Jamie Kendrick, deputy director of the city transportation department, said inaction on the Red Line would bring further congestion to the streets of Southeast Baltimore. He said a city traffic analysis projects that without the transit line, every intersection on Boston Street would be in gridlock by 2020.
That hasn't stopped Canton activists from pressing their case. More than a dozen neighborhood residents gathered recently at the Captain James restaurant, a ship-shaped building where Aliceanna runs into Boston, to meet with a reporter. All voiced objections to a surface line on Boston Street.
Jack Stout, a community association board member who lives on Ellwood Avenue, compared the fight against surface light rail to the community's successful fight against the extension of Interstate 83 through Canton. "I see this as our generation's Battle of the Highway."
Caroline Burkhart, who lives in Canton Square "in the heart of the mess," fears that light rail would bring noise, vibration and ugliness to the neighborhood. "No one wants to live next to a train," she said. "Our property value is going to deteriorate."
But the opposition in Canton is not unanimous. Some residents would welcome a rail transit connection and don't care whether it is on the surface or in a tunnel.
Christina Martin, who lives about six blocks from the waterfront on Streeper Street, said she and her husband are "very excited" about the prospect of riding the Red Line. She dismissed concerns that a light rail line would harm property values. "You look at D.C. Your property is worth a lot more if you're next to a Metro line," she said.
Martin, who said her street is frequently jammed with the cars of patrons of O'Donnell Square restaurants and bars, said the Red Line could ease parking problems by letting people visit Canton without their cars. She added that she and her husband would explore other areas of the city more if they could do so by rail.
The 29-year-old nurse practitioner believes some of the divide over the Red Line is the result of a generation gap.
"When you talk to the older generation, they are really opposed to it," she said. "Young people on our block are very much for it."
