Warehouse

Twenty Giant Food workers will be laid off by the end of the month after a dry-goods warehouse in Jessup that supplies Giant stores closes, union locals representing workers said Monday. Warehouse operator Jessup Logistics LLC said in April that it was shutting down the warehouse and laying off about 250 people. The subsidiary of New Hampshire-based C&S Wholesale Grocers said it would save about $13.5 million a year by shifting the distribution work to a more technologically advanced facility in York, Pa. Giant, the region's largest grocery chain, outsourced the dry-goods operation to Jessup Logistics but still owns the center and runs a fresh-foods warehouse as well as the transportation and recycling divisions.

  DSW Shoe Warehouse will open its first Baltimore city store this fall at The Shops at Canton Crossing. The retailer has leased 19,500 square feet at the Canton center, developer Neil Tucker, a principal with Chesapeake Real Estate Group, said on Thursday. Canton Crossing, now under construction, is opening in October with anchors Target, Harris Teeter, Michaels, Old Navy, ULTA Cosmetics and Loft. DSW Inc. runs 377 stores specializing in branded footwear, handbags and accessories.

More than 100 city firefighters and emergency personnel battled a five-alarm fire that broke out Sunday morning in a mostly vacant, three-story brick warehouse in Baltimore's Woodberry area, sending heavy smoke throughout the city. The Fire Department was called about 6:30 a.m. and the fire was brought under control at 1:20 p.m., according to Chief Kevin Cartwright, a Fire Department spokesman. No one was thought to be inside the building that houses a handful of small businesses, no one from the surrounding area was evacuated, and there were no injuries reported from the blaze, he said.

Standing amid his $44 million refurbished textile mill, now nearing completion, developer and one-time mayoral candidate David Tufaro observed a bird wading in the Jones Falls nearby. "That's our great blue heron," Tufaro said. Water birds fly up and down the Jones Falls between the two sides of the mill, which straddles the stream. So he insisted that an image of one be included on the rooftop sign that faces Interstate 83, announcing the presence of the commercial-residential complex called Mill No. 1. When residents begin moving into the converted mill early next month, the valley between the Baltimore neighborhoods of Woodberry and Hampden will shift from being a predominantly industrial area to being an extension of the surrounding neighborhoods.

Here are the 13 exhibits that constitute the Maryland Science Center's "Wonder Warehouse" 1) Whackaphone What it is: A calliope made of PVC tubing that you play by whacking the open ends with a flip-flop What it demonstrates: properties of pitch and tone 2) Keystone Zone What it is: A race to build an arch What it demonstrates: compression 3) See Saw Science/Tiltometer What it is: two big and two small seesaws What it demonstrates: leverage, balance and pivot points 4)

Giant Food has put its former dry goods warehouse in Jessup on the market, the real estate firm handling the listing said Monday. The now-vacant, 760,000-square-foot complex on 60 acres in the Maryland Wholesale Food Center on Assateague Drive supplied Giant grocery stores before the operation closed in June. The dry goods facility is owned by Giant, but the regional grocer outsourced its operation in 2011 to Jessup Logistics LLC, a subsidiary of New Hampshire-based C&S Wholesale Grocers.

A New York investment firm has given a $12.5 million short-term loan to the owner of an Arbutus industrial building to "stabilize the property for the longer term," according to one of the firm's managing directors. "Like many owners of Class-B and Class-C assets in the nation's middle markets, this sponsor needed a competitively priced, non-recourse bridge loan," said Geoffrey Smith, of Hudson Realty Capital Inc., in a statement Thursday. Hudson loaned the money for upkeep of a 689,000 square foot building in Arbutus on a 34-acre industrial site that currently houses a "prominent manufacturing company, mechanical contractor, logistics company and wholesaler of natural stone products," the statement said.

An Owings Mills-based real estate investment group announced plans Tuesday to convert a former Hochschild, Kohn & Co. department store warehouse and showroom in Mount Vernon into apartments. "The building will offer 171 residences comprised of 146 studio and one-bedroom units and 25 two-bedroom units," said a statement from the Time Group. Apartment sizes will vary from 470 square foot studios to 950 square foot two-bedroom units   -  all will have 13 foot ceilings, the firm said.

A four-alarm fire in a warehouse in the 1600 and 1700 blocks of W. North Ave. injured no one last night but forced the evacuation of nearby residents. Firefighters received a call about 7:30 p.m. reporting a fire at the intersection of Pennsylvania Avenue and Retreat Street, said Chief Kevin Cartwright, spokesman for the city Fire Department. About 35 trucks and 100 firefighters and medics responding found nothing at that intersection but saw smoke and flames shooting out of a warehouse about two blocks away.

The Baltimore City Fire Department battled a three-alarm fire at a warehouse at 1200 Baylis St. in the Canton area late into the night Sunday, bringing it under control around midnight. Capt. Roman Clark, a department spokesman, said about 60 residents in the block were evacuated. No homes were involved in the fire, but heavy smoke and the fire's proximity to residences spurred the evacuation, said Chief Kevin Cartwright. An MTA bus was called to shelter residents. Power was also out in the immediate area.

A 20-year-old man was taken to a local hospital in grave condition Tuesday evening after an incident at Pier One on Old Philadelphia Road in Aberdeen, Harford County fire officials said. It was unclear how the incident occurred, but it was originally reported as an accident involving a piece of machinery, according to Rich Gardiner, spokesman for the Harford County Volunteer Fire and EMS Association. The accident may have been secondary, however, he said. Gardiner did not have additional information available around 8:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Orioles fans, I don't blame you for being upset. Here we are, the second week of January, and the silence from the Warehouse is deafening. Let's review what we have so far. No major moves to make this team better in 2013. No progress in the hunt for a big bat in the middle of the order. No signing of a much-needed first baseman. (Adam LaRoche, we hardly knew you.) Instead, what we get from the Orioles front-office is the sound of crickets. Here's the team's big off-season move so far: they re-signed Nate McLouth to play left field.

An Owings Mills-based real estate investment group announced plans Tuesday to convert a former Hochschild, Kohn & Co. department store warehouse and showroom in Mount Vernon into apartments. "The building will offer 171 residences comprised of 146 studio and one-bedroom units and 25 two-bedroom units," said a statement from the Time Group. Apartment sizes will vary from 470 square foot studios to 950 square foot two-bedroom units   -  all will have 13 foot ceilings, the firm said.

A Chinese national selling plastic bags, restaurant supplies and other merchandise from China out of a warehouse in Baltimore was sentenced to 16 months in prison Wednesday for dodging customs duties on the imported products, according to the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. Jin Qing Huang, 57, was president of Woncity Inc., which kept a warehouse in the 2800 block of Annapolis Road in Baltimore and another in Northeast Washington and imported large quantities of Chinese products.

Many people see Thanksgiving leftovers as too much of a good thing and toss them out. Vinnie Bevivino wants those uneaten castoffs and more — he sees a chance to make some green with them while going green. Bevivino, 31, is the owner of Chesapeake Compost Works, the Baltimore area's latest addition to Maryland's fledgling food recycling industry. His startup began processing scraps and spoilage from local restaurants, supermarkets and institutions about a month ago in a cavernous old warehouse in Curtis Bay. Early next year, if all goes as planned, he hopes to begin selling that unwanted food waste after it's been transformed into dark, rich humus, which the region's gardeners and urban farmers can use to make new food.

A residents' group in the Baltimore neighborhood of Remington is asking the city to purchase two warehouses that were going to be replaced by a gas station and convenience store until those plans fell through in recent weeks. The Remington Neighborhood Alliance sent a letter to Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake on Monday requesting the city purchase 2926 Remington Ave. and 320 W. 29th St., which were about to be sold to Royal Farms - until the company recently backed out of the contracts, according to the properties' current owner.

A four-alarm fire that sent flames shooting 100 feet into the night air early yesterday destroyed the Cockeysville warehouse of a company that installs running tracks and gymnasium floors, Baltimore County fire officials said.Damage was estimated at more than $1 million to the Martin Surfacing Inc. building at Alt and Cockeysville roads, in an industrial area west of York Road, said Battalion Chief Mark F. Hubbard.Pieces of roofing material from the blaze landed on streets and lawns in nearby residential areas.

An Odenton business park is the top contender to be the site for a new distribution warehouse for the May Co.'s Hecht department stores, according to a county real estate industry source who asked not to be identified.The warehouse of at least 600,000 square feet would employ 150 to 200 people in positions from front-office work to "technical blue-collar" jobs operating the computerized facility, said Rosemary Duggins, marketing director of the Anne Arundel County Economic Development Corp.

Giant Food has put its former dry goods warehouse in Jessup on the market, the real estate firm handling the listing said Monday. The now-vacant, 760,000-square-foot complex on 60 acres in the Maryland Wholesale Food Center on Assateague Drive supplied Giant grocery stores before the operation closed in June. The dry goods facility is owned by Giant, but the regional grocer outsourced its operation in 2011 to Jessup Logistics LLC, a subsidiary of New Hampshire-based C&S Wholesale Grocers.

A New York investment firm has given a $12.5 million short-term loan to the owner of an Arbutus industrial building to "stabilize the property for the longer term," according to one of the firm's managing directors. "Like many owners of Class-B and Class-C assets in the nation's middle markets, this sponsor needed a competitively priced, non-recourse bridge loan," said Geoffrey Smith, of Hudson Realty Capital Inc., in a statement Thursday. Hudson loaned the money for upkeep of a 689,000 square foot building in Arbutus on a 34-acre industrial site that currently houses a "prominent manufacturing company, mechanical contractor, logistics company and wholesaler of natural stone products," the statement said.