Development

In the wake of WWE's Over the Limit pay-per-view, a new Intercontinental champion has been crowned, four other champions continue to hold onto their titles and John Laurinaitis remains employed. Sunday night's show delivered an evening of quality entertainment and good in-ring performances. On a non-major PPV event, WWE delivered a product that surpassed the expectations of many. Here's a match-by-match look at the show: Battle Royale This last-minute addition to the card was a means of crowning a No. 1 contender for one of the midcard titles.

A Baltimore County councilman withdrew a bill Thursday that would have given a wide range of exemptions on development regulations to the Metro Centre at Owings Mills. Councilman Kenneth Oliver plans to reintroduce the measure June 4. It would give special exceptions to the huge project on matters including building sizes, parking, open space requirements and signage. Oliver, a Randallstown Democrat, said he did not have enough votes on the council to pass the bill. Some on the council and in the community had called the bill a "blank check" for the project's developer, Howard Brown of David S. Brown Enterprises.

If all goes as planned, sometime this morning a spacecraft will blast off from its launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and ride a fiery plume of contrails upward through the pre-dawn darkness to begin a two-week journey to the International Space Station and back. But the flight won't be just another NASA resupply mission. Instead, the Falcon 9 rocket and its unmanned Dragon cargo capsule built by Space Exploration Technologies Corporation - SpaceX for short - will be the first commercially owned and operated vehicle ever to rendezvous with the station's orbiting astronauts.

Joe Flacco took a couple of steps to his right, spotted Ed Dickson about 10 yards down the field and lofted a pass between two defenders that the young tight end hauled in. After Dickson was touched down and the Ravens' offense retreated back to the line of scrimmage, Flacco yelled out a play that ended with his other primary tight end, Dennis Pitta, making a catch along the left sideline. Flacco wore a red jersey, black gym shorts and no shoulder pads, and his notoriously calm demeanor, which earned him the nickname "Joe Cool," was even more casual than usual.

Hundreds of people lined up on sun-drenched asphalt Saturday to see if they could get regular payouts, in the form of paychecks, from the new Maryland Live! Casino, a slots casino scheduled to open at Arundel Mills mall in about three months. "I hope I get lucky enough to get a position," said Mark Ellison, who's from West Baltimore. "They want people who are willing to go the extra mile so customers come in and enjoy spending their money. " The operators of what will be the state's largest casino hosted a job fair Saturday with the Anne Arundel Workforce Development Corp.

After a seven-year delay, Randallstown residents cheered Monday over an announcement that a Walmart will open on Liberty Road next year. Officials and residents have long hoped that the store — a planned $9 million, 160,000-square-foot supercenter with groceries and a pharmacy — would revitalize the aging commercial corridor, encouraging other national retailers and restaurants to set up shop in the affluent, largely black community....

Four trucks laden with 100 slot machines arrived early Wednesday morning at the nearly completed casino at Arundel Mills mall. For the next two hours, workers wheeled banks of the gleaming new machines, one by one, inside on hand trucks. Installation of the first set of slots moved Maryland Live! Casino, the state's largest, another step closer to its scheduled opening in three months. That's progress for Maryland's lackluster gambling program, which has yet to be fully implemented more than three years after voters approved five slots locations statewide.

The big reveal at the end of Sunday night's episode of "Game of Thrones" is that the Stark children, Bran and Rickon, are not only alive, but hiding right beneath Theon Greyjoy's nose in Winterfell. So much for Greyjoy's relentless hunt. Theon should have to duel Joffrey for the title of "World's Second Most Incompetent Leader. " Anyway, the news that the Stark children are alive was the biggest piece of plot development that happened in "The Prince of Winterfell," the eighth episode of Season 2. Other than that (and Jaime Lannister's escape, which I'll get into below)

Over 90 percent of the proposed housing developments in Maryland have gone bankrupt over the last five years; now you can add Thistle Landing to the list ("More of the same," June 12). It's a shame you have once again attacked a proposed housing development. And how dare you imply that owners and elected officials are unethical and trying to sneak around the rules. Remember, you cannot sell a home for what it costs to build anywhere in Maryland. With newspapers like yours who would want to?

Maryland is on the verge of missing a golden opportunity this year to promote transit-oriented development and pedestrian-friendly communities. By seeking to establish State Rail Station Overlay Districts, House Bill 948 would have been in keeping with the state's traditions of progressive government and bold experimentation in civic improvement. Although the bill was defeated in the Environmental Matters Committee this year — and there is little hope for its revival — the ideas it contains are worthy of continued discussion and debate.

With residents being bombarded by fliers, robocalls, even a telephone opinion survey, the fight over the future of the former Solo Cup site in Baltimore County is taking on the trappings of a political campaign. As the debate continues about whether the county should allow a Wegmans supermarket and other development at the former manufacturing plant on Reisterstown Road, two other developers in the area are fighting the project — and each side is trying to rally community support.

Edwin Roger Fitzgerald, a retired professor had taught in the Johns Hopkins University's mechanics and materials department for nearly 40 years and whose hobby was farming, died May 11 of complications from a stroke at Gilchrist Hospice in Towson. The Parkton resident was 88. The son of Irish immigrants — his father was a principal and mother a teacher — he was born and raised in Oshkosh, Wis. He was 16 when he graduated from Oshkosh High School in 1939, and then entered Oshkosh State Teachers College for a year before enrolling at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

Faith Child Development Center's pre-kindergarten class celebrated its graduation ceremony May 16. Colorful graduation hats decorated the bulletin board and graduation streamers hung from the ceiling. But the mood was far from cheerful after the event, as the staff of the school shut its doors to students and their families for the last time. On May 11, Faith Lutheran Church announced that Faith Child Development Center, which has offered classes for ages 2 through pre-k for 12 years, would not reopen next school year.

The 15-year real estate tax abatement for the Superblock in West Baltimore raises important policy issues that need to be addressed. Specifically, should the city — and in certain cases, the state — grant economic incentives for real estate developments that 1) create competitive disadvantages for existing property owners and 2) reduce the city's property tax revenues from large-scale commercial developments? From my private-sector perspective, the answer to the question is simple: Granting tax abatements that disadvantage existing taxpaying properties is wrong and will lead to an overall loss of tax revenues for the city.

The Howard County school board is scheduled to reconsider Tuesday a measure that would determine which schools can accommodate new residential development. Each year, school officials craft a chart that designates the areas ripe for development under the county's Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance by labeling schools as open or closed. The ordinance ensures that roads, school buildings and other infrastructure can handle more residents. Recently, the school board failed to pass the chart, voting in favor of it 4-3. The chart requires at least five votes for passage and allows for the student board member, who has limited voting powers, to cast a vote.

The master developer of Columbia's Town Center aims to begin construction by early next year on a $100 million apartment and retail complex, the area's first new housing in a decade. The Metropolitan Downtown Columbia will be a six-story, 380-unit development that the Howard Hughes Corp. plans to build in a joint venture with Kettler of McLean, Va., and Orchard Development of Ellicott City, on land next to The Mall in Columbia. Rents are expected to range from $1,600 a month for a one-bedroom apartment to $2,800 for a three-bedroom unit — making them among the highest in the region.

The Baltimore County Council is poised make it easier to get information about plans filed under a real estate development method that has been criticized as too easy on builders and too hard on residents trying to keep track of what's going on in their neighborhoods. A bill before the council would reform the planned unit development (PUD) process, which allows developers to depart from underlying zoning by providing a community benefit to go along with their projects. Members are expected to vote Tuesday to require that preliminary plans be posted on the county website before developers meet with community members and before agencies have begun their first review of the project.

It's disappointing to hear so much rhetoric coming from members of the development community and some local politicians over new storm water rules in Maryland ("A threat to Smart Growth" Feb. 2). The plain truth is that developers appreciate a clean and healthy Chesapeake Bay when they can build waterfront homes or other development projects with real estate values boosted by water views. But when saving the bay requires them (and everyone else, by the way) to do more to protect it, they threaten to retreat to the sprawling suburbs again.

Baltimore's Board of Estimates has approved the final variable of a formula that will dictate the amount developers in South Baltimore pay for road improvements. The new formula replaces time-consuming traffic impact studies and ad hoc negotiations between developers and the city, which for years have determined what builders pay to mitigate the traffic produced by their developments. "Sometimes [developers would] end up spending more on the traffic impact study than on the mitigation fees themselves," said Jamie Kendrick, the city's deputy director of transportation.

The Army's next-generation carbine may come out of a Highlandtown machine shop best known for making high-volume bottling equipment for major drink makers. Adcor Industries Inc. learned this month that it was among a handful of weapons makers selected to compete to build a possible replacement for the M4, a rifle descended from the well-known M16 and that some soldiers have criticized as unreliable in the dry, dusty conditions in Iraq. Adcor, which employs about 80 people in its block-sized building on South Haven Street, will face some of the biggest names in global gun-making in a race to be the Army's small-arms weapon of choice in the 21st century.