Mid-century new urbanism

Hopkins Plaza in Baltimore, Maryland is the product of a broader urban revitalization program conceived by the city’s authority in the late 1950’s. Charles Center as it became known sought to rehabilitate and “modernize” the image of this corridor of downtown. Hopkins plaza is actually one segment at the southern edge of what is in effect, a trio of plazas/ open spaces conceived to grant the downtown area a large civic space for gatherings, concerts, festival, and other entertainment events. The open spaces encapsulated by government office towers and business interest prove to be a progressive concept at the time, even winning praise by notable architectural and planning critic, Jane Jacobs; Jacobs admired the projects holistic approach and the rejection of the tabula rasa approach prevalent in most post-war urban renewal, - Jane Jacobs noted: “ this is less of a project than an integral, continuous part of downtown”, and “… from someone who is so grateful to be delighted for a change, instead of depress and disheartened by a downtown project.”1

Nonetheless, there was still a degree of disruption to the community, the site occupied today by Hopkins Plaza was once a thriving commercial center, yet, the Charles Center project did very little to restore the small business opportunities in order to mitigate the economic hardship to the area. Furthermore, to create the superblock Hanover and Redwood streets were interrupted to develop the new plaza, further disjointing the small business sector. The plazas enjoyed a relatively brief a period of interest form the community at large, with public concerts and open markets. Today it’s chiefly the office employees of the adjacent towers that utilize the plaza for lunchtime gathering, at other times the plaza receives few visitors, undoubtedly a result of the limited visibility from the street and sidewalk levels.
Another contributing factor to scant visitors is the layout where vendors are relegated to the periphery of the plaza which in turn fosters a circulation patterns radiating from the interior of the site to the outer edges in search of restaurants, and sidewalk vendors, in contrast, very few pedestrians are observed entering the plaza to utilize the seating facilities. Yet again, it could be the ambiguous appearance of the plaza to the average passerby, who could assume this plaza is the domain of the corporate towers for the exclusive enjoyment of their employees. This seems to be a common problem for urban plazas, the adjacency of open spaces to office buildings replete with suburban commuters appear uninviting to other factions of the urban community. In 1997 renovation were undertaken to remove most of the skywalks in an attempt to reestablish street level pedestrian setting.


1-McCarthy, Michael P.,Warren, Marion E.,The Living City: Baltimore's Charles Center & Inner Harbor Development.2002