OPPOSITION TO THE MCB PLAN

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Inner Harbor For Everyone cares deeply about the vitality and future of Baltimore's Inner Harbor Park, advocating for adherence to the 1978 charter amendment enshrining Inner Harbor Park into perpetuity as a public park that includes a specified area for low-scale limited commercial uses, currently occupied by Harborplace; an open, pedestrian-friendly, and publicly accessible park for everyone; responsible, equitable, and sustainable development within Inner Harbor Park and along the waterfront; excellence in urban design; and fair, open public processes. 

As such, Inner Harbor For Everyone opposes the MCB Inner Harbor redevelopment plan.

Inner Harbor For Everyone is neither anti-development nor anti-tall buildings. To wit, MCB is encouraged to build tall on their newly acquired PNC Bank site at 1 East Pratt Street and/or their News American site at 300 East Pratt Street.

As noted in the Inner Harbor History section on this website, Harborplace fell into receivership in 2019. MCB purchased the lease several years later after Mayor Brandon Scott, by his own words, secretly chose them to redevelop Harborplace. There had been no design competition, no RFP, no traffic study, etc. MCB received $1 million from the city for soft costs and to hold community engagement sessions that were held after the fact.

MCB's plan includes housing and office uses, both disallowed on that site, per the Baltimore City Charter. The State of Maryland and City of Baltimore promise over $400 million towards the plan, despite severe ongoing financial challenges.

The Baltimore City Planning Department recommends that the Baltimore City Council pass bills to change the zoning and remove all height restrictions - the very design guard rails that insured the open, low-scale Inner Harbor we enjoy today. This recommendation was made despite vociferous objections from the public on multiple issues, including, but not limited to, the sheer mass and inappropriateness of the proposed buildings; the privatization of public park land, including McKeldin Square; the lack of public process in choosing a developer; the prohibition of housing and office uses in Inner Harbor Park; a downtown 34% office vacancy rate that negates the need for additional office space; lack of traffic studies regarding the elimination of multiple lanes of already overloaded Light Street and Pratt Street; gigantic looming luxury towers at water's edge that will plunge the promenade, harbor, Constellation, and areas north and east into deep shade. 

Despite these objections and Baltimore City's Urban Design and Architecture Advisory Panel's repeated criticisms about buildings that are "just filling space" and the site plan that, among other things, would remove grass, hardscape, and space necessary for festivals and special events, the City Council seems on a glide path to enable MCB to proceed. 

Please see below for a more in-depth discussion of objections raised by the general public, architects, and urban planners.

The Harborplace masterplan produced by MCB interjects their private views regarding pedestrian circulation on the waterfront promenade, transportation and traffic flow through downtown, and the use of public park land. None of this is within their purview and would require massive public expenditures to accomplish. A democratic planning process is needed to resolve such issues impacting the greater Inner Harbor environment beyond the limited vision of a for-profit developer.

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Lack of Procedure and Public Input in Choosing a Developer

On the morning of 30 October 2023 at the event to unveil MCB's plan to redevelop Harborplace, Mayor Brandon Scott confessed that he had hand-picked the developer and kept it secret for three years. The plans displayed by MCB showed a breaching of all zoning and design guidelines adhered to for more than half a century. 

Oddly, the blue and white airy "Our Harborplace" sketch behind the assembled elected officials depicts Harborplace as it exists today - no gigantic apartment buildings towering over the promenade and no gimmicky geometric structures. This illustration, as misleading as MCB's community engagement sessions, is symbolic of MCB's efforts to obscure their intentions, which could include erecting towers taller than the 32 stories currently shown on their plan (see Elimination of All Height Restrictions section below).

A few hours after the plan's unveiling, Councilperson Eric Costello introduced a suite of City Council bills on behalf of MCB for legislation to change the zoning and lift all height restrictions, along with a charter amendment to be placed on the November 2024 ballot. 

This collaboration between the developer and elected officials evidences a lack of transparency and disregard for public input. It also raises many questions.

Clearly, there was no open, transparent, fair process for this once in a lifetime opportunity. The question is why. Why were there no design competitions, RFPs, traffic studies, etc? Why was MCB chosen? Was this legal? Why did so many city and state officials fall in line behind a plan completely out of sync with the most valuable address in Baltimore and Maryland?

Claims that the public will have final say via the November 2024 charter amendment referendum to allow housing and offices in Inner Harbor Park ring hollow, as the electorate reflexively votes YES to referenda by a wide margin. Were the referendum to fail, the City Council legislation changing the zoning and eliminating height restrictions would not become null and void. The Inner Harbor Park will be stripped of its protective design guidelines when the City Council passes the bills and the mayor signs them.

Privatization of Public Park Land

The Inner Harbor Park is the only park enshrined in the Baltimore City Charter. It belongs to all citizens for their enjoyment.  The park includes the north, west, and south shores of the Inner Harbor; south of Pratt Street to the water's edge; east of Light Street to the water's edge; north of Key Highway to the water's edge; and from the World Trade Center around the shoreline of the Inner Harbor to and including Rash Field.

While MCB owns the lease to the Harborplace pavilions, the land that the pavilions sit on and the land around them is owned by the City of Baltimore. 

Housing towers and office buildings are inconsistent with what is allowed by the Baltimore City Charter and belong neither in Inner Harbor Park nor in any public park. Allowing MCB to construct housing and offices in Inner Harbor Park sets a dangerous precedent.

Unlike the Harborplace pavilions, designed to serve as public gathering spaces and provide amenities to the park, residential and office buildings are not publicly accessible and therefore are a privatization of public park land.

MCB could develop their properties located just outside of Inner Harbor Park boundaries at 1 East Pratt Street and 300 East Pratt Street, which meet all zoning and height requirements. 

Elimination of All Building Height Restrictions

MCB's plan violates the 50' height limit within the Inner Harbor Park along the west shore and north shore west of the World Trade Center. This is inconsistent with the foundational design principles that restrict building heights within Inner Harbor Park and allow taller buildings across bordering streets. City Council bills 23-0446 and 23-0448 would remove all height restrictions. 

At the January 2024 MCB forum at the Maryland Science Center, in response to the question "Instead of getting rid of all height restrictions, why not just amend to raise the restrictions? Without any restrictions, what is to stop this developer, or another, from building skyscrapers?" MCB replied "There's nothing to stop me from building skyscrapers, and you shouldn't." 

Rezoning of McKeldin Square From a Public Park to Commercial Use

City Council bill 23-0448 adds "commercial use" and allows for buildings up to three stories and 20,000 square feet. 

Value Extraction

Gigantic apartment towers would extract value from buildings with views that would be blocked and that were built with the promise of never having blocked views, as per the 1979 charter amendment to the Baltimore City Charter restricting building height in Inner Harbor Park.

Light Street and Pratt Street Lane Reductions

Lane reductions on already overburdened Light and Pratt streets, an over-reach by MCB seemingly designed to increase park land, would cause daily gridlock in the downtown area, lengthen travel times, worsen air quality, and negatively impact tourism. Independent traffic studies must be completed in advance of any changes to zoning and height restrictions that would enable the MCB plan to proceed.

Re-use vs Demolition

Baltimore has been stung time after time by demolitions in advance of project financing that never arrived, creating parking lots and reducing the tax base. Harborplace pavilions, historically significant for having served as the model for waterfronts worldwide, were designed as local food and vendor marketplaces. Other major cities with waterfront pavilions nearly identical to ours have successfully restored them to their original purpose. Harborplace could be restored or repurposed in a much shorter time frame than the massive redevelopment being proposed. 

Shadows

Attention must be paid to the significant shadows the huge towers would cast. The photos and captions below tell the story.

City Council Bill 23-0444

Proposes to amend the City Charter through a referendum on the November 2024 ballot.

Inner Harbor Park:

Expands the allowable development area from 3.2 to 4.5 acres;

Allows for multi-family dwellings;

Allows for enclosed off-street parking.

City Council Bill 23-0446

Inner Harbor Park:

Allows for mixed-use development;

Removes the language requiring ‘relatively low-scaled’ development in order to ‘accommodate the view of the harbor from adjoining subdistricts’;

Removes the 100 ft. building height restriction and allows for unlimited height.

City Council Bill 23-0448

Downtown Inner Harbor area:

Allows for flexible development boundaries;

Removes limitation of 4 million sq. ft.;

Removes the limitation of 250 dwelling units per acre.

Inner Harbor Park:

Removes the 50 ft. building height limit at the pavilions;

Adds residential zoning;

Allows for enclosed off-street parking.

McKeldin Square:

Adds ‘commercial use’ to the public park;

Allows for buildings up to 3 stories and 20,000 square feet.