Great City

Developers in downtown Baltimore seek tax breaks and infrastructure improvements for their projects. In return for those benefits, Baltimore should require an architectural design competition in an effort to make the city a center for world-class architecture. A good place to start would be the project at Harbor Point being developed by John Paterakis, where the city will build a bridge from Harbor East to the Point and grant tax breaks for the development. But this requirement should be required of all downtown developers - and the city should also use design competitions for its major projects.

Fred Lazarus has made many great contributions to Baltimore, but perhaps one of his lesser known and appreciated ones is raising the bar for high quality architectural design, as represented by the Brown Center and the Gateway student dorm building on the Maryland Institute College of Art campus ("MICA's Fred Lazarus to retire in 2014 after guiding art school for 35 years," April 30). Those buildings serve as inspirations for the rest of Baltimore. Excellent design is a vital element for raising the spirits of residents, workers and visitors alike.

What is a great city? It's a city that, when you're in the heart of it, you know exactly where you are. New York is a great city. Boston is a great city. San Francisco (at left, beyond the Golden Gate Bridge) is a great city. New Orleans is, still. Inside, we've chosen a few of America's best cities that are especially worthy of a trip and asked folks who know them -- from bell captain to movie director -- to make some recommendations. SEE ARTICLE ON PAGE 4R.

With all that's happened in the last year, its hard not to feel a degree of civic pride when looking at the magnificent nighttime view of the purple dome of City Hall. Its been a great year downtown, with all of the peaceful major events: Sailabration, 4th Of July, Grand Prix, St. Patrick's Day, New Years Eve, Michael Phelps tribute, the Orioles fantastic season, and then the Ravens brought the focus of the world to Baltimore. We've watched with fascination the filming of House of Cards and Veep on the streets downtown throughout the year.

Excerpts from the prepared text of Mayor Sheila Dixon's inaugural speech As Baltimore enters our new season, I am humbled by the faith you have placed in me. I do not take lightly the oath I have sworn to uphold this afternoon. But know that I will face each coming day of this new season in our city with prayer, with optimism and with hope. The kind of hope that has seen this daughter of Baltimore come from humble beginnings to accept the honor of being the first woman to serve as the mayor of the greatest city in the world.

Social observer, career cabdriver and neighborhood storyteller Thaddeus Logan is offering Baltimoreans another volume of his urban epistles. "Hey Cabbie II!" looks at the Baltimore that passes under the radar of the media and the academics. Logan loves Baltimore unconditionally and airs its embarrassments, guilty pleasures and unauthorized stories. These compact urban tales speak the truth while describing Baltimore, black and white, rich and poor, from the leafy boulevards of Roland Park to the broken asphalt of Oldtown.

Los Angeles was not meant to be a great city, geologically speaking.MARC service will be improved, now that Penn Station has been made all but inaccessible.Russia is ripe for reform but few reformers are in sight.Say it ain't so, Tonya!

NEW YORK - I live in the "greatest city in the world" in the "greatest nation on Earth." All Americans, all of creation, have been hearing this for decades. U.S. presidents and New York City mayors, among others, have been programmatically reminding all of humanity of these notions since the early '80s. Am I the only one who winces every time the commander in chief or Hizzoner shoots his mouth off about how much better than everyone else we are? Another national leader boasted long and loud of his people's superiority.

Fred Lazarus has made many great contributions to Baltimore, but perhaps one of his lesser known and appreciated ones is raising the bar for high quality architectural design, as represented by the Brown Center and the Gateway student dorm building on the Maryland Institute College of Art campus ("MICA's Fred Lazarus to retire in 2014 after guiding art school for 35 years," April 30). Those buildings serve as inspirations for the rest of Baltimore. Excellent design is a vital element for raising the spirits of residents, workers and visitors alike.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was of the mindset that the State's Attorney and Baltimore City Police Commissioner work for the "same team", so to speak. What Patricia C. Jessamy is doing by her incendiary comments is to create a large, permanent impassable chasm between herself and Commissioner Bealefeld ("Jessamy calls for probe of Bealefeld," Aug. 11). Ms. Jessamy is taking this issue to a very personal and juvenile level. This certainly does not bode well for the city of Baltimore for the next few months (at least until election day)

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake announced that 12 new surveillance cameras will be installed along Charles Street in Midtown. "The CitiWatch program is a vital part of Baltimore's effort to reduce violent crime in our neighborhoods. The cameras serve as a force multiplier that enables the men and women of the Baltimore Police Department to do more to protect the citizens of this great city," Rawlings-Blake said in a statement.  The cameras, funded by the Governor's Office of Crime Control and Prevention and grants from the Abell Foundation, stretch from the Washington Monument to 20th Street, and bring the number of cameras in the city's network to 622, officials said.

Developers in downtown Baltimore seek tax breaks and infrastructure improvements for their projects. In return for those benefits, Baltimore should require an architectural design competition in an effort to make the city a center for world-class architecture. A good place to start would be the project at Harbor Point being developed by John Paterakis, where the city will build a bridge from Harbor East to the Point and grant tax breaks for the development. But this requirement should be required of all downtown developers - and the city should also use design competitions for its major projects.

Anthony W. Batts was officially sworn in Thursday as Baltimore's 37th police commissioner, pledging to build trust with the community while continuing to reduce violent crime. Batts, who spent three decades with departments in California, has been guiding the city police force since his arrival in late September following the retirement of agency veteran Frederick H. Bealefeld III. The city's homicide numbers are on track to rise compared to last year, when Baltimore saw fewer than 200 killings for the first time since the 1970s, but overall gun violence continues to trend downward.

Social observer, career cabdriver and neighborhood storyteller Thaddeus Logan is offering Baltimoreans another volume of his urban epistles. "Hey Cabbie II!" looks at the Baltimore that passes under the radar of the media and the academics. Logan loves Baltimore unconditionally and airs its embarrassments, guilty pleasures and unauthorized stories. These compact urban tales speak the truth while describing Baltimore, black and white, rich and poor, from the leafy boulevards of Roland Park to the broken asphalt of Oldtown.

From the Cleveland Browns to the Baltimore Browns to the Baltimore Ravens? Why did it really happen? Should we canonize Art Modell ? Arthur Modell was definitely not a saint, but he was a principled man. Truth be told, Art never wanted to leave Cleveland, but financial hardship, much of his own doing, put him at risk of losing control of his beloved football franchise. The move to Baltimore was strictly business, and while we thank him it had absolutely nothing to do with the value presented by our great city.

Regarding your recent editorial advocating holding city elections on the presidential cycle, it doesn't make sense to only partially correct a situation that everyone agrees needs to be fixed ("Straightening out city elections," July 6). None of Baltimore's elected officials met with their constituents to discuss this election-cycle issue before they selfishly voted their preferences. The arguments for moving city elections to the gubernatorial cycle significantly outweigh the arguments our elected officials voted to help themselves.

Regarding your recent editorial advocating holding city elections on the presidential cycle, it doesn't make sense to only partially correct a situation that everyone agrees needs to be fixed ("Straightening out city elections," July 6). None of Baltimore's elected officials met with their constituents to discuss this election-cycle issue before they selfishly voted their preferences. The arguments for moving city elections to the gubernatorial cycle significantly outweigh the arguments our elected officials voted to help themselves.

Schools in the nation's largest cities compare favorably to rural and suburban schools in key kinds of academic achievement, according to the first ever detailed assessment of urban school districts.In particular, city school systems fare well in such important academic areas as placement in advanced-level courses, scores on reading and mathematics tests and availability of all-day kindergarten, according to the study, conducted by the Council of the Great City Schools, an organization in Washington that represents the 44 largest school districts in the country.

For the first time in a very long time, it felt good to come downtown to work and see Baltimore alive again. With Sailabration going on, it brought back fond memories of how great Baltimore was at one time, but as I leave and go home and make my way down Monroe Street, the scenery is a stark reminder that Baltimore is still on life support. But for now I rather enjoyed seeing ships moored at the docks even though they are not off-loading commerce. It still is a great feeling. Growing up in Baltimore and working here pretty much my whole adult life, it brought back a time when the bows of ships would overhang Key Highway and where the Sparrows Point shipyard built around the clock and Baltimore was a 24-hour city.

Editor: I am Dave Glenn and I am really excited for the opportunity to run for the Havre de Grace City Council in the city I am so proud to call my home. Let me first introduce you to the candidate. I have been a resident of Havre de Grace since 1967. I have been happily married to the former Terri Culley for the last 29 years. I have two children: Kellie, a trauma nurse at Christiana Hospital and Shawn, who is serving his country in the U.S. Air Force. I am a proud graduate of Havre de Grace High School (class of 1975)