(7/11/2005) ROCKVILLE - Standing at the corner of Veirs Mill and Norbeck roads, Governor Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr., today announced the State's preference is to build the Intercounty Connector (ICC) highway along the Corridor 1 alignment...

View the ICC preferred route

(9/1/2005) BALTIMORE - The Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) in cooperation with the Port Land Use Development Advisory Council (PLUDAC) has completed a draft Port Land Use Maritime Industrial Retention and Growth Management Strategy (MIRGMS)...

Click below to go directly to the MIRGMS documents:
MIRGMS Report Part 1
MIRGMS Report Part 2

(9/15/2005) BALTIMORE - Proclaiming it as a dynamic example of a public/private partnership, Governor Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr. today led a ceremonial ground breaking for Metro Center at Owings Mills along with representatives of State and local government, business, and surrounding communities...

Metro Center at Owings Mills - Aerial View
Metro Center at Owings Mills - Entrance
Metro Center at Owings Mills - Floor Plan
Metro Center at Owings Mills - Library Rendering

(11/15/2005) BALTIMORE - Ten Baltimore-area companies have been named winners of the Greater Baltimore Committee's 2005 Bridging the Gap Awards honoring minority firms for business achievement and others for their efforts to strengthen minority business opportunities in the region...

(11/30/2005) MIDDLE RIVER - Enthusiasm for the new Route 43 extension remains high among economic development officials, but owners of small businesses in the Middle River area are more apt to shrug...

(1/15/2006) BALTIMORE CITY - Along a block of North Calvert Street, surrounded by crumbling and boarded-up rowhouses, homebuyers are shelling out $400,000 and more for luxury townhouses sprouting on the site of long-demolished buildings.

At Clipper Mill in Hampden, residents are moving into a cluster of former industrial buildings converted to apartments and condominiums and are snapping up new townhouses...

(1/15/2006) SILVER SPRING - For a glimpse of what could be in Baltimore's future, go to downtown Silver Spring. On a chilly weekday, office workers eat lunch at Chipotle Grill, grab coffee at Starbucks and flip through the best-sellers at Borders Books and Music. A mother and her toddler emerge from a Gymboree class and peer into shop windows. Diners wait to be seated at Eggspectations. Residents and commuters scurry from the nearby Metro station and park-and-ride...

(3/21/2006) BALTIMORE - Developers led by Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse have been chosen to transform the state's aging Baltimore office complex into a hub of offices, shops, housing and a hotel centered around public transit, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr....

(9/14/2006) State transportation officials plan to add 1,500 parking spaces to the MARC commuter station off Route 175 in Odenton, where daily ridership on the Penn Line exceeds available parking.

(9/14/2006) An Annapolis development firm has won the right to transform a 15-acre, state-owned parking lot adjacent to the Savage MARC station into a $175 million complex of offices, residences and shops, ending a three-year search for a private company to jump-start the languishing industrial enclave along the Howard-Anne Arundel county border.

(10/4/2006) A Lutherville developer is planning $230 million worth of new warehouses, offices and apartments near Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport and Arundel Mills Mall that could serve employment growth expected from the nation's base realignment.

(12/1/2006) Developer Foulger-Pratt Co. of Rockville plans to build two residential buildings and a hotel above a proposed multi-modal transit center at the Silver Spring Metro station.

(12/15/2006) Preston Partners Inc., a Lutherville-based commercial real estate firm, plans to close its Bethesda office by the end of the month as part of a larger consolidation of its brokers into new office space in Columbia, a company official said.

(12/16/2006) After years of building in the suburbs with open land and large numbers of shoppers, big-box retailers and others are seeking new business in shopping-deprived cities such as Baltimore by pumping new life into urban neighborhoods and rethinking their cookie-cutter image.

(1/18/2007) Baltimore got a second Sheraton brand hotel on Thursday.

The Wyndham Baltimore Inner Harbor Hotel is now the Sheraton Baltimore City Center Hotel, which is halfway through a $30 million renovation.

(1/18/2007) Financially strapped Mills Corp., the Chevy Chase mall developer that owns Arundel Mills and Marley Station, agreed yesterday to be bought by a Canadian investment company in a deal valued at $7.5 billion.

(1/19/2007) Cushman & Wakefield, an international real estate brokerage in New York, will expand to Baltimore next week with a lineup of local veteran brokers from the former Trammell Crow Co.

(1/22/2007) Greenbelt developer the Bozzuto Group, a prominent builder in the Baltimore area, has been picked to develop a 3.24-acre residential, retail and office project in Silver Spring in partnership with Montgomery County officials.

(1/30/2007) WESTMINSTER, Md. (AP) - Developers are reviving Maryland's malls with downtown-like new urbanism, but Westminster's economic development director calls his city "the real deal."

(2/2/2007) Baltimore-based Atlantic Builders Group Inc. has been awarded contracts to build three new Wal-Mart Supercenters in the Baltimore area, which are valued at $40 million and are expected to be built within eight months, the developer said.

(2/26/2007) Now that developers are uniting this historically urban format with the increasingly popular ‘live, work, play’ motto of mixed-use development, the newly evolved transit-oriented development trend is taking root in suburban areas across the country.

(3/2/2007) Adam Gross imagines the gateway to downtown with all the grandeur of an Italian piazza: sparkling fountains, brilliantly designed restaurants and landscaped walkways that beckon visitors with a sense that the street itself is a destination.

(3/9/2007) Baltimore officials announced yesterday that they have picked five design teams to compete to redo Rash Field and add a parking garage beneath it.

City officials say that they hope that the Joseph H. Rash Memorial Park -- which opened in 1976 -- will be completely redeveloped in time to allow Baltimore to host a spring 2009 stop of the Volvo Ocean Race in the Inner Harbor, should it choose to return to the city.

(3/14/2007) In CoStar Lead Street, we highlight the Federal Reserve's survey of economic conditions and while markets remain generally strong, the word robust no longer shows up. We also report on: Montecito's and ING's new venture to acquire medical office buildings; BP's sell off of gas stations; Comerica's plans to relocate to Dallas and give you the latest properties under contract, including 15 hotels.

(3/29/2007) The Baltimore County Public Schools has signed a long-term lease to open a remedial school program at the Baltimore Crossroads @ 95 development in White Marsh.

(3/29/2007) Commuters who use the Owings Mills Metro station should be able to park in a 2,900-space garage in just over a month.

Crews are putting the "finishing touches" on the seven-story building beside Interstate 795, said Arthur Adler, vice president of Owings Mills-based David S. Brown Enterprises. Brown and Towson-based Whiting-Turner are developing the Owings Mills Metro Center -- 46.5 acres of stores, offices and residences -- on the station's parking lots.

(4/11/2007) Zieger/Snead Architects of Baltimore has been picked to help create a new vision for Rash Field, a 9.3-acre site between the Rusty Scupper restaurant and the Maryland Science Center along Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

(4/28/2007) A landmark Baltimore office tower built by the founder of Amoco Oil was purchased yesterday by a Wilmington, Del.-based commercial developer.

The Buccini/Pollin Group said yesterday that it acquired One North Charles Street, built in 1963 by oil magnate Jacob Blaustein, for an undisclosed amount. Buccini/Pollin will be spending more than $30 million, including the acquisition cost and nearly $10 million in renovations to the 25-story tower and outside plaza, said Christopher F. Buccini, a founding partner.

(4/29/2007) More than 100 relocation experts, commercial real estate professionals, government officials and representatives from retail, banking and hospitality climbed aboard Thursday for the 15th Annual VIP Real Estate Tour of Anne Arundel County.

(5/20/2007) Cecil County's rural charm is expected to lure thousands of households moving to the region to fill jobs at the Army base in Aberdeen.

But when the defense contractors come looking for a home, Delaware could reap a better crop.

(5/28/2007) Mark Corneal looks at the government-owned land outside the gates of Fort Meade and, instead of 173 acres of dense woods, sees Maryland's next hot spot for development.

(5/29/2007) With Christmas still 210 days away, Towson Town Center and Mondawmin Mall are preparing for the shopping rush early.

(6/20/2007) Real estate investment trust First Potomac Realty Trust said Wednesday it bought a two-building office in Annapolis, Md., its first buy in the market, for $10.1 million from an undisclosed seller.

(6/22/2007) Frederick, Md.'s Westview Corporate Center, a 450,000-square-foot office complex located less than an hour outside of Washington, D.C., has come under new ownership. TA Associates Realty took the five-structure, Class A property (pictured) off the hands of Westview L.L.L.P. in a $96 million deal.

(6/25/2007) BAA Maryland, developer and manager of the AIRMALL® at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall (BWI) airport is proud to announce the arrival of M&T Bank’s first ever full-service bank branch located pre-security near the Southwest Airlines Terminal. Travelers, visitors and airport employees now have the opportunity to cash in at the airport and conduct an array of banking activities.

(8/3/2007) The Bernstein Management Corp., a privately funded Washington, D.C., real estate investment and management group, has picked up its second property in Baltimore, paying about $10.2 million for One Market Center on the city's west side.

(8/3/2007) A Charlotte, N.C.-based real estate company has launched plans to build a 1.2 million-square-foot office and retail development in Havre de Grace that could bring as much as 900,000 square feet of office space to Harford County.

(8/9/2007) A 35-story office building, a hotel, and more than 20,000 square feet of retail space are among the options being considered for the Baltimore City revitalization project on the city's west side called the superblock.

(9/13/2007) Five more enclosed shopping complexes are raising the roof for renovations to appeal to time-starved consumers with increasingly sophisticated tastes

(9/17/2007) Manekin L.L.C., the developer of Water's Edge Corporate Campus in Belcamp, Md., has brought in Alex Brown Realty Inc. as a new equity partner for the 467,000-square-foot mixed-use project. The project will cost $60 million to complete and is being developed to accommodate an impending influx of government-related businesses within the next few years.

(9/18/2007) SALISBURY, Md. – A vacant field bordering Arthur W. Perdue Stadium might soon be converted into an upscale office park featuring two Hilton hotels, restaurants and retail space.

(11/5/2007) The Maryland State House, a national historic landmark and the oldest capitol still in legislative use, will close from April until the 2009 General Assembly session for major renovations to its 40-year-old internal piping system, state officials said Monday

(11/8/2007) Corporate Office Properties Trust hopes to start construction by the end of the year on a five-story addition to Corporate Place, an office park just south of Honeygo Boulevard and White Marsh Mall that it acquired as part of a $362.5 million portfolio acquisition from Nottingham Properties Inc.

(11/8/2007) The developers of a $720 million waterfront development near Fells Point have won approval to start laying the groundwork for their project, even as they await word on their request for public funding to help finance it.

(11/25/2007) Black Friday is over, but the holiday shopping season has just begun. For many people that means lots of car trips to the mall and the inevitable traffic hassles.But for Shalonda Long, it's all a walk in the park - the parking lot, that is.As one of the residents of Greenwich Place at Town Center, a luxury townhouse and apartment complex in Owings Mills, Long lives just a stone's throw from the sprawling Owings Mills Mall. "The mall is so close, you can walk there in about five minutes," said Long, 31, who also manages the luxury property, which opened last fall. The complex has 332 midrise apartments and three-story townhouses, with two-car garages, renting for about $1,200 to $1,800 a month.

(12/13/2007) The state Board of Public Works yesterday approved a pair of contracts that advance transit-oriented development projects. The board approved an interim $1.2 billion redevelopment plan for the State Center government complex on the edge of downtown Baltimore. The redevelopment of the 25-acre site, which brings together MARC service, light rail and several bus lines, has been described as the largest single-site project in Baltimore since the revitalization of the Inner Harbor. The agreement the state signed is with a consortium led by the Baltimore firm of Struever Brothers Eccles & Rouse.

(12/14/2007) DALLAS, TX – Baltimore’s Inner Harbor will soon be home to the landmark Four Seasons Hotel and Residences at Harbor East. The hotel is the focal point of the redevelopment of a 6-block area that connects the Inner Harbor with the surrounding residential neighborhoods. HKS Hill Glazier Studio is the design architect, with Beatty Harvey & Associates providing architect-of-record services.

(1/6/2008) Baltimore’s hotel portfolio continues to expand with the recent completion and opening of Marriott’s SpringHill Suites a few blocks from Inner Harbor.

(1/9/2008) Downtown Columbia might not be on the short list for planned Metro or light rail stops in coming years, but as the area develops, landowners want to make sure it is “transit ready.”

(1/11/2008) Laurel city officials and the community applauded Laurel Mall redevelopment plans to expand beyond indoor shopping, but rejected a Washington, D.C., developer’s attempt to build a 20-story residential tower during 2007, a busy year for city development.

(2/13/2008) Last year, Dr. Gavin Hamilton lived on the 17th floor of a new building in Baltimore's trendy Harbor East community. This year, the 32-year-old specialist in internal medicine found an apartment he likes even more -- a converted loft in the Station North Arts and Entertainment District. He's so pleased with it, he's throwing an Oscar party to show it off to his friends.

(2/22/2008) Owing Mills, MD-based Black Oak Associates has received final site plan approval for a new "green" lifestyle center in the Baltimore area. Black Oak has already broken ground on Main Street Eldersburg, which is located on 12.5 acres at the convergence of MD Routes 32 and 36 in Eldersburg, MD. Grading is about 70% complete and ground-up construction is scheduled to begin this spring.

(2/26/2008) A stalled project to redevelop a critical downtown corner appears back on track after market changes forced a shift from an apartment tower to a mix of hotels and residences. Two new hotels with 300 rooms are now planned for the $100 million Citycenter project at Calvert and Lombard streets, first proposed three years ago as a luxury apartment tower, developer Mark Sapperstein says.

(2/27/2008) Baltimore developer Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse Inc. has proposed an extensive expansion of its successful Tide Point business park in Locust Point that includes nearly 200,000 square feet of office space, a parking garage and several new residential buildings, according to city documents and sources familiar with the project.

(3/7/2008) The developers of a massive redevelopment of Fells Point's Broadway Market have altered their building plans in an effort to secure financing and start construction by spring 2009.

(3/7/2008) The O'Malley administration's effort to tighten shoreline development restrictions gained political momentum yesterday, as local officials announced their support for the bill after winning key concessions.

(3/12/2008) Picture floating high above Pratt Street in a ski-lift-style gondola, soaring over the Inner Harbor on a seven-minute journey from the Convention Center to Fells Point. Trey Winstead of Winstead Brothers LLC has been studying, planning and engineering such a 1.3-mile route along overhead cables for six years. Now along with his brother Peter Winstead he's ready to pitch the plan to put Baltimore on the cutting edge of urban aerial transit to the city's design panel.

(3/13/2008) BALTIMORE (Map, News) - If you’re going to talk green, you might as well be green, says Rachel Taylor. Taylor recently moved her 10-year-old stone products company, Athena Stone, into office space in a new energy-efficient and environmentally friendly building at the refurbished Lucky’s Warehouse in Brooklyn on the Middle Branch river.

(4/18/2008) The Carroll County commissioners voted yesterday to take the next step toward participating in a regional waste-to-energy facility, responding to an invitation from their counterparts in Frederick. The 2-1 vote came after weeks of debate on the matter in public hearings and workshops, and is part of an ongoing discussion about how to manage solid waste in both counties. It will allow the boards to next determine the cost of such a facility, which -- if built -- would be in Frederick County.

(5/6/2008) The plain, unassuming cluster of state office buildings in Central Baltimore known as State Center is truly an island in the middle of several thriving city neighborhoods.

(5/7/2008) The state of Maryland and a team of private developers are pushing ahead with an ambitious $1.6 billion redevelopment of the state's aging 28-acre midtown Baltimore office complex, planning to cluster new offices, apartments, condos and shops around existing mass transit and a new central plaza.

(5/9/2008) Washington, D.C., ranks fifth among 50 U.S. metro areas in the U.S., and Baltimore No. 11, in a study of long-term economic competitiveness.

(5/12/2008) BALTIMORE (Map, News) - The national economy is at its lowest tide in recent years, but the largest Baltimore City projects have remained afloat through aggressive public-private partnerships involving major local developers.

(5/20/2008) The state could hire a private company this week to help lease the Baltimore World Trade Center, a move aimed at upping occupancy at the publicly owned Inner Harbor office building.

(6/2/2008) The Purple Line transitway proposed for Montgomery and Prince George's counties almost certainly will be light rail rather than a rapid bus route, but what else will it be?

(6/4/2008) Politicians and businessmen piled onto buses at Tipton Airport last week to go to school. Their syllabus: new developments around Odenton. Planned by the West Anne Arundel County Chamber of Commerce, about 160 people on three motor coaches toured the area, rode over major highways, small state roads and pot-holed side streets, passing through what is planned to become the 1,600-acre Odenton Town Center, a mix of shops, homes, businesses and offices.

(6/11/2008) The rebirth of an aging industrial park in Baltimore County as a mixed office and warehouse complex highlights what some say is a shift in the industrial real estate market away from projects in between the Baltimore and Washington beltways.

(6/18/2008) A mostly closed shopping center in Essex could become the home of big-box retailers and a supermarket. The Diamond Point Plaza, which has struggled since losing Sam's Club and Ames stores, is under contract to a Pikesville developer who is lining up retailers.

(6/20/2008) Developer Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse hopes to transform 17 acres in South Baltimore's Port Covington into a community that could include homes, shops and offices, along with a promenade and even a trolley. Struever Bros., working with the owner of the adjacent Tidewater Yacht Service Center, envisions a 2 million-square-foot development with 2,010 housing units, some of which could be built on reconstructed piers.

(6/26/2008) On Avon Court in Halethorpe, there's an unwritten law that says the parking space in front of your home is your spot. But the commuters who flock to the Halethorpe MARC station don't follow that code. They see the absence of no-parking signs as an invitation to leave their cars on the residential street - especially as the 770-space lot at the station fills up every day.

(6/27/2008) Mayor Sheila Dixon walked down a block in West Baltimore yesterday and noticed what wasn't there: doctors' offices, cleaners, grocery stores. Instead, she saw abandoned houses with collapsed roofs, vacant lots overrun with trash and weeds, and residents desperate for something better.

(6/28/2008) The Army has reached a tentative deal with a Texas-based development firm to build a large office park at Fort Meade, with the firm pledging to work with local and state officials to ease expected traffic congestion around the post.

(7/27/2008) College Park, a city of sandwich shops and abandoned businesses, has long been billed an eyesore and an impediment to the progress of the University of Maryland’s goal to become a top-10 research institution. But by 2013, East Campus, a portion of university land that houses a few maintenance buildings and a bus depot, could be transformed into a city center filled with shops, a Birchmere Music Hall, movie theater and housing. The plan for the $900 million, 38-acre project will be submitted to the Prince George’s County Planning Board within the next couple of weeks and could be approved by January, developers said.

(7/31/2008) The Maryland Transit Administration wants to help relieve the parking crunch at Aberdeen’s MARC station by proposing up to 165 new parking spaces, officials said at a recent meeting. The proposed expansion project, which would bring the total number of spaces to 293, will: Reconfigure the existing east parking lot on APG Road; Create two new parking lots across East Bel Air Avenue on Taft Street; Add head-in street parking along APG Road.

(8/4/2008) More than a year after Baltimore passed a law intended to keep housing affordable for working-class families, City Hall is testing the limits of its newfound power on a prominent stretch of waterfront property. Relying in part on the new law, the city is negotiating with Turner Development Group to build at least 200 affordable homes and apartments alongside the massive residential project proposed for the Westport neighborhood on the Middle Branch of the Patapsco, The Sun has learned.

(8/20/2008) The O'Malley administration plans to announce Wednesday that it has negotiated the purchase of 13 double-decker rail cars from a Virginia railroad as part of an effort to reduce crowding on the MARC system, where capacity has been strained by an influx of riders escaping high fuel prices. The Maryland Transit Administration is scheduled to bring the almost $22 million contract with Virginia Railway Express before the Board of Public Works this morning. Approval is expected.

(8/21/2008) As Michael Dresser and Rona Kobell reported last week, drivers in Maryland and across the country are driving much less these days as a result of high gas prices ("Foot off the gas pedal," Aug. 14). Unfortunately, as Americans look for alternatives to their cars, they are finding that many of our public transportation systems - short-changed over the years and facing their own high fuel bills - are unable to keep up with the rising demand.

(8/21/2008) Developers hope to start building a $230 million project next spring near the campus of Johns Hopkins Hospital in East Baltimore that would include luxury apartments, shops and, later, offices or a hotel to cater to the expanding health system's growing number of employees, patients and visitors. The project's developers expect that the Washington Hill complex would forge a link between the world-renowned institution and surrounding neighborhoods, rejuvenating three vacant blocks where dilapidated public housing was razed three years ago. City leaders and developers believe that the 1.2 million-square-foot project can capitalize on the growth of Hopkins, which is in the midst of a major expansion on the city's east side.

(9/10/2008) New shops and restaurants would rise along more than a dozen blocks of Baltimore's most heavily traveled downtown boulevard, Pratt Street, and the corridor itself would get a $100 million makeover in one of the city's most ambitious urban renewal initiatives since the redevelopment of Charles Center and the Inner Harbor.

(10/2/2008) Anne Arundel County officials are looking to Odenton Town Center to help absorb an influx of several thousand government and private-sector jobs being shifted to Fort George G. Meade under a Defense Department realignment plan slated to be completed by 2011. The county plans to apply to state officials to have the area designated a BRAC Revitalization and Incentive Zone, which would allow the county to offer tax incentives to companies moving to the area and rebates to developers who build there.

(10/5/2008) Every prudent act of government, one of Britain's great political thinkers once wrote, is founded on compromise. No better example may be found than in Baltimore's proposed Red Line to extend transit from Woodlawn to Canton, and the form it might take. Should it be a rapid bus line with its own right-of-way or light rail? How much of it should be built on the surface and how much underground? The project's cost varies widely depending on those choices - from $545 million to $2.4 billion.

(10/21/2008) NAI KLNB has brokered the sale of Metro Square, a 72,000 square foot retail shopping center located at 11120 & 11130 Reisterstown Road in Owings Mills, MD. Gil Neuman and Chris Kubler of NAI KLNB represented the seller, 145 Albany Avenue LLC/SFW Strip LLC, while the buyer, Cedar Shopping Centers of Port Washington, NY was self-represented. The sales price was $15.25 million or $212 per square foot.

(10/24/2008) Tate Armstrong is just waiting for what he calls a “twinkling of the eye.” The president of Konterra Realty LLC of Beltsville, Armstrong has received approval from Anne Arundel County to start construction on a 150,000-square-foot office building being marketed to defense contractors at Fort George G. Meade. The only problem: The defense contractors aren’t biting yet, and the shaky economy has prompted many banks to shy away from financing new commercial buildings that don’t have any signed tenants.

(10/30/2008) City officials plan to unveil a multiphase plan today to transform a 100-acre arts and entertainment district north of Pennsylvania Station into a $1 billion "cultural crossroads" for Baltimore over the next three decades. Mayor Sheila Dixon is set to endorse the initiative for the Charles North renewal area, which is centered on the intersection of Charles Street and North Avenue and includes the state-designated Station North arts and entertainment district.

(11/17/2008) Columbia developer Corporate Office Properties Trust broke ground Monday on an office park in Aberdeen, hoping to capture a portion of the 150 defense contractors expected to move into Greater Baltimore over the next three years.

(11/25/2008) The Baltimore Development Corp. has received four proposals to develop part of the so-called superblock on Baltimore’s West side, including one from the former owner of New York Fashions Inc. The proposals are being evaluated by the BDC and would be part of the larger revitalization of the superblock, which city officials have said is an important link between the city’s west side and its downtown business district.

(12/3/2008) The light rail variant of the city’s proposed east-west Red Line mass transit system is the best available option, a gathering of city business leaders said Tuesday. The rally, sponsored by the Greater Baltimore Committee, follows the last of several public hearings on the issue and comes ahead of Gov. Martin O’Malley’s recommendation on a Red Line variant to federal officials early next year.

(12/15/2008) Has the time come to devote significantly more funding to mass transit? An emphatic YES! Should it alter the current balance between federal funding for highways and transit? Let the states and metro areas decide. What works for Maryland is not likely to work for Montana.

(12/17/2008) Despite flagging revenues and a dismal financial outlook, Maryland is moving ahead with plans to support development related to the influx of thousands of military jobs here from the base relocation and closure process. State officials have their priorities straight. In providing $5 million to help finance improvements in five newly created enterprise zones, Maryland can direct growth where it wants it, promote mass transit use and capitalize on a major federal investment.

(1/1/2009) Most Marylanders remain blissfully unaware of how growth and development occur around them or affect their daily choices. They probably don't know about last summer's round of "listening sessions" sponsored by the Maryland Department of Planning, or the draft report from the Task Force on the Future for Growth and Development in Maryland - or that the General Assembly expects to see legislation this year to "revise and re-energize" Maryland's Smart Growth program.

(1/22/2009) Hilton Hotels, one of the world's largest lodging firms, said yesterday that it is moving its corporate headquarters -- and several hundred jobs -- to the D.C. region this year, parking itself squarely in the back yard of a major competitor, Marriott International. The announcement, which surprised industry executives, comes less than two years after the Blackstone Group bought the Beverly Hills, Calif., hotel chain for $26 billion and later named Christopher Nassetta chief executive. Nassetta, who grew up in Arlington County, had been chief executive of Host Hotels & Resorts, based in Bethesda.

(1/27/2009) The Port of Baltimore/Maryland Port of Administration has purchased 14.606 acres in Chesapeake Commerce Center from Duke Realty Corporation (Duke). The Port of Baltimore will use this land in Duke’s warehouse and distribution development in East Baltimore City for cargo needs.

(2/4/2009) A major component of the economic stimulus bill passed by the House last week focuses on infrastructure investment as a prime way to lift the U.S. out of a deepening decline. President Barack Obama warns of a "generation" of lost earnings if legislation isn't enacted to breathe life into an economy floundering in recession. Pumping money into infrastructure is desperately needed - but it is not enough. Building bridges and roads without a clear 21st-century national strategy to guide the investment will squander it. The result? The United States will lose much more than a generation of earnings; we will sacrifice our competitive edge in the global economy.

(2/19/2009) Metro and Maryland transportation officials said yesterday that they would use their share of the $787 billion stimulus package to pay for bridge maintenance, new buses and other large rehabilitation projects. Officials said the projects would create jobs while rebuilding the region's infrastructure.

(2/25/2009) The Baltimore City Board of Estimates approved a $4.5 million deal Wednesday to sell a block of land in downtown Baltimore to a team of developers planning to build a pair of Hyatt hotels. A development team led by Mark Sapperstein, Benjamin Greenwald and Joseph Haskins plan to construct a 450,000-square-foot complex anchored by a Hyatt Place and Hyatt Summerfield Suites with a combined 300 hotel rooms.

(2/26/2009) The MARC commuter rail system will receive $10.3 million of President Barack Obama's recently passed economic stimulus funds to launch a series of station improvements this spring. U.S. Rep. C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger, D-2nd District, will announce the MARC projects tomorrow at a news conference at the MARC station at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport.

(3/9/2009) Despite job losses and falling gasoline prices, record numbers of Americans rode subways, buses and commuter rail last year, boosting public transportation ridership to its highest level in 52 years, according to a survey to be released today by the American Public Transportation Association. Advocates say the ridership figures show growing support for public transportation. They hope to use that support to push for federal funding beyond the $8.4 billion in stimulus money set aside for transit. More investment in transit not only helps the economy, advocacy groups say, but also helps the environment and fosters energy independence.

(3/26/2009) BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport has landed a $15 million grant through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act signed by President Barack Obama earlier this year. The money, which will come through the Federal Aviation Administration, will be used to upgrade pavements on the aircraft ramp and taxi lane between concourses C and D at the at airport, according to a statement from Gov. Martin O’Malley’s office.

(3/31/2009) The number of completed historic structure commercial rehabilitation projects in Maryland dropped from 75 projects totaling $303.9 million in private investment in 2001 to 20 projects totaling $32.8 million in investment in 2005, due in part to the State's cutbacks on a tax credit incentive for redeveloping older buildings, according to a new report commissioned by the Abell Foundation.

(4/11/2009) President Barack Obama turned to Maryland for another high-level appointment Friday as the White House announced that he intends to name Maryland Transportation Secretary John D. Porcari to the No. 2 position in the U.S. Department of Transportation. In choosing Porcari, Obama has selected one of the few state transportation secretaries whose portfolio includes all the major modes of travel - highways, aviation, mass transit, maritime commerce and rail freight. If he clears the required background checks and is confirmed by the Senate, Porcari would serve as deputy to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a former Illinois congressman and a Republican.

(4/15/2009) The Maryland Port Administration put its Seagirt Marine Terminal on the market for lease Wednesday, saying it’s the only way to pay for dredging and other improvements. The agency released a request for qualifications from potential bidders, who would be required to invest in a new 50-foot berth and new cranes at the 200-acre terminal.

(4/16/2009) The Maryland Transit Administration said Thursday it would spend $20 million in improvements to the Baltimore Metro Subway with funds from the federal stimulus package. The work will include overhauling train wheel assemblies and installing a new public address system at the city rail stations, the MTA said in a news release.

(5/5/2009) One exciting ripple effect of President Barack Obama's commitment to high-speed rail, which he demonstrated with an $8 billion pledge in federal stimulus money, is the promise of economic development in the areas surrounding transit hubs. The promise is real and has been demonstrated around the world in countries where high-speed rail is established. High-speed rail draws people from all walks of life. Business travelers and tourists for sure, and pretty much everyone else: According to a recent survey conducted by HNTB, the average person needing to make trips from 100 to 500 miles would choose high-speed rail over air and passenger car if travel time and fares were about equal.

(5/10/2009) After several years of delay, Maryland's latest attempt to foster urban-style, mixed-use development at state mass transit rail stations is moving forward in Savage, where a $175 million combination of apartments, offices, shops and restaurants is envisioned for what is now a 13-acre parking lot.

(5/12/2009) Mayor Sheila Dixon signed a bill Tuesday to extend a protective zoning district around the Port of Baltimore, a move port advocates say will help foster growth in maritime-related industry. Industrialists, developers and city officials had worked for more than a year on a compromise on the issue. The district helps maintain a separation between port and residential or commercial land uses. The law extends the life of the district, called the Maritime Industrial Zoning Overlay District, another decade through 2024.

(6/4/2009) Development Opportunity! The Maryland Transportation Authority (MdTA) and Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) have issued an RFP to seek conceptual proposals from qualified and experienced developers for a transit-oriented development (TOD) project at the Laurel MARC Station on the Camden Line in the City of Laurel, Prince George’s County, Maryland. The Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) will convey approximately 4.35 acres at the site to the selected offeror by sale or ground lease. Proposals should identify mixed-use, market-driven development opportunities that support increased use of transit and provide an advantageous revenue stream to MTA.

(7/16/2009) Four years after a deal that never got on track, state agencies are again moving forward to develop the area around the Laurel train station. The Maryland Transportation Authority and Maryland Department of Transportation announced in June they are accepting conceptual proposals for a transit-oriented development project at the Laurel Maryland Area Regional Commuter train station, located on Main Street, east of Route 1.

(8/5/2009) The General Motors transmission plant in White Marsh is one of several plants that will get part of a $2.4 billion pool of money from the federal government to go towards building batteries and electric drive projects for electric cars, the White House said Wednesday.

(8/6/2009) An area around a Laurel MARC station has been designated a "smart site" by the governor's office, a designation city and state officials hope will expedite the process of developing the plot and revitalize economic health in the downtown district.

(8/14/2009) The train station is the nucleus. Around it, high-rise buildings with a mix of apartments, offices and shops form a bustling urban center. People use public transportation more and their cars less. They stroll on wide sidewalks past storefronts, greenery and public art. This is the vision for the area around New Carrollton Station, circa 2030, outlined in a new transit district development plan and zoning overlay that received preliminary approval July 30 from the Prince George's County Planning Board.

(8/25/2009) The $610 million in federal money allocated to Maryland transportation projects, which began trickling into the state's economy this spring, is now flowing steadily — resurfacing roads, upgrading transit facilities and boosting demand for contractors from Western Maryland to the Eastern Shore.

(8/27/2009) The Maryland Board of Public Works approved on Wednesday a transfer to the federal government of state-owned land in Northwest Baltimore where U.S. officials plan to build an office building to house some Social Security Administration operations.