I know TheDoctors308 was here but haven't seen him post in a long time.

I'd like to do a ride along and ask a few questions. I'm going to be buying a place there soon.

Anyone else with good Baltimore advice is welcome to chime in.

Don't live in Baltimore.

I'll echo this. But I only rent a room on the east side currently. Like any large city there are good parts and bad parts. Nice parts and working people parts.

If you move to town and need a roommate, IM me.
I don;t know how long I'll be here(long story) but I am less then comfortable where I am now.

SS

Give me a street and block # and I'll tell you what the deal is.
Baltimore ghettoes are not ill-defined, nor are hipster neighborhoods.
There is only one good neighborhood in Baltimore and that is Roland Park.
There are other isolated pockets of civility but none of them are defensible.

Go to the census bureau website and look up the address.
You'll be looking for race, household income, owners vs. renters and single mothers with dependent children.
Cross reference that with the murder map that the Sun has.
I live in a neighborhood that's 52% White (which is a statistical oddity for Baltimore),
yet I had three teenage murderers in a Section 8 house living right down the street from me.

Baltimore is like that.

I'm looking at Maryland ave. Just south of johns Hopkins. 2 blocks from the park and art museam.

Charles Village.

Not too bad, mostly robberies and burglaries to the west of Howard St.
Gets dicier to your East past Charles towards Guilford Ave. and also below 25th.

8/24/12 - Kristie Hufnagel - Homicide - 100 W. 29th St.
41 yo female - Looks like she was strangled - drug related.

It looks good between Howard and Guilford.

I'm wondering how long it'll take to gentrify to greenmont.

Mind If I IM you some more questions?

Go right ahead.

Greenmont is the Heart of Darkness.

When we were shooting The Corner I gripped locations all over East Baltimore north of the cemetery.
I came to the conclusion that the epicenter of the Baltimore ghetto is the corner of 23&1/2 and Oliver Streets.
Back in the 80's, I had friends who lived in punk rock houses in some really choice spots.
I think that the only reason none of them were eaten was the natives just didn't know what to do with spikey white people with purple hair.
Even so, we never went down to the corner store solo and walked our women out to their cars.

You have to watch your step anywhere on the streets of Baltimore.
Harden your residence and resign your vehicle to fate.
Some of that is just city life, some of it is special to Baltimore.

I sent you an IM. Awaiting your response.

FYI, I lived in Canton (a relatively safe pocket in SE) for a year. I had my car window shot out and unknown suspects attempted to gain entry into my front door. I also came home after my shift and found a 'citizen' passed out on my stoop. I was none too pleased. I also parked my truck while I was in Hampden and some douche thought it was a great idea to rub shit down the side of my truck as well.

The area youre talking about...4344876307x times worse. You've mentioned gentrification so I already know your mindset. Good luck bud, you'll be some sort of statistic soon enough.

I saw that, too

I had friends that lived on the 300 blk of University Pkwy.

One guy had his laptop stolen while he was at work and his roommates were sleeping upstairs.

truth

I used to go to college there a looong time ago.   What about north of Johns Hopkins off Coldspring lane between Roland park and Charles st?

I'm a City Fire Fighter / Paramedic and used to be stationed at 25th and Kirk until they moved us to Montford Ave. I've been in that area for almost 10 years now and I can tell you it has only gotten worse. It is amazing just how clear of a line there is between the ghetto and nice area surrounding Union Memorial and Johns Hopkins U. The majority of the calls we get are for various sick cases, cardiac, and "breathing problems" We also get a good amount of shootings, assaults, and the always present drunk on the corner. Most of those are just bums that want to get something to eat or a ride somewhere. One of the problems with a nice neighborhood being so close to the ghetto is it's easy for the knuckle heads to walk a few blocks over and break into a car or mug some tax payer. During the day that area is pretty safe. You have to worry more about some hippy bothering you about wanting to save the wheat flea in Bangladesh or some goofy cause than anything else. But at night it gets a bit rougher. My advise is if you want to live in that area, get to know it quickly and know the best routes to avoid and potential problems.

One of those crazy punk rock houses was on N. Montford. I remember it well, it was splitting in two.
There was a 2" gap at the base of the central staircase and by the time you got up to the top, the gap would swallow your leg.
Somebody did fall in there one drunken evening. I figured one day the front of the house would just collapse into the street.
Bar on the corner called "Paul's". It's probably still there.

Let's get this straight, we weren't gentrifying anything.
Just young, poor and living down.

I lived in the 900 block of S. East Ave for 2 years...in that time frame my truck was broken into twice, our giant pot in front of our house was stolen, our alley was routinely used for drug sales and hang outs, most recently our old neighbors had someone enter their home clear the kitchen out and walk out.  The neighborhood kids would ask to use the phone order pizza etc, wait for it to arrive take the pizza leaving the occupant to pay the bill.  This was one of the higher ends of Canton, 2 blocks east 2 blocks north of the square...never again for me....

S. East street?

I lived around the corner from W. West St. in Pigtown for a while.

Pigtown was entertaining. Best of the Baltimore whitetrash neighborhoods.
I had a 30 yo grandmother a couple of doors down. But it was safe.
Our yutes did not allow the dusky tribes to the north and west to fish in our streams.
Then they blew up Murphy Homes and that neighborhood was ravaged by Section 8.

The city crushed Sowebo. We had a groovy little thing going on there for a while.
I remember those halcyon days of the early 90's well. Good times.

K,
So how's Locust point?  I used to live in the 1400 block of Hull st.  Moved out in 2003.

From just driving through it it looks like the white trash have taken over.

I might be moving to Ridgely's Delight next summer.

I used to live at St. Paul & University Pkway in a high rise.  $400 a month efficiency; the underground parking saved my car & motorcycle.  However, a crazy person kniffed an old lady right outside the front door of the building once.

At that time, I worked just above 25th & Charles - which was a rough place even in the mid 90s; the gutters & ground around the trees were littered with crack vials, used needles, dime baggies, etc.  Three secretaries had a run in with an purse snatched one lunch time; another time 2 hoopties were stollen right outside during work hours (addicts probably).  

I moved to Hampden in the late 90s; it was even safer than Roland Park at the time & probably your best bet.  The "crime" there tended to be domestic violence within the longtime resident families - they are the pasty descendants of W. VA hill-billies who long ago flocked to the old mill jobs along the Jones-Falls (it was once a power-producing stream rather than a polluted spillway).  There was even rumor of an ad hoc vigilante group that stepped in when some teens started mugging locals  (hillbillys are like that).  

My older brother moved there in the 90s too - only he fell prey to the seedier side of Hampden, started drinking & stopped working.  Kinda resented the place after what it did to my brother (though I guess its as much his fault as anyone/anyplace).

Can't say I really miss Baltimore.  Good luck OP - you are going to need some luck in Baltimore.

Well I decided not to make an offer on the house. In other news a girl was shot and killed on the block I was visiting. I pulled up a few minutes after the body was removed.



Wollard can't win fast enough.

Welcome to Baltimore...
Duck motherfucker!

It doesn't much matter if you moved into a "nicer" hood in Baltimore or not.  You would still be beset on all sides by trash.  There are small pockets of civilization there, but you have to lick through the turd to get to the tootsie roll in the middle.  I would suggest finding something in the areas just outside of Baltimore.  Catonsville and the outer parts of Arbutus/Halethorpe are holding on ok and you can be downtown in less than 10 minutes.  

Why live in the wasteland when you can just visit?

PS- I lived there for 21 years and now I live in Mt. Airy.  Family still lives outside of Sowe Bmore and are ready to GTFO as well.

Bodymore, Murderland.