North Avenue

Work was due to begin this week on the construction of a new bridge over Bynum Run in Bel Air, linking North Avenue off Rock Spring Road with Henderson Lane in the Irwin's Choice community off Conowingo Road. In preparation for the bridge construction, the Harford County Department of Public Works announced that North Avenue from Creek Park Drive to Irwin Creek Drive will be closed for approximately 10 months. The road closure was supposed to occur as early as Tuesday; however, the closure had not been put in place as of Wednesday afternoon.

When Christa Daring was a student, she rode a bus from her Waverly home and crossed North Avenue on her way to classes at the Baltimore School for the Arts. "This was always oh-so no-man's land," she said of the commercial crosstown street that is taking some convincing steps this spring as an arts district. She stood in the old North Avenue Market building, where she and fellow members of the Red Emma's Bookstore and Coffeehouse collective will be moving from Mount Vernon to a much enlarged space.

Two men were injured in a shooting on North Avenue in the early hours of Saturday morning, police said. An unknown number of people approached the two men, who were standing in the 2100 block of E. North Ave., shooting one victim, aged 19, in the chest and another, aged 26, in the back of the legs, according to police. The victims, who have not been identified, were transported to an area hospital and were in stable condition. The Eastern district, where the incident happened, has seen 8 shootings and 3 homicides as of Mar. 9, according to police data, a slight decline from the same point last year.

For years, the vacant Columbus School on a busy corner of East North Avenue appeared to be nothing more than a giant planter. Leafy tree branches stuck out over the top of the historic red-brick walls, making it seem like the school's only future inhabitants would be squirrels and birds. But Kevin Bell and Michael Barland saw more. They are investing about $14 million into the run-down 120-year-old building, also known as Public School 99, to make it livable for dozens of families.

Photographer Linda Day Clark teaches at Coppin State College and lives and takes photographs in the vicinity of North Avenue. In her work, she tries to reach beyond the crime and poverty that people may see on the news and probe the everyday lives of the people who live there. She has also photographed in Nigeria, where she traveled in 1994.Her North Avenue and Nigeria photos are featured in an exhibit of her work opening at Fells Point MAP on Saturday. The works were chosen by guest curator Deborah Willis, who is curator of exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution Center for African-American History/Culture.

Baltimore Police have made an arrest in the death of a woman in the 300 block of E. North Avenue late Friday night. On Sunday afternoon, police said Darren Ruffin, 47, has been arrested and charged with homicide in the incident. Police said they responded at about 11:49 on Jan. 18 for a reported aggravated assault. Police allege that Ruffin had been involved in an argument with the victim, Melissa Davis, 44, and during the course of incident Davis was stabbed, police said. She later succumbed to her injuries, and Ruffin was subsequently arrested.

Just over 50 years ago, North Avenue was such a thriving shopping and entertainment area The Evening Sun reported "the broad, cross-town boulevard from Walbrook to the gate of the Baltimore Cemetery has been called 'Baltimore's Forty-second Street.' " Today, neither North Avenue nor New York's Times Square is faring too well.Yet there is some good news from North Avenue. In Walbrook, a successful development of new town houses is celebrating its first anniversary. Across from school headquarters at Guilford and North avenues, 13 Queen Anne-style town houses have been renovated into 67 handsome rental apartments.

A participant in an early morning fistfight yesterday outside a North Avenue nightclub returned in a car moments later and fired shots that wounded six people -- most of them juveniles, Baltimore police said.The gunman was still being sought last night. The gunfire occurred outside Odell's nightclub in the first block of East North Avenue about 2:30 a.m.According to police, the gunman -- in a brown Nissan Maxima and accompanied by several other people -- stood up through the vehicle's sunroof and opened fire toward a sidewalk crowd with a silver-colored handgun.

Baltimore is often changing before your eyes. I was reminded of this as I talked with Maryland Institute College of Art students as they readied a part of the old North Avenue Market for an event to be held this evening at 6 and 9 at 12 W. North Ave. The show, or "multimedia, experimental fashion event" is called "Brouhaha: A Six-Alarm Affair." The title is a reference to the six-alarm fire that destroyed the old market in August 1968. Parts of this cavernous landmark were immediately repaired.

It's been decades since a fire burned out the once-bustling North Avenue Market, where more than 200 vendors hawked meat and seafood, produce and sandwiches. A bowling alley filled the second floor. And now, say developers who own the distinctive building in a long-deteriorating stretch of midtown Baltimore, it's time for people to start coming back. A development team that includes a longtime market landlord and the owner of the nearby Charles Theatre building has launched a $1 million project to restore the 1928 landmark, which was built to house the market.

A man and an 11-year-old boy were shot inside a house in West Baltimore on Monday night, police said. The boy is expected to survive his injuries, but homicide detectives were called to the scene because of the severity of the man's gunshot wounds. Detective Jeremy Silbert, a Baltimore police spokesman, said officers believe the two were shot in a house in the 1900 block of Bentalou Street, then the boy ran two blocks to the 2100 block of North Avenue, where officers were on foot patrol.

Two men were injured in a shooting on North Avenue in the early hours of Saturday morning, police said. An unknown number of people approached the two men, who were standing in the 2100 block of E. North Ave., shooting one victim, aged 19, in the chest and another, aged 26, in the back of the legs, according to police. The victims, who have not been identified, were transported to an area hospital and were in stable condition. The Eastern district, where the incident happened, has seen 8 shootings and 3 homicides as of Mar. 9, according to police data, a slight decline from the same point last year.

Baltimore Police have made an arrest in the death of a woman in the 300 block of E. North Avenue late Friday night. On Sunday afternoon, police said Darren Ruffin, 47, has been arrested and charged with homicide in the incident. Police said they responded at about 11:49 on Jan. 18 for a reported aggravated assault. Police allege that Ruffin had been involved in an argument with the victim, Melissa Davis, 44, and during the course of incident Davis was stabbed, police said. She later succumbed to her injuries, and Ruffin was subsequently arrested.

It has been a big week for the historic theaters of North Avenue. First the city announced it is moving forward with the Maryland Film Festival's plan to restore the Parkway Theatre. Now comes news that the state is chipping in a substantial sum toward the restoration of the Centre Theatre. The group that plans to turn the 1939 theater at 10. E. North Ave. into a multi-purpose arts space has been allocated $3 million in tax credits by the Maryland Historical Trust, a division of the state's planning department.

Commuters north of downtown will see major traffic disruptions Thursday, as Baltimore deals with another problem with its aging water infrastructure - this time the failure of a 90-year-old main that closed the intersection of North Charles Street and North Avenue. Public water rushed south along Charles Street all day Wednesday, buckling pavement, shuttering businesses and temporarily displacing residents in the Charles North neighborhood after a 60-inch transmission pipe broke at the East 20th Street intersection.

As of 9 a.m. Wednesday, traffic was slow on I-695 outer loop near Route 295, due to an accident. Accidents were slowing traffic at Cold Spring Lane and York Road in Baltimore City, Route 222 and Route 275 in Port Deposit, Roxbury Mill Road at Route 97 in Howard County, Brass Mill Road at Compass Point Road in Belcamp and Hawkins Point Road and Chemical Road in Baltimore County. Traffic was slow on I-895 near the Steel Bridge, due to construction activity. The Maryland Transit Administration is advising light rail system patrons that shuttle bus service is in place from North Avenue to Hunt Valley, due to storm-related damage along that portion of the line and repair work underway.

Charles North residents will have a chance to walk and talk today with members of their community organization about making their neighborhood more of a cultural hub. Residents plan to gather at 1:30 p.m. at the McDonald's in the first block of North Ave. to participate in a one-hour tour of the part of the community bordered by 20th Street on the north, Greenmount Avenue on the east, Trenton Avenue on the south and Howard Street on the west. The purpose of the walk is "to get people talking and excited about their neighborhood's future" and "to look at North Avenue," said Charles Smith, Charles North Community Association board member.

Police today were investigating the fatal shootings of two men and the wounding of two others in West Baltimore in an incident apparently sparked by a drug dispute.One of the dead men was hit 10 times in the hail of gunfire from semiautomatic weapons, police said.About 3:15 p.m. yesterday, two gunmen came out of an alley and opened fire on people crowded on the corner of North Avenue and Pulaski Street.Dead at the scene was Bryan Ligons, 25, of the 800 block of McKean Ave. He had been shot at least 10 times while in the 2000 block of W. North Ave., police said.

In order to help the estimate 300 people still without water in the East North Avenue corridor, the Baltimore City Department of Public Works has opened four stations to provide free bottled water for residents to help stay hydrated. According to a press release, Public Works Director Alfred H. Foxx said the four stations - located at the Oliver Recreation Center, Lanvale Towers, the intersection of Belair Road and North Avenue, and 1401 E. Oliver St. - are open to all of those affected, but residents must bring either a valid Baltimore I.D. or a bill to prove they live between Belair Road and Aisquith Street.

Twenty years after opening its first large residence for students, the Maryland Institute College of Art plans to build a $16.5 million addition that will increase the number of undergraduates living on campus and help revitalize Baltimore's North Avenue corridor and northern Bolton Hill. College officials intend to break ground this fall on Commons II, a five-story building with 62 apartments that can accommodate about 240 students. When it opens in the fall of 2013, MICA will have on-campus housing for more than 1,000 students, up from practically none in 1991 and enough for more than half of its undergraduates.