HIGHWAY TO NOWHERE —> FRANKLIN DELL
“The reimagining of Baltimore’s “Highway to Nowhere” (HTN) has the potential to become the first project in the city since Camden Yards to rise to the level of “international showpiece” - a model example of landscape design, architecture and adaptive reuse of outdated and divisive transportation infrastructure. And critically, it’s nowhere near the harbor.”
View west from downtown over the “Highway to Nowhere” (and future Franklin Dell) toward HUB West Baltimore
Overhead of the “Highway to Nowhere” reimagined as Franklin Dell and bookended by key development sites, including HUB West Baltimore
Planning Underway - Watch This Space
HUB West Baltimore has assembled - and is in the process of growing - a community-based planning group to help re-imagine this future critical spine of West Baltimore as the Franklin Dell (working title). We’ve gathered community organizations, former city planners, major developers, architects and landscape designers to move the design process forward. The money to get started is in the recently-passed infrastructure bill - but that money is competitive. We’re here to help make Baltimore’s key application for those funds be success.
All around the world, urban fabrics, transportation networks and, indeed, cities themselves are being rethought, reimagined and restructured. It’s nothing short of a new-century renaissance of how humans live on this planet. In many areas though, equity, and writing of past wrongs, has not even been part of the discussion. Here in Baltimore though, we’ve got an opportunity to make a new model - one with equity at its center, and the project more-fully successful as a result. Indeed, if this project is executed well, it could represent a pivot point in not just our city’s evolution, but that of our country.
Lots more to come - again, watch this space - but until then, here’s a link to a design we highly admire by a recent graduate of the University of Maryland’s landscape architecture school, Emma Podietz. (Note to city - hire her for the design team!) Her design includes a wealth of green space, room for transit, numerous community benefits (including a new library, community gardens, multiple recreation spaces, and a new transit station), and makes excellent use of regrading opportunities that may become available with excess fill dirt from the Douglass/B&P Tunnel project.
Further Reading
- See the website for the upcoming book “Stop the Road, Baltimore’s epic 40-year battle over Interstate Highways,” assembled with interviews of over 50 people who were there and played a key role. Be the first to know when it comes out by registering on the site.
- Browse Justin Fair’s comprehensive archive of Highway to Nowhere stories and videos
- Read the original Highway to Nowhere “Community” plan, entitled: “Baltimore Urban Design Concept Team”, which included such community stalwarts writing the plan as Skidmore, Owings and Merrill; Wilbur Smith and Assoc.; Parsons, Brinckerhoff, Quade and Douglas; and the J. E. Greiner Co. Compliments of the National Academies Transportation Research Board.