Office Space

In recent years, commercial property owners have had to dangle new amenities in front of prospective tenants to gain an edge in an increasingly competitive office-space market. It might be parking, a lobby restaurant or a fitness center. For David W. Kornblatt, that something extra is nothing new, because he was one of the first in Baltimore to build a conference center with a spectacular vista for tenants, in his 28-story St. Paul Plaza office tower, in 1989. Kornblatt hopes to take his venture a step further by promoting his meeting rooms with a view to outside groups.

A Howard County councilman is dangling the incentive of housing allocations before developers of mixed-use projects in the hope of spurring construction of office space, particularly on the burgeoning commercial corridor along Route 100. Christopher J. Merdon, an Ellicott City-Elkridge Republican, is sponsoring a bill that was introduced yesterday to offer developers one housing unit allocation for every 2,000 square feet of office space that is developed...

The Baltimore development company that rehabilitated the dormant American Can Co. plant has turned its sights on renovating the abandoned Procter & Gamble Co. soap plant in Locust Point.Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse Inc.'s work on the Canton landmark resulted in significant retail space. It is studying converting the 26-acre waterfront site at 1422 Nicholson St. into primarily office space."In terms of the energy and the excitement level, we're thinking of it in terms of American Can, and in terms of the character we're hoping it will have -- but we're thinking at this point, and it's very early in the process -- that it will be just office space," said Bill Struever, the company's president.

A gleaming new structure that will house a jewelry store and office space has emerged on the site of a five-alarm fire 10 years ago that destroyed two buildings that represented more than a century of history on Annapolis' historic Main Street. The new building, which holds the addresses of 184/186 Main St. and 7 State Circle, has brought closure to the community, which witnessed long fighting over plans for the site and had been frustrated by the appearance of the vacant lot in the heart of Annapolis' prized historic district.

One hundred years ago, people were without cars, railroads were the main form of transportation and one could hardly travel in the mid-Atlantic region without passing through Odenton.The town that most people cruise through on Interstate 97 or Routes 170 or 175 was the area's major railroad junction."I used to call it 'the little engine that tied it all together' -- with Baltimore, Washington and Annapolis," said Roger White, research director of the Odenton Historical Society.While Odenton now is mostly a commuter stop for business people headed to Baltimore or Washington, the society has been trying for nine years to preserve its rail history through photographs and biographical data, White said.

The retail center at Dorsey Business Park stands out in its neighborhood. Surrounded by six large and towering office buildings, the flat, single-story retail center looks like a fish out of water. These days, it appears about as healthy as one. Although its largest tenant, Body Factory fitness center, which takes up nearly two-thirds of the center, seems as strong as its well-muscled members inside, three of the seven parcels in the retail center are vacant shells visible from the street.

NEW YORK - The future of Ground Zero began taking shape yesterday as developers unveiled six possible ways to rebuild the devastated site, all of which feature a memorial park to the nearly 3,000 killed in the Sept. 11 attacks and a city skyline that will remain permanently altered by the absence of the World Trade Center towers. The plans vary in the amount of space allotted to a memorial park, but all replace - in shorter buildings - the entire 11 million square feet of office space lost in the towers' destruction.

Baltimore is fighting a two-front development war, struggling to rescue its aging downtown while encouraging construction in trendy, waterfront areas. The waterfront is winning, according to a new report by the Downtown Partnership. Downtown Baltimore lost 2.9 percent of its jobs, a total of about 2,600 jobs, in the 12 months that ended in August, in part because of a shift in office space from downtown to new locations on the waterfront in places such as Fells Point, Bond Street Wharf, Tide Point and Canton.

The day the lights went on last summer at 750 E. Pratt St., Baltimore's first new office tower in a decade, Constellation Energy Group Inc. moved in to three floors. Today, just a few other offices have been leased and only a third of the 15-story building is occupied. And it has plenty of company. Some 10 blocks away, Constellation's former headquarters at 250 W. Pratt is close to 20 percent vacant. At 36 S. Charles St., two of the floors vacated by law firm Piper Rudnick LLP's 1999 move to Mount Washington stand empty.

Mercantile Bankshares Corp. said yesterday that it had agreed to sell its headquarters tower in downtown Baltimore for $51.2 million to a Virginia real estate investment company that has been buying commercial properties in the city. Mercantile, the state's largest independently owned bank, would lease back its space in the 21-story building at 2 Hopkins Plaza for at least another decade under its contract with the buyer, Harbor Group International LLC of Norfolk. The sales contract gives the buyer 30 days to complete the deal or opt out of it. The deal is set to close in mid-December.