August 24th, 2009
Promenade or PromeNot?
By Jamie McCoy, Baltimore intern
Whalen Properties is hoping to buy land from the Spring Grove State Hospital in Catonsville in order to build a shopping center, which will be called the Catonsville Promenade. As a lifelong Catonsville resident enamored with the neighborhood’s small town feel, I was naturally suspicious of any sort of large scale development that could potentially change the face of the town. And I am not alone—“PromeNOT” signs can be found on many many lawns across Catonsville.
Catonsville’s Laura LeMire is involved with the group Catonsville Voices, which is spearheading the opposition to the development of the Promenade. The biggest concern that LeMire cites is traffic. “The beltway will be backed up, which will impact the community,” she says. “Traffic will overflow onto Frederick Road, Edmondson Avenue, Wilkens Avenue, and Rolling Road.” Although Whalen Properties promises that the traffic issues will be dealt with, LeMire has a hard time believing it.
Steve Whalen explains that he doesn’t want to create a mall that “feels just like every other mall in the country.” He says there will be a mix of bigger chains and smaller retail shops and restaurants—the big chains will be needed to pay the higher rent, but there will be an effort to get unique shops as well.
A 20-year Catonsville resident who preferred to be known only as Mr. Rich is wary of this plan. “Who needs another Target?” he asks. “We don’t want the mainstream restaurants and shops in our neighborhood. That’s just not Catonsville.” Rich would prefer to see the business district along Frederick Road improved, and is worried that the Promenade would take away from these local businesses.
Many of Frederick Road’s business owners refused to comment on the Promenade, but Sean Dunworth of the Catonsville Gourmet Restaurant said that the creation of the Promenade might actually bring more business to Frederick Road, and that, in general, he supports many of the things that Whalen has proposed. “A compromised version of the plan would be terrific,” he says. “Whalen would have to work with the community, but in general this Promenade could be a good thing.”
Whalen is certainly doing his research on the project. He has travelled all over the country visiting shopping malls that are attractive additions to communities, citing the Parole Towne Center in Annapolis and Santana Row in San Jose as examples. And he too is a lifetime Catonsville resident—he says he has the community’s best interests at heart. He wants to “enable residents to do everything from eating to shopping right in the community.”
It seems, however, that Whalen will have to do a lot of convincing to assure the community that Catonsville won’t lose its feel. “I’m nervous about it too,” says Whalen. “It’s a big undertaking and we have one chance to do it right. That’s why you hire the best people to work on the project so that the job can be done well.”
Still the question remains: Do we really need it?
Photo courtesy of Whalen Properties.
3:54 pm
Categories: Uncategorized
Jamie, as I explained to you repeatedly, the Promenade is NOT a mall. Yet you keep repeating that description in your article anyway! It is a vertically integrated, mixed use project. The cutting edge in green, smart growth re-development.
Malls are typically 100% retail. We are proposing no more than 40% of the project as retail and restaurant, with the rest being residential condo, entertainment, hotels, Class A office and recreation. Virtually none of those aspects exist in a quality way anywhere else in Catonsville. Why must Catonsville be a place to drive through, as it is now, rather than a potential destination, a great amenity, a place to drive to? Why can’t we have great amenities in Catonsville? Why must we always drive someplace ELSE to find something nice?
Laura LeMire loves to repeat her traffic mantra, without one scintilla of evidence beyond her opinion. but the truth is that sufficient infrastructure improvements can and will be made as part of the project to mitigate traffic impacts. Among other things, that happens to be a requirement of the County’s development approval process. Even more importantly, she loves to conveniently ignore that, if the Promenade replaces local residents trips to more distant amenities, that substitution effect will have Catonsville residents spending less time in their cars, rather than more. That, of course, doesn’t fit on a little blue lawn sign, does it?
I also invited you, Jamie, to come to our office and review our detailed video presentation. You have chosen not to do so before writing your blog. How can you opinionate on such a complex topic when you haven’t seen or heard the actual story? How do you draw conclusions when you don’t know all the facts? Not exactly journalism’s finest hour. You’ll find that 90% of the folks with little blue lawn signs arefrom that exact same mindset — don’t confuse me with the facts; I don’t like it!!! (whatever it is…)
Finally, Whalen Properties is probably the largest commercial property owner on Frederick Road. I’m not going to cut off my nose to spite my face. I fervently believe that a well-designed Promenade will bring more folks and more interest to Catonsville and work synergistically to spur quality redevelopment on Frederick Road, just as the original development of Harborplace and the Inner Harbor helped spur interest in and redevelopment in Fells Point, Canton and Inner Harbor East. The effect can be symbiotic and complementary if designed and properly coordinated. The idea that both cannot be mutually supportive, beneficial and ultimately successful is baloney. But it does take hard work, good planning and coordination to be successful and that’s why we are spending so much time doing our homework. We get one chance to do it right.
I’ve been fervent about Catonsville since I was born here 59 years ago. I’ve developed many successful projects in and around this, my community. At the end of the day, it really does come down to separating the visionary from the reactionary. There is much local support for a great idea whose time has come, even if the proponents choose to express their advocacy more quietly, without littering the landscape with little blue lawn signs.
I have been a resident for almost 10yrs and I for one am very excited about the proposed Promenade! Truthfully, it was a blue sign against the project that made me aware of it! I believe the project would significantly increase Catonsville draw to the surrounding public. Currently I goto Ellicott City or Columbia or even downtown Baltimrore for shopping/entertainment, but it would be great to have one locally. If its done in the same fashion as White Marsh’s ‘The Avenue’ or even like downtown Silver Spring I will be very pleased. We need more restaurants/shopping/entertainment in this area.