MCB plan would make Inner Harbor vital and livable | READER COMMENTARY
In response to the recent column by Dan Rodricks, “59% of Baltimoreans support the Harborplace redo? Really?” (April 21), I am happy to write as a supporter of the project.
I am a lifelong Baltimorean who lives on Light Street one block from Harborplace. I watched the foot traffic around the Inner Harbor fall precipitously as Harborplace emptied out, and it is not recovering. The MCB Real Estate proposal is a contemporary, fresh approach that will generate energy and draw people from all over the region back to the Inner Harbor. It’s also an exciting addition to our skyline and a salute to our amazing waterfront with great views from all directions, even leveraging the Constellation by making it more visible from Pratt Street.
We all want a vibrant, livable downtown and another 900 highly desirable residences at the Inner Harbor on top of great waterfront spaces for us all to share will help make that a reality. As for park space, Westshore Park and Rash Field are focal points of communal activity throughout the year, but McKeldin Plaza is a concrete swath of limited use. Calming the six-lane (and larger) highway that is Light Street, currently a favored spot for dirt bikers and speeders, is a must for walkability and safety.
We also want a successful economy and the number of office and storefront vacancies downtown is truly shocking. A new anchor at the Inner Harbor is urgently needed right away. Also, Baltimore is exploding with entrepreneurs starting new businesses, many from communities that have been largely underrepresented in our past successes. They need visibility in places that draw maximal foot traffic to prosper. Developer David Bramble and his team are sensitive to those needs and are already delivering for them.
Finally, we put the development of Harborplace into private control 45 years ago. That ship may have sailed, but how fortunate we are to have MCB investing hundreds of millions of dollars to take our signature feature into the future with a vision that will attract Baltimoreans and visitors alike. They have literally put their money where their mouth is and I wish them nothing but success. We are counting on them.
— Michael S. Saxon, Baltimore
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