Train Tracks

The ramp from southbound Hanover Street to southbound Interstate 95 remained closed yesterday evening and likely will be closed this morning while engineers repair damage from yesterday's early-morning tanker fire, according to the Maryland Transportation Authority police. The South Baltimore bridge was shut down about 3 a.m. after a tanker-truck overturned on the ramp, leading to traffic delays forcing the Maryland Transit Administration to temporarily shut down the Camden MARC train line between Baltimore and Washington.

Frustrated by shoddy-quality kids' toys, Fred Lundahl, owner of a pressed steel company in Moline, Ill., made a toy truck for his 5-year-old son in 1920 and built an industry. He wanted his son, Buddy "L," to have indestructible playthings to resemble the newest adult toy, the automobile, and to spark imaginative play.Just before the younger Lundahl died in 1981, he wrote that his father "truly believed that the only really good playthings were those that could make a child's dreams come true, playthings you could actually do things with, ones that REALLY WORKED just like the big machines they modeled."

A three-judge panel at the Court of Special Appeals in Annapolis heard arguments yesterday on the zoning approval for the proposed Wyndham Inner Harbor East Hotel.The challenge, filed by the Waterfront Coalition against the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, seeks to invalidate the zoning.Each side had 30 minutes to argue its case. Typically, decisions are rendered within six to eight weeks.In past action, the coalition -- made up of neighborhood groups from Fells Point, Butchers Hill, Canton and East Baltimore -- has sought to set aside the amendment of the Inner Harbor East Master Plan and to obtain an archaeological investigation of buried train tracks thought to be under the hotel site.

Bet you've never seen a turntable like this. Today, the B&O Railroad Museum's program "Round and Round" allows visitors to watch as the Roundhouse turntable moves locomotives. The turntable, a 50-foot rotating hardwood circle with train tracks in its center, is able to move a 100,000-pound locomotive 360 degrees. It only takes one person to control the 1884 turntable, which is the centerpiece of the Roundhouse. Three locomotives - America's first steam locomotive, the Tom Thumb; America's first horizontal boiler steam locomotive, the Lafayette; and America's oldest operating steam locomotive, the William Mason - will be rotated and placed in their bays today.

One man died early Saturday morning in an Anne Arundel County accident that closed Route 100 for more than three hours. A second man has been hospitalized with life-threatening injuries, according to Division Chief Michael Cox. At 6:29 a.m., rescue workers were called to a collision on eastbound 100, just west of Telegraph Road, near the MARC system's Penn Line. The vehicle went off the road and fell about 30 to 40 feet to the train tracks below, with crews taking roughly 20 minutes to free the two victims, Cox said.

A Maryland Transit Administration police officer fatally shot a man last night who was trying to rob a passenger near the Reisterstown Road Plaza subway station, police said. Police said the robbery suspect pulled out a gun after being confronted, forcing the officer to fire in self-defense. The officer was part of a team of seven plainclothes officers who were patrolling the area last night in response to a wave of robberies, said Capt. David Marzola of the transit police. Police reported seeing the suspect, accompanied by two other men, approach a passenger leaving the subway about 7 p.m. The man pressed a pistol into the passenger's back and then rifled through his pockets, Marzola said.

The development team planning a $600 million medical trade mart and conference center in downtown Baltimore may need twice as much land as it originally sought for the project, its chief local representative indicated yesterday.Baltimore businessman Richard Swirnow told a meeting of the Downtown Partnership that his team, Parkway/Swirnow Group Ltd., would like the rights to develop the city-owned blocks bounded by Paca, Pratt, Howard and Camden streets -- land that was partially earmarked for an office building that never materialized.

IndyCar officials confirmed Friday that the Baltimore Grand Prix will return Labor Day weekend, but they will hold off on releasing the series' complete schedule until after Sunday's season finale in Las Vegas. "Baltimore was a big win this season for a business like ours," said Terry Angstadt, president of the IndyCar Series commercial division. "The entire city was behind it, from the mayor's office to the fans. The grandstands were full with happy, engaged people. When that happens, we're winners.

IndyCar drivers found a number of flaws during Thursday afternoon's track walk, their first up-close-and-personal look at the course for this weekend's inaugural Baltimore Grand Prix. The drivers brought up varying concerns, but nearly all agreed to take a wait-and-see approach. Graham Rahal noticed there is a lot of work still being done, and he worried the late paving of the train tracks near pit road by the B&O Warehouse might not set right overnight. He also didn't like the chicane - an an artificial feature creating extra turns - around the train tracks on Pratt Street.

Greyhound Lines has joined Amtrak to explore the physical and economic feasibility of constructing in Baltimore the latest form of urban transit center -- an "intermodal terminal" that would bring together five kinds of transportation in one location.Architects hired by Greyhound and Amtrak showed Baltimore's Design Advisory Panel conceptual plans last week for an $8 million to $10 million bus terminal and garage that would be constructed on a triangular lot north of Pennsylvania Station.