BALTIMORE — A new apartment building is set to be built on an overgrown vacant lot along Park Heights Avenue, joining a handful of new developments in that area of northwest Baltimore.
The proposed Abe Dua Residences would change the landscape of Park Heights at Cold Spring Lane. It would be a six-story complex, in a neighborhood with mostly two-story buildings.
It would be even taller than the new Renaissance Row apartments that opened last year, just a couple of blocks away.
The area has seen a flurry of new developments, spearheaded largely by the Park Heights Renaissance group. Besides Renaissance Row, the Woodland Gardens senior-housing complex offers affordable housing on Park Heights at Virginia Avenue. Another redevelopment is of homes along Loyola Northway. Park Heights Renaissance is now taking applications for the third phase of that project.
Abe Dua Residences, at 4405 Park Heights, would have 50 units; almost 40 percent of them would be handicap-accessible or subsidized for homeless residents ("PSH" units).
It would include 4,700 square feet of community space and 1,000-square feet of retail.
The size of the proposed building was a major topic at a recent meeting of the city's urban design and architecture advisory panel. Joe Iwaskiw, of Soto Rachitecture, told board members that the company has "addressed some scale issues."
Board member Sharon Bradley raised concerns about the development from a street-level, pedestrian point of view, and noted the proposed "massive wall" at the garage level.
"You're working with a very difficult site," because of everything else that's around, added board member Osborne Anthony. Since the two-story residential buildings will most likely remain, "the size of these buildings become very important," he said.
He implored the developer to even look at "very subtle slivers" that could make the facade more "animated," instead of very "banal and blank-looking walls."
