Middle Branch shoreline makeover starting to take shape in South Baltimore
(Dan Rodricks)
BALTIMORE –
Yes, Baltimore, we can have nice things. We can have a whole stretch of waterfront restored to something like its pre-industrial best, with marshes and wildlife, but also with parks and trails, old neighborhoods improved and their residents better connected to the waters around them.
This is not some unfunded fantasy, but a growing reality in South Baltimore, around the Middle Branch of the Patapsco River, the city’s “forgotten waterfront.” It’s called “Reimagine Middle Branch,” a multi-million-dollar project in phases, headed by the South Baltimore Gateway Partnership (SBGP).
Remember the promise of casino money to fund community improvements? The SBGP gets $8 million a year from Maryland slots revenue toward fulfilling its decade-old master plan for South Baltimore neighborhoods (see list below) and the Middle Branch. It gets funds from other sources, too. So far, SBGP has about $250 million in work completed or underway.
After years of planning and permitting, you can finally see results.
Along northbound Hanover Street and the rear of MedStar Harbor Hospital, crews have been rebuilding the broad marshes of native plants and grasses that disappeared during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
“The Middle Branch of the Patapsco used to have 3,000 acres of wetlands before the industrial era,” says Brad Rogers, executive director of the SBGP. “There were wetlands ringing the whole Baltimore waterfront.”
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