BGE as a company actually goes back to the first streetlight as well as the company charged to provide a network of gas lines to feed the new technology of gas lamps and was called the Baltimore Gas and Light Company. So it is BGE's 200th anniversary as well this year, even though the good old municipal utility is long part of a national conglomerate called Exelon and has advanced from serving a few downtown streetlamps to serving over 650,000 gas customers and a million electric customers in the region.

But back to the streetlight: If a streetlight is out, and many seem to be out especially in Baltimore's poor neighborhoods, it isn't easy to decide whom to call and who is responsible for fixing it. In Baltimore only 10,000 of the 70,000 street lights are owned by the City and the rest is owned by BGE which has occasionally led to bickering instead of partnership, for example when it came to conversion of the lamps from metal halid or high pressure sodium to LED.

Light levels are said to be related to crime levels SUN photo)

To say that the relations are complicated may be an understatement when it comes to parsing out who owns what before a street light emits light: Its not only who owns the post and lamp but also who owns the power supply. In the City the answer is usually, the city owns a duct bank or conduit under the street and BGE owns the cable in it and all the switches, shut-offs and power stations from the power generation to the point of consumption. The electric juice inside could be sold by BGE but also by a number of others electric power suppliers that are competing in an open marketplace. But yes, it is a public-private partnership as the Mayor's strategist says.

That is an important point for the Mayor who has identified additional street lights as a crime fighting tool. This is in alignment with the guidelines provided by "Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design" (CPTED) and international organization devoted to what its name says. Baltimore police has long subscribed to the notion as well by placing mobile generator powered lights in high crime areas, a rather inelegant solution that blasts bright light into windows of the houses along those streets and stigmatizes a crime area in the same way as the blue flashing lights mounted to the tops of streetlights. Catherine Pugh imagines her safety initiative  less conspicuously as additional regular streetlights,

"I know there's been a promise of 6,000 new lights on the streets of Baltimore and I want to strategically decide where they will go on." (Pugh in a press conference on December 14, 2016)

One way to bring more light is the already noted conversion of the lamps to LED which turns in many cases the yellowish old sodium lamps in a much brighter white light that allows better identification of faces, colors and other details on the streets or sidewalks aside from saving electric energy.

The "cobra head" street light with high pressure
sodium lamp and monochrome light (photo: Philipsen)

But light, crime and public private partnerships isn't all there is to streetlights. Increasingly, they are also noted as important elements of the "smart city". As items of innovation just as Baltimore's first street light was in 1817 when it was the first gas light in America's urban streets. A smart light now is a place where data and information are collected, not only with cameras mounted to the poles, but also with sensors that can hear gun-shots (Baltimore police tested this already in some places) or sensors that can feel if someone is around and turn itself off or into a lower state of brightness if not. (The lights already have sensors that turn the lights on and off, depending on ambient daylight levels). Streetlights are also suitable as small cellphone towers or as places to distribute free WiFi. As such they can create more equity in access to information in neighborhoods where some students have to do their homework hanging out near their school walls to catch a WiFi signal since their parents don't have the money to buy Internet service for their home.

But more light isn't always good. At least that is what the Dark Sky advocates say who set out to reduce light pollution resulting in the increasing inability of seeing stars in the night sky, even on a clear night because city land suburban lights cast a bright glow over it. The modern street light is a "cut-off" fixture that casts its light more or less straight down and not into the sky or sideways like Baltimore's first gas light did it; but since the modern light has so much more oomph (lumens and footcandles) the light bounces back from the pavement and up it goes. Anyone who has looked down from an airplane window on a clear night can see how especially gas stations, shopping centers and ball-fields are so brightly lit that one can easily identify them even from 30,000 feet. In fact, night satellite photos from space reveal better than anything how much space sprawl and its twin, the streetlight. have devoured.

The retrofitted LED street light
with with a white light (photo: Philipsen)

Meanwhile, the streetlight as part of the electric grid  is as vulnerable as the entire grid. If the grid goes down, so do the lights and traffic signals. Only Baltimore's first streetlight on Holliday and Baltimore Street will still glow. It is still gas powered, and as such also a symbol of resilience.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Buy American: Example MTA buses

Few people would guess that a standard 40' MTA bus costs over half a million dollars. $556,774.00 to be precise.  The previous generation of MTA's hybrid buses cost even more, about $750,000.

New MTA New Flyer diesel bus 

Even fewer people know that transit agencies using federal funds (nearly all of them) have to buy American made buses by law and that transit agencies can choose only between three North American bus companies: New Flyer (MTA's buses, headquartered in Winnipeg, Canada), Nova (St Francois du Lac, Canada) and Gillig (Hayward, California. (another bus maker, North American Bus Industry, NABI was purchased by New Flyer in 2013).

New Flyer and Nova assemble their buses in the US to qualify. 49 CFR661 mandates that 60% of a bus' components by cost must be of US origin. One can easily imagine what such a % figure does for rational manufacturing. Such as skimping on the chassis so it stays under 40% if it is foreign made.

To make matters worse, both bus companies use the same Cummins engines to propel their buses.

The New Flyer bus hybrid diesel electric model

When the MTA bought recently 172 new buses for 97.8 million (162 of them replacing old buses, 10 are added to the fleet for the Baltimore Link roll-out), only New Flyer provided a bid, the other company was too busy to even bother. All buses are 40' buses, the 60' "articulated" buses cost even more.

By now readers will guess that the Buy American requirement has a price.  The provision is in effect since 1991 but it is also a suitable illustration in the discussion about "America First". Trying to buy and make only at home can back-fire, not only in real hard $ but also in choice and in product quality.

The MTA has a fleet of 750 40' buses plus about 40 articulated buses and moves about a quarter million people a day. (By comparison: MTA New York runs 5,750 buses).

The Gillig bus, America's largest bus manufacturer

That's a lot of people who care about how quiet, smooth, clean and reliably their bus runs. The MTA has the 26th largest bus fleet in North America according to 2015 data, but the 7th largest New Flyer fleet. Could MTA bus patrons have a better ride, quieter buses, higher fuel economy and a more modern design if  bus companies could buy from an unrestricted market? Would transit agencies have to pay less? New York's MTA which doesn't use federal funds for their buses occasionally thinks so. In 2008 a sleek articulated Mercedes Benz bus could be seen plying Manhattans streets for test purposes only.  No purchase came of it.

Hard to say how foreign buses would compare. Even though the geographic spread of the market is huge, North American bus manufacturers don't have an easy time to survive. The number of just two companies is testimony to many bankruptcies and buy-outs in a market where demand is based less on need and more on what funds bus operators have access to to buy replacement buses. (FTA can provide up to 80% of the cost with a 20% local match). If no federal money is available transit agencies run their buses beyond their 12 year expected life span to the detriment of rider service and the detriment of the manufacturers. (MTA's oldest buses are 14-15 years old, according to Administrator Paul Comfort).

The Mercedes Citaro city transit bus

The corpses of bus makers line transit routes, so to speak. They include foreign makers that tried their hand with plants in the US: Among them the  German bus company Neoplan (bankrupt in 2006), Orion a subsidiary of the German Mercedes Benz company. The US bus maker Flexible went bankrupt in 1996. The scarceness of available US buses poses transit agencies in a precarious condition. At times they have to wait for their buses. Certainly not a condition that generates price competition. This situation may be temporary.

New technologies will certainly shake up the bus market, just as Tesla demonstrated it in the car market. Already there are two small bus companies (one with Chinese roots) that make all electric buses. Federal agencies also tested fuel cell buses.

In the meantime, anyone who ever rides  Dutch, German or French buses will realize that US transit buses seem to lag behind their European counterparts in design and innovation. Low-floor buses, now  also common here, were first introduced in European cities; so where buses with three doors, wider front boarding doors, longer rigid body buses with double rear axles, double-articulated buses for BRT on separate right of ways, and buses with frame-less glazing for the side windows.

CityPilot self driving bus

A new Mercedes Benz Citaro Euro 6 bus could be bought for $300,000 in 2014. It can be bought with EPS (electronic stability system) and as "CityPilot" it can also bought as a self driving version for test purposes.

"America First" is tricky business.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

updated for inclusion of Nova Bus

Baltimore Business Journal article about MTA bus procurement
Mineta Transportation Insitute report: The US Transit Bus Manufacturing Industry
Fuel Cell bus report
New York is testing a Mercedes Benz Bus
Citaro Bus brochure

White Supremacy in Port Covington?

When Baltimore elected the new slate of City council members it was clear that things wouldn't be any longer as they were before, when critics described the Council as a "rubber stamp" for the Mayor.

The new more combative Council could be seen in action several times already, for example when Councilman Zeke Cohen questioned the MTA about charging extra for for bus rides on the student passes for after school activities. Ryan Dorsey was right on his side. Next up: Minimum wage.

Council candidate Dorsey making his case before the
election (Photo: Klaus Philipsen)

Dorsey who represents the third District upped the anti last week with a Facebook comment on the Baltimore City Voters Facebook page. His comment appeared under the link of an article that stated that Kevin Plan was one of the members on the President's "council" on economic advisers which had sprung from an initial breakfast meeting to which the President had invited industrial leaders.

Ryan Dorsey White supremacy cozying up to white supremacy? Shocker.

"Quisling" probably isn't even an appropriate term to use. It specifically refers to a local traitor getting in bed with an occupying force. Plank is not a local. He is not from Baltimore. He does not live in Baltimore. He is not about Baltimore. He is, himself, an occupying, colonizing, culturally appropriating force. 

The comment didn't go unnoticed and soon commentary came form all sides, including the Mayor, the City Council President, fellow council members and Joshua Harris, the Green Party's candidate for Mayor who had lost against Catherine Pugh. Harris wrote this in response to Dorsey's comment:

Joshua Harris

February 4 at 6:18pm · Baltimore

I would like to take a moment to say thank you to councilman Ryan Dorsey. I applaud his willingness to use his personal (white) privilege to shed light on an issue often swept under the rug and ignored in our city. In the face of political correctness and political theater he spoke truth to power, and stood by it. As a black man, I am often afraid to speak to issues of race, not wanting to be viewed as the "angry black guy". I truly applaud Dorsey and other white allies that I have seen in action: Nina Therese KasniunasDavid Troy Roshelle Kades Andy Ellis Andreas Spilly Hon Spiliadis Jen Fischetti Molly Amster Madeline Suggs Megan Kenny and many others. I hope that this has been an opportunity to further the dialogue about "Whiteness", what it means to not merely be a philanthropist from a distance, but risk and set that "Whiteness" aside to truly become an ally in the fight against structural, economic, and environmental racism and white supremacy. In the age of a Trump presidency this is a glimmer of hope. We need more folks willing to take a real stand even if it means risking it all. THANK YOU!

Councilmember Costello was less enthusiastic:

Eric Costello February 3 at 5:04pm 

The comments about Kevin Plank are simply untrue, disgusting, and are unbecoming of a member of the Baltimore City Council. This type of baseless and reckless rhetoric adds no value to moving our City forward. A public apology is warranted.

The SUN ran an article about the controversy which included a statement from Mayor Catherine Pugh:

"I am shocked. I have known Kevin Plank for almost two decades. He is a great Marylander, a great person and someone who is doing everything he can to lift Baltimore. Everywhere I go, in every corner of this city and this country, people talk about what Kevin Plank is doing for Baltimore."

The Dorsey comments opened the discussion about the wisdom of the tax breaks for Port Covington all over again, even though the matter is a done deal with legally binding papers that the previous Mayor, Council and Board of Estimates had approved.

Council hearing about Port Covington TIF in 2016 (Photo: Philipsen)

I sent Dorsey a number of questions asking for a written interview for this article. He sent me instead an article that apparently is intended as an op-ed in the SUN in which he digs his heels deeper in explaining his statements in the broader context of systemic racism and in the context of the Memorandum of Agreement between the City and Sagamore. In explaining his stand Dorsey says on Facebook this morning:

"I also believe that Plank's Port Covington development benefits White Baltimoreans at the expense of Black Baltimoreans. It relies on financial assistance from a Black-majority City to build a community that a majority of Black Baltimoreans may not be able to afford. Each of these actions treats issues of racial disparity and discrimination as secondary to business opportunity. This trivialization of race reinforces systemic racism, and by reinforcing social, political, and economic systems that disproportionately benefit White residents, falls under the umbrella of 'white supremacy'. I stand by my statements..."

Unfortunately, the references to the MOU that Dorsey makes in his op-ed don't seem to reflect the amendments that his predecessor Council members and the African American ministers of the BUILD coalition had negotiated and quote an older version of the MOU. The amendment improved numerous conditions including the referenced Affordable Housing requirements which Dorsey quotes in his editorial in their old version. The amendments read as follows:

1. Doubling of Commitment. The Amended MOU doubles SDC's inclusionary housing commitment to require that SDC provide income-restricted residential units equal to 20% of all residential units at Port Covington. At least 60% of these units must be provided on-site, while the balance may be developed offsite to address affordable housing needs in other City neighborhoods.

2. Affordability. At least ten percent (10%) of the affordable units, whether on-site or off-site, will be affordable to households at or below 30% of Area Median Income ("AMI"), so long as housing vouchers or similar assistance is available to SDC. SDC will also seek low-income housing tax credits ("LIHTC") to develop
units affordable to households at or below 60% of AMI, with at least five percent of the units affordable at or below 50% of AMI. If LIHTCs are not awarded, the required units must be affordable at or below 80% of AMI.

3. Required Fund Payments. If on-site affordable units cannot be constructed on a financially reasonable basis, SDC must make payments to the City’s inclusionary Housing Offset Fund, in amounts from $40,000 up to $60,000 per unit. For off-site units, the range would be $30,000 to $50,000 per unit until the City and SDC share in profits, when payments related to off-site units would increase to $40,000 to $60,000 per unit. 

I know Ryan personally and supported His run for the Council seat. I also responded recently to his invitation to speak about the student bus fares. His courage to step out of the generally approved line of consent and voice a different opinion is laudable, so is his intent of shedding light on institutional racism and the deplorable inequalities of Baltimore. I certainly share his severe concerns about the President's actions. But  all of that should be no reason to resort to the same simplified fire-bombing rhetoric that isn't based on fact.

A more activist Council: Zeke Cohen at the podium, Dorsey on the right. 

The participation of the various company leaders at the President's breakfast to which they were invited certainly doesn't constitute an endorsement of the policies of the one who invited. It represents nothing more than a willingness to learn and listen in dialogue, the same willingness that the Mayor and Congressman Cummings had also voiced. There may have never been a time when dialogue was more important right now. At least for the time being it is still true that it is better to be "at the table" than "on the table".

Only one industrial leader has since resigned from what the President has since morphed into an "advisory economic council", the CEO of Uber. His resignation was more a response to his own company's flap at the small New York taxi strike against the President's travel ban than a full throated political gesture.

There is no question that Baltimore has all the problems Dorsey references. But there is also no question that no city in America can prosper without a sound economic base. New anti-government and anti-trade policies coming from Washington represent a clear and imminent danger to Baltimore's economy. To have a successful entrepreneur who has built a large company in Baltimore being included among the CEOs of Uber, Dell, Dow, Intel, Boeing, Ford and others is not a small thing for Baltimore, nor is Plank's commitment to local manufacturing. To make it an issue that Plank lives in Baltimore County and not in the City seems rather myopic, in that context. In the bigger picture Baltimore needs to be seen as part of the region anyway, a metro region that includes the Washington region and competes globally.

I am sure the current mayor and Council would have been a stronger force in the negotiations of the Port Covington TIF, where unions, churches and some Council members had to basically force the previous administration into a better deal.

There will be plenty of opportunities for being vigilant in the 30 plus years in which Port Covington will have to be realized according to the plans, commitments and intentions. But using a superceded MOU and warfare rhetoric is just not the way of doing it. I suppose BUILD and the African American leaders of the communities around Port Covington who all approved the MOU will tell Dorsey in due time.

 Klaus Philipsen, FAIA


Ryan Dorsey's complete statement explaining his positions and the original Facebook post:

On Friday evening, the Baltimore Sun devoted an article to comments I made in the Baltimore City Voters Facebook group, criticizing Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank’s decision to become an advisor in President Trump’s administration. I compared that decision to his company’s Port Covington deal.

I stand by the substance of these remarks, although they may have been framed in too shorthand a fashion for readers not involved with the forum. I spoke knowing that most readers of the forum understand the historical context, and that my remarks about Plank refer to systemic forces, not personal attributes.

There is a persistent notion that those who elected Trump can be viewed as cartoon racists: poor, uneducated rednecks who use racial slurs and spout hatred. The reality, however, is that Trump’s win was carried by far more polished, professional types. Pew Research shows that Trump won college educated Whites by a 4-point margin, and as CNN’s exit polling shows, Trump won a majority of Americans making $50,000 or more, whereas Clinton won voters making less than $50,000 per year by a 12-point margin.

You will never hear most of these Trump voters use the n-word, foment Islamophobia , or promote sexual assault.  I am comfortable assuming that Trump voters shy away from such language not just because it is impolitic, but because they truly believe Trump is wrong in those areas. The problem is that these voters allow other issues, including economic issues, to become more important than misogyny, racism, xenophobia, or prejudice of any other sort. It is not a coincidence that those most likely to view matters of systemic inequality as secondary to other issues are also those who benefit from existing systems. By being willing to accept or ignore these systemic forces, including systemic racism, these men and women only help to perpetuate it.

No self-respecting Democrat can defend Donald Trump’s track record of prejudice. For months now, we have heard a chorus of public figures talk about their commitment to not normalizing Trump’s behavior, and not engaging with his administration as though it represents a legitimate approach to governance or the views of a majority of American voters. Yet, it seems for some, I crossed a line by criticizing Kevin Plank for doing exactly that.

When Kevin Plank aligns himself with Donald Trump’s administration by serving as an advisor to it, he is normalizing Trump’s behavior and treating his administration as legitimate. He is also earning a significant amount of potential political capital with these actions. In the process, Plank has become a representative of sorts for our City within the Trump administration. We should look at Plank’s track record to better understand what that might mean for Baltimore.

I do not pretend to know what is in Kevin Plank’s heart, but I do know what is in his memorandum of understanding for Port Covington. In issues of public policy, it is the actual impact on people, not the intended impact, that ultimately matters.

Take Port Covington’s inclusionary housing agreement. It makes 10% on-site affordable housing a goal, not a requirement, and defines affordability as 60% of Area Median Income (AMI). It does not require that these units be built unless Low Income Housing Tax Credits can be secured for them. If the tax credits are not secured, the memorandum raises the affordability ceiling to 80% AMI. Again, 80% is a goal, not a requirement. Ultimately, the developer can pay a fee that is significantly less than the cost of providing the units to avoid building any on-site affordable housing at all.

Because AMI is calculated for the Baltimore-Towson-Columbia metropolitan area, a rent payment based on an income of up to $46,000 per year, or $22.12 per hour, would be counted as affordable. Keep in mind, the median household income for Black households in Baltimore is $33,610, and the minimum wage is currently $8.75 per hour. The workers responsible for building Port Covington may also be unable to afford its affordable housing. The negotiated minimum wage for Port Covington's skilled trades is lower than Baltimore City's prevailing wage for all but 1 of the 98 listed skilled trades, and also less than the hourly rate needed to afford an 80% AMI housing unit.

That means our majority-Black City gave over a half-billion taxpayer dollars to a development that a majority of Baltimore’s Black residents may not be able to afford. Even Port Covington’s off-site affordable housing only requires “a preference for, but not a limitation to, locations that do not further concentrate poverty, as determined by the developer.” Those are tough facts to spin.  

That is just the beginning. Even as the vision of Port Covington remains mostly on the drawing board, its priority for City resources and attention has surpassed that of most Baltimore neighborhoods. Consider how our political capital to bargain for federal or state transportation funding is now occupied by the I-95 off ramps or Port Covington’s anticipated light rail spur, while infrastructure across most of the City’s majority Black neighborhoods continues to languish as it has for decades, having been cut in line yet again by waterfront development.

More broadly, consider the school funding issue. The state’s formula cuts funds when Baltimore’s tax base grows, in anticipation of more local taxes. Tax deals of the kind Port Covington is receiving mean those new funds won’t be available to cover the shortfall.  We are told that a short-term fix has been fashioned, and that a long-term formula fix is coming.  However, advocates have been warning all along of these consequences, and the time for fashioning a solution was before those consequences manifested themselves. City Schools ran a $50 million deficit in the two years preceding the deal, and suffered a $130 million shortfall this year. Who is harmed? A public school population that is 90% Black and Brown, in spite of White residents representing over 30% of the City’s population.

This is exactly how systemic forces take the actions of well-intentioned people, and use them to perpetuate a fundamentally racist allocation of benefits and costs. The system that organizes benefits and costs this way is called White Supremacy. If I choose not to speak out against it just because it does not harm me directly, I am enabling it. Port Covington—at least this round—is a done deal, but we must learn from it going forward if we are to truly undo the structural racism holding our City back.

I am glad that Kevin Plank has a philanthropic record, but Baltimore needs parity more than it needs charity. Charity, after all, is often aimed at the effects of structural ills (funding shortfalls) not the causes (unjust development). Addressing the latter requires a willingness to speak about it in clear terms. It also should not take a White city councilman to generate this degree of attention to the issue, when Black residents have made these same points for decades.

Baltimore reeling from violence

Baltimore's crime statistics in 2016 were bad. 2017 is shaping up to be worse. Today's shooting and attempted execution at Red Emma's coffee shop  brought the. familiar pattern of  a violent feud between two people who know each other to the inside of a popular coffee shop in an area considered "reclaimed" from violent North Avenue as part of the hard fought Station North revitalization.

Crime at the intersection of many conflicts: Red Emma shooting

The discussion about crime in Baltimore is complicated. It follows many  narratives which makes a response so difficult that effective crime prevention or protection apparently has taken a beating. Baltimore crime as a function of drugs, of poverty, of joblessness, of dysfunctional families, is the familiar story. Mass incarceration, police brutality and a federal consent decree that tries to address racial and social injustice is a more recent narrative. The bifurcation between "urban" (blue) and "rural" (red) Americans is the latest overlay. Nobody should think that Baltimore or blue Maryland would protect us from the red "law and order" stands or divisive discussion about how to solve the problem. Just consider how many Baltimore police officers come from outside the City and see the City only through the lens of crime. Some tweets with snide remarks about liberals by an officer after the Red Emma shooting suggested animosity against the left clientele of the coffee shop. The Facebook discussion on the normally extremely civil and informed Baltimore Voters Facebook page became completely unhinged over the coffee shop shooting.

And then, of course, the State can trump the City any time. The Governor likes to put space between himself and the President but some of his remarks about Baltimore easily fall into a popular narrative that see cities as basket cases, as cesspools of moral turpitude and incompetence. Take the President describing "the carnage" in our cities. It isn't that the term is inappropriate as such, one can certainly describe what is going on in Baltimore or Chicago as carnage. But brash political leaders who want to send in the troops, are not the answer. The President has only threatened the Mayor of Chicago with it, the Governor of Maryland has actually done it. On the night of the unrest this may even have been the right thing, but any generalization of the authoritarian strong-man pattern renders any attempt of improving police-community relations useless. On the other hand, one cannot help but feel sorry for the regular police officer who receives so many mixed signals in an extremely volatile and dangerous work environment. There can be no doubt that the uncertainty of how to execute law enforcement has made the police less effective to the detriment of public safety.

Mayor Pugh wants to hire more officers who live in the City. Since a quick turn-around in the rate of local officers is unlikely, the second best would be to include police in more aspects of the City than murder and mayhem. Short staffed as City Police presumably is, that may also be wishful thinking. But a community cannot afford a police that can't be bothered with the small stuff that affects the quality of life only because they have all hands full with the many uncleared homicides. The police have to be "citizens in uniform" and they have to be law abiding citizens' friends and helpers. For that they have to get out of their squad cars, shed the jump-suit battle outfits and reflective eye shades and mingle with the rest of us. This isn't a new idea, in fact every police commissioner in recent memory has embraced community policing and walking the beat, but mostly it wasn't done.

Baltimore has the third highest officer per population density in the country. It must be possible to engage police in a manner that feels less like an occupying army that is feared and more like the type of protective force that makes us feel safe. For this to happen, both sides have to be willing to engage with each other in new ways before it is too late to bring some type of peace back to our streets or Baltimore's population will take another nose-dive.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA


City Paper about the shooting at Red Emmas

Baltimore Public Markets are in danger

One of the most obvious, but perhaps least understood, methods of enhancing social integration in public spaces and encouraging upward mobility are public markets. Increasingly, community leaders and local government see public markets as a means of addressing some of the more vexing problems of our cities: the need to bring people of different ethnic groups and incomes together; the need to make inviting and safe public spaces; the need to reinvigorate low- and moderate-income neighborhoods and to support small-scale economic activity; the need to provide fresh, high-quality produce to inner-city residents; and the need to protect open space and preserve farming around cities. (Project For Public Spaces, Public Markets as a Vehicle for Social Integration and Upward Mobility report)

The public market: A place to gather, eat, buy food and run a local business
(photo: Philipsen)

Baltimore is in the envious position of having six public markets that until recently were all managed by the Baltimore Public Markets Corporation (BPMC). But as of this month Baltimore is en route of rapidly losing public control over those markets or losing several of the altogether.

"BPMC was established in 1995 as a non-profit organization, to operate the public markets in a manner beneficial to the City of Baltimore and it's citizens....Baltimore’s Public Markets are the oldest continuously operating public market system in the United States. In operation before the city’s health department and even the mayor’s office, the markets continue to maintain a tradition for which Baltimore is famous" (website). Or as current Market Director Robert Thomas puts it in a statement for this article:

Citizens of this city are .. presented with an underestimated jewel in that Baltimore enjoys multiple public markets unlike any other American city of which we are aware.

The first market was funded with the proceeds from a public lottery in 1763. . Then and now the public markets were a major source of (fresh) food. 

Given the role of markets as integrators in a divided city and a source of healthy food in neighborhoods that often are still food deserts, it should be pretty alarming to residents that almost all of the six remaining public markets are in peril of losing the very characteristics that made them special throughout their long history. 

The Cross Street Market is already in the hands of a private developer and is slated for demolition and reconstruction.

Cross Street Market

The Broadway North Market has been shuttered for a long time and both market sites are currently being offered up to developers with no restriction to maintain the use as a public market. The Request for Proposals (RFP) describes the City goals without any mention of the word market:

A. Stabilize and enhance the property values adjacent to the site;
B. Reactivate the parcels as commercial or mixed-use developments;
C. Improve pedestrian circulation within and around the site;
D. Provide an urban infill program/land use that serves as a resource to the surrounding communities to the east, west, north and south of the Site;
E. Redevelop the parcels in a manner that responds to and is compatible with the existing character of the Fells Point historic district;
F. Project design that compliments, enhances, and further activates the streetscape along the Broadway Street commercial corridor;
G. Incorporate green building practices into the design and construction process; and
H. Preserve the historic integrity of the properties on the site where possible

The Hollins market is also up for redevelopment through lease or purchase by a private developer but it is required to stay a market.

Hollins Market

The Avenue Market on Pennsylvania Avenue has been ailing for decades and has seen several attempts of revitalization. It sits in the middle of a food desert and should probably most of all Baltimore markets fulfill the original function as a public gathering spaces and source of healthy food.

Broadway Market

The 1885 Northeast Market adjacent to Hopkins Hospital has recently been rehabilitated and is still operated by the Baltimore Markets Corp.

The mothership of all Markets, the Lexington Market is proposed for complete demolition and rebuild in an adjacent location. A concept plan for this was recently made public but how exactly the project would be realized or funded is still uncertain. Whether the new market can still have any Baltimore authenticity remains a question as well. (See also BBJ's column today Keep Lexington Market's History Intact).

The discussions around the rehabilitation of the Cross Street Market shows that the course for Baltimore's markets isn't clear or that there is little consensus on what it should be. Robert Thomas states:

I consider the Cross Street disposition an important and informative episode in the history of Baltimore’s public markets. Lessons learned, and being learned, from this experience will inform outcomes of the next two RFPs, along with other factors not totally under control of the Markets corporation. (Robert Thomas)

The 1763 link between lottery proceeds and Baltimore's first market is especially interesting if one considers that the formerly public market is now in the hands of the private developer Caves Valley as part of a public private partnership (see here). Caves Valley is also a partner in the nearby Horseshoe Casino. Once again Baltimore is collecting money not only from the lottery but especially from the local casino. Federal Hill, the neighborhood of the Cross Street Market, is located inside the especially created Casino Benefits District. Caves Valley has taken the market only last month but has already taken a pretty tough stand with existing merchants which have to vacate the facility during the demolition and renovation. The local vendors are in danger of being eradicated since no arrangements for them to survive during construction seem to be made. The reconstruction and the plans for the future which include a Starbucks are already the topic of lively meetings in South Baltimore. National chains are certainly not what PPS considers a hallmark of public markets:

What people like about markets (PPS)

Finally, public markets are made up of locally owned, independent businesses operated by their owners, unlike the ubiquitous franchises that dominate retailing today. This helps account for the local flavor of public markets and the uniqueness of the shopping experience. Public markets consciously seek out local entrepreneurs and businesses and therefore offer an alternative to common retail practices. (Project For Public Spaces report)

During the 254 years of public markets in Baltimore the designs, functions and wares of the markets have changed many times. Today several of the markets have a hard time attracting customers and are far from thriving. Action is needed to stem the bleeding. Successful public markets all across America show, that public markets can be an integral and flourishing part of a modern city. In Baltimore it looks like the era of public markets in Baltimore is at a great risk of coming to an end. Baltimore still needs public markets as a safeguard for food security, as public spaces and as integrators between classes and races. Maybe more than ever. Baltimore Markets Director Thomas seems to agree:

Preserving this uniqueness, while remaining relevant enough to effectively serve the communities where our markets are located, is the upcoming challenge. We intend to remain true to our mission of supporting communities with affordable food and with small business opportunities as we navigate changes: some predictable; some not. Market management and Board are developing and implementing strategies that should help the Markets improve our support of Baltimore’s communities, even though there are almost as many opinions about how to do that as there are people to talk to about it. (Robert Thomas)

Markets need collaboration (PPS)

Baltimore should tighten the controls in whatever deals it does for the remaining markets. If the markets are run privately, the City should maintain ownership.  Public Markets should not become trendy food halls that may prove to be a temporary fad. They need to remain what they have been for 254 years, public anchors under public oversight that provide decent, affordable healthy food, provide an accessible public domain and give local vendors a chance to create a start-up business. 
Thomas is pointing out where the ultimate decision making power resides:

Ultimately, even though the Markets Board will be heard, the property is titled to Mayor and City Council of Baltimore. That fact must be respected, but also encourages citizen support and input. (Robert Thomas).

Residents of Baltimore who care about their markets should make their voices known. The proposals for the Broadway and Hollins Markets are due February 12.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

Baltimore Business Journal about Market RFPs

Baltimore Magazine 2014: Then and Now, Baltimore's Public Markets
Historic Baltimore Markets Report

         

Looking at Baltimore and Washington as one area for transit

Fifteen years after the 2002 Baltimore Rail Plan had been unveiled, the Baltimore region has not seen any new rail project being realized. Not the ones one the map and no other ones either. For 13 years all attention had gone to the $3 billion Baltimore Red Line that the Rail Plan had identified as the highest priority. It was taken off the menu in 2015. The Washington Purple Line survived only after major State funding cuts. While Governor O'Malley's transportation Secretary Porcari (who later went to Obama's DOT) had moved towards spending almost as much money on transit as on roads and had advanced two multi-billion dollar transit projects at once, Governor Hogan is much less keen on transit, especially costly rail transi. This was also evident in his State of the State address today in which he stressed roads and bridges "in every jurisdiction of the State" through "unprecedented investment", presumably coming in part from the reallocated Red Line funds.

Transit advocates have grouped and re-grouped, wondering how the role of transit can be fortified in a State that holds the purse-strings in Maryland's transportation planning through the Transportation Trust Fund. They point out that 85% of Maryland's population live in urbanized Central Maryland where road capacity can't keep up with growth and congestion increases, making rail a logical choice.

Baltimore and Washington: One transit region. Graphic MTOC

Many questions have been asked:

• What did the Washington area do right that made the Purple Line survive and the Red Line not?
• How can the business community become a stronger advocate for transit?
• Should there be additional funding sources for transit outside the Maryland? Transportation Trust Fund?
• Should the Baltimore and the Washington area compete over transit dollars or collaborate?
• Should the Baltimore area develop a new regional rail plan?

In response to those questions new transit advocacy coalitions have been formed, the regional Get Maryland Moving Coalition  and the statewide Maryland Transit Opportunity Coalition are new in addition to the Central Maryland Transit Alliance (CMTA), the advocacy group Transit Choices and groups such as the Transportation Equity Coalition which address the civil rights aspects of transportation funding. Get Maryland Moving is currently rallying for a House and Senate bill in Annapolis to repeal the 35% fare-box recovery mandate which is current law.

The Maryland Transit Opportunity Coalition held a transit advocacy night in Annapolis this week showcasing the extensive connected rail transit system the group envisions. With MARC and the D.C. Metrorail as core elements, the system would extend from Martinsburg, West Virginia to the west, to Waldorf, Maryland, to the south, all the way up Elkton, on Maryland’s Delaware line to the north. In October last year when the Coalition first appeared publicly, those behind the proposal said it would cost $8 billion.

The group stressed that this was the same price as the proposed roadway widening of I-270 in Montgomery County. “In the context of how expensive major highway projects are, making major progress on transit is cheaper,” said state Sen. Jim Rosapepe, a Democrat who represents Prince George’s and Anne Arundel counties. One of the transit lines in the menu is the Red Line light rail, a project that got a recent boost from a letter that the Justice Department sent indicating merit to the civil rights complaint that had been filed against the rail project's cancellation. A map of the Coalition shows how the State funds that had originally been set aside for the rail project in majority black urban Baltimore have been reallocated for road projects in predominantly white rural areas.

Expenditure of the State transportation dollars Red Line versus highways. Graphic by Kristen Ahearn, Transportation Equity Coalition

When Prince George's County Executive Baker announced that he would want to build the Red Line if he were to run for Governor and win it became clear that the project isn't necessarily dead for good.

The argument for transit is not any longer simply one about congestion and how to move people in the most effective manner. Along with the mobility question comes the question of quality of life and where people want to live these days, where businesses want to locate and what the educated, highly mobile younger population picks when they decide where in the United States to live. Good transit is as much a must-have for a modern city as coffee shops and micro breweries. But it is also a matter of equity and social justice in which transit is the key to opportunity for the growing segments of the population that don't have the ability to drive for lack of a car, lack of health or being of an age not suitable to driving.

At the transit event in Annapolis, Shyam Kannan, WMATA's Managing Director for Planning explained that assets near transit perform much batter than those relying entirely on the automobile. He stated that assets near transit represent 1% of land area but represent 8% of the tax contribution. 

purple Line

It is prudent for Baltimore transit advocates to stress the regional aspects of transit and the economic benefits of access across a much larger area than represented by the two current Metropoliltan Planning Organizations (MPOs) in Baltimore (BMC) and Washington (WashCOG), both the conduits for federal dollars coming to the region. Combined Baltimore-Washington are one of only 10 global metro conglomerates which compete for investors and business word-wide.  Howard and Montgomery Counties which both sit in part between Baltimore and Washington are two of the richest jurisdictions in America. Both have their own nascent bus transit systems and rapidly growing transit agencies. Newer, smaller suburban transit agencies which do not have to contend with old legacy systems are often the most innovative when it comes to being nimble and frugal.

Transportation knows no borders and people don't pick their destinations or jobs based on jurisdictional boundaries. It is time that the bigger region creates and integrated, seamless one ticket zones for all transit system that include rail, bus and "last mile" solutions in a fully integrated manner, regardless of the transit provider. Full farecard integration has been a common practice in Europe for decades and thanks to electronic chip cards it is now also becoming available in unlikely places such as six counties of the Tampa area which just introduced the Flamingo Card.

Transit friendly legislators in Annapolis such as Baltimore's Brooke Lierman (Sponsor of the farebox recovery repeal and the transportation scoring bills) and Robby Lewis are waiting for additional ideas that can be turned into policies in the State. A Governor with a specific focus on being business friendly can hardly ignore how important a well functioning transit system is for business and employees alike.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA

WYPR about the new coalition