About Baltimore's Fell's Point

The Future of Real Estate: Capsule Lodging

As the population of the world rapidly grows, while the real estate in the world stays the same and possibly diminishes if there is any truth to the concerns of global warming, the challenge of finding room to house all of these people presents itself.

Not only is there a limit to the available land, but there is a concern about being able to keep the air, the water, and the land free of harmful pollutants.

Many areas have implemented smart growth initiatives, which are efforts at increasing the population density in certain areas where public utilities can best be managed for larger groups of people as compared to urban sprawl which has tendencies to increase pollution and costs substantially more to provide the same services to all of the people.

In some regions of the world where the population density is high throughout the land, innovative ways have been designed and implemented to account for this concern.

Areas such as Japan and Hong Kong are using "Capsule Lodging" to limit the space which is used by any individual person.

These capsules are arranged side by side and stacked, at least, two units high, similar to many condominiums.

Modern conveniences are provided such as air conditioning and heat, television, and internet service. The washrooms are communal.

Imagine how much space could be saved in a 4 bedroom house if it used these capsules instead of copiously sized bedrooms.

The smaller size of these units provides an added benefit in that it is easier to make them strong enough to withstand natural disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes, or tsunamis.

The lower cost of these living quarters could make it possible to eliminate homelessness.

It could bring the cost of housing down below that of the average automobile. Mortgages would be a thing of the past. Words and terms such as foreclosure, short sale, deed in lieu, and the like would eventually fall into the category of archaic.

Food Trucks Gathering in Baltimore

On Friday, August 5th, 2011 5 PM - 10 PM, there will be the 2nd Gathering of Food Trucks in Fells Point, Baltimore, MD. The food trucks will rally at 906 S. Wolfe St. , Baltimore , MD , 21231, across from Red Star.

Baltimore's food truck fleet will gather in Fells Point for the city's second food-truck rally. Gypsy Queen, Miss Shirley's, Souper Freak, GrrChe and Iced Gems are expected. The location is the parking lot across from the Red Star. The event will include live music, and beer and wine will be sold. Baltimore Sun

If the only fare you have gotten is a hot dog on the side of the road, you are in for a treat. These are gourmet food trucks, restaurant quality food prepared by top chefs from around the Baltimore, Maryland.

There Goes My Hero Foundation will have a tent to enlist more donors to the Bone Marrow Registry. If you can't make it to the event on Friday, you can register online, and when people see you walk by they'll say "There Goes My Hero"!

Prior to the first Gathering of Food Trucks, WBAL-TV spoke to Chef Chris Cherry of The Silver Platter:

"What we have are things like sweet chili baby-back ribs, we have lobster mac and cheese with truffle essence, we have some creamed white corn and prosciutto bacon, we do things like firecracker shrimp and New England lobster roll, which is one of our biggest sellers," said Chef Chris Cherry, of Silver Platter. "We wanted to give the customer something different than just food in a brown bag, so we went to high-end plastics and different types of presentation." WBAL-TV

I don't know about you, but that just made me "Hon"gry!!

Will you be heading to Fells Point to sample the gourmet food trucks on Friday, August 5th, 2011 at The Gathering TAKE 2?

Why Is The Front Of My House Bulging Outward?

Not only is it bulging outward, but it is scaring me. I am afraid that this thing could fall down if I breathe too hard.

Such is the case of many an older row house in Baltimore City.

The bricks may be brittle, the mortar like sand, and cracks may be abundant, which are allowing moisture to get behind the bricks and force them outward.

But in the case of this particular house, the front wall was refinished by professional masons and it was done well.

The problem on this one seems to be the house next door. Yes, the house with no windows, except for some rotting and loosely fitting boards, the house with what appears to be a whole house rooftop window, which is allowing tons of rain to just pour right in and fill up like a deep lake, and the house that looks like it has had no maintenance or attention what so ever in 50 years.

Not only is it important that you look for problems in your own house and fix them, but if you have a dilapidated shack next to the house that you are considering purchasing, then you may want to reconsider.

The dump next door may ruin your house no matter how hard you try to fix and maintain your house.

The house in this case may have to be condemned even after all of the work has gone into it.

Tear Down The Expressway

Several major cities have been considering or have already started to remove urban highways and replace them with mass transit, boulevards, parks, and housing.

The urban highways became a necessity when so many people moved to the suburbs, but over time this had its negative impacts as well.

The highways tended to divide neighborhoods, remove existing housing, which provided a tax base for the city, and contributed to heavy traffic congestion.

As the cities had fewer homes and less residents, they had to raise taxes on the remaining people's properties to still provide the needed services. This led to even more people leaving the cities.

Typically those who remained were the poorest residents, who were more likely to be attracted to crime.

By removing the expressways, the cities hope to reunite neighborhoods, replace the expressways with walkable boulevards or with railways to decrease congestion through the implementation of transit oriented districts, provide more housing, and add more park space.

In turn, the hope would be that crime would subside, more people would return to the cities, and taxes could be lowered.

7 Cities Consider Removing Major Urban Highways

Baltimore City: Police Have Their Priorities Wrong

Within many neighborhoods in Baltimore City the parking is tight such that residents may be required to park a few blocks away from their homes.

In spite of this fact, the city has so many desirable attractions that the residents are willing to overlook this one inconvenience.

Occasionally, in order to more easily deal with this situation, residents may do a quick double park to unload there car before they proceed to find a place to park. Typically this double park is just for a minute or less and it is such that other cars can still get past them.

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Here are some true stories:

Someone straddles their car over the curb on a street which only has parking on one side. They do it such that other cars and pedestrians can safely get past. They only are going to take a minute to put their grocery bags into the house. A police officer stops and writes a ticket.

Someone double parks to put his computer in the house after coming home from night classes for his Masters. In his particular neighborhood, gangs of young punks go around looking for people like him with the simple intent of beating him up for the fun of it. By dropping off his computer first, it will leave him more capable of running, or of defending himself, or less of a target. A police officer comes by and gives him a ticket.

Someone who has parked a couple of blocks from her house goes to her car to get a disc. She is punched in the face by some punk. She screams and he and his punk friends run away. The police take the report. Later a detective calls and asks her to come to the precinct to give more details. There were no further details to give but she agrees. When she goes to the police precinct at the scheduled time, the detective has decided not to come in on that day.

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Did I mention that gangs of young punks are beating people up for the fun of it?

By the way, did anybody hear that Baltimore is headed for another year of over three hundred murders.

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I have heard, but would like not to believe it, that police will take an extra ten minutes to get to a report of a shooting so that they will not be put into danger.

When the police go speeding down the street with their sirens blasting and their lights flashing is it for a serious crime such as a shooting or is it to respond to a call from a little old lady who has complained about somebody being double parked?