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Northwest Baltimore

Photo Credit: Marylandracing.com

Northwest Baltimore is a vibrant, culturally diverse community with a rich history and a challenging, but promising future. This is an area where citizens are willing to put aside their cultural and ethnic differences and work together to bring their neighborhood to it’s full potential. Residents are working with The Northwest Baltimore Corporations to:

• Attract more business to the area.
• Help existing businesses to grow and prosper.
• Develop a wide range of programs and services including the innovative Child Development Center, the Preakness Art Work Contest, and the Park Heights Community Farmers' Market.
• Work with community and business associations to address issues that impact the quality of life including education, the redevelopment of Pimlico Racetrack, public safety, and neighborhood cleanup and beautification.
  The people of Northwest Baltimore have a lot to look forward to, but more importantly they have a great place to call home.

Northwest Baltimore neighborhoods include:
Ashburton | Hanlon Longwood | West Arlington | Windsor Hills | Chesworlde | Pimlico

Ashburton
Named after the esteemed lawyer and member of the financial house of Baring and Company, Alexander Baring, Lord Ashburton, the present day community is a stable neighborhood with well-kept homes and manicured lawns.

Ashburton is a stately neighborhood which has changed from the exclusive province of gentile whites to that of Jews, and finally to the “Gold Coast” home of the blacks. Through all of its transitions, Ashburton has remained an exclusive enclave for its residents. In the beginning, Ashburton was the manor and farm of the Gittings family, long distinguished in Baltimore history. The first part of the 20th century saw its sale to the George R. Morris firm for residential development. Early sales literature includes the following recitation of the advantages of life in this neighborhood: “Placing Ashburton in the country sounds strange to the modern Baltimorean who motors there from downtown in 15 minutes! Once it was thoroughly rural, and though the City has long since grown out to it and finally surrounded it--Ashburton still preserves much of its natural beauty. As far as has been possible, the original, easily-rolling contour of the land has been preserved.”

With all its natural advantages, it is to its effective restrictions that Ashburton owes the largest measure of its success. These restrictions govern the placement of houses and garages, and require the architectural approval of plans. They are chiefly for the purpose of maintaining a high standard, protecting the rights of the property owner as to sunlight and air space, and upholding the value of his investment. The method of approval of plans is one that assures all the protection desired by the neighbors and at the same time, offers the least interference.

For the last 50 years, the Ashburton community has graciously accommodated 3 radical population changes. A new house occasionally appears, but the physical landscape remains the same. Begun as a residential fortress. Ashburton has been transformed into a vital community that has helped to demythologize the equation of population changes with depreciating neighborhood stability.

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Hanlon Longwood
Hanlon is a well-established solid community of fifty-five tree-lined blocks of meticulously maintained properties and long-term active residents with a working vision for preserving a high quality of life. The neighborhood is a preferred address and attracts new residents as soon as properties become available.

Many Hanlon residents have been here for 20, 30 even 40 years and are the 2nd or 3rd owners of their beautifully maintained homes. “Newcomers” are always welcome and invited to enhance their investment by participating in the community. Hanlon's eastern boundary is flanked by one of the most beautiful best-kept secrets in Maryland - Hanlon Park. Hanlon Park with Lake Ashburton is a hundred acre park with two playgrounds, a pavilion, softball and football fields, tennis courts and a “bowl” area with great sound acoustics for those warm weather concerts.

The atmosphere is peaceful and quiet. The shade of the tree-lined streets and the manicured lawns create a scenic pathway as you walk around the community and then to Hanlon Park. Joggers and walkers take their regular steps around the reservoir that is Lake Ashburton. Parents take their children to play on the two state-of-the art playgrounds. The pathways are used by bikers, skaters and steppers. The sounds of organized sports and pick-up games let you hear children enjoying each other. Picnics are enjoyed at the pavilion nearly all year round. The hills are perfect for sleigh riding during those rare snowstorms. The picture painted by the sun rising and setting on the water makes you appreciate living in Hanlon every day of every season.

Hanlon is only a few minutes from downtown and major highways. The subway and light rail systems are a short distance away. There is a local mall and the highways give you access around the Baltimore Metropolitan area. Public recreational facilities include Cahill Performing Arts and Cultural Enrichment Center, Liberty Recreation Center, Forest Park Golf Course, Carrie Murray Outward Bound Center and two other beautiful parks - Druid Hill and Leakin with the Gwynns Falls Watershed Trails. There are two for-profit spa and exercise facilities. Medical services are available at the Garwyn Oaks Medical Center, University of Maryland Outpatient Care, Sinai and Kernan Hospitals, and a few independent practices.

In addition to the picturesque scenery, variety of desirable housing styles, and proximity to education, recreation and conveniences, Hanlon has a strong neighborhood organization. The Hanlon Improvement Association has been in existence for more than thirty years. The goal is to ensure the community moves forward and addresses the demands of today and the future.

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West Arlington
The community of West Arlington was born in the 1890's, and derives its name from its proximity to the older Village of Arlington. The Village of Arlington, which has long since been absorbed by Baltimore City, stood along Reisterstown Road in today's Park Heights Area and never extended west of the Western Maryland Railroad tracks. Until its development as a suburban residential community, West Arlington remained farmland.

West Arlington was the brainchild of George E. Webb, a Baltimore streetcar and real estate entrepreneur who was later active in the development of the Mt. Washington and Glen communities. The new company initially laid out several unpaved avenues and sold building lots. Development was slow at first but picked up towards the close of the century, and in the first decade of the 20th century West Arlington matured into a independent community. In 1900 the first streetcar link to West Arlington was opened — a loop line running to Park Heights Avenue where a connection could be made to downtown Baltimore City.

By 1903 there were already enough residents in West Arlington to form the West Arlington Improvement Association, and by 1909 the West Arlington population was estimated to be around 1,000. Social clubs were inaugurated and churches founded in West Arlington during the early 1900's.

Patrick Flanigan was undoubtedly early West Arlington's greatest resident promoter. A sewer and road contractor, Flanigan from East Baltimore moved to a sparsely settled West Arlington in 1898. So taken was he with his new community that he tirelessly boosted the area to his many business associates and friends. Through his contracting company Flanigan contributed to the physical development of West Arlington by building its sewers. Because of his many efforts on behalf of the community he was dubbed “Mayor” of West Arlington, and honored at a neighborhood carnival thrown for his benefit at the nearby Electric Amusement Park.

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Windsor Hills
Windsor Hills derives its name from the Windsor Mill, an 18th century grist mill that was located on the Gwynns Falls, probably at the Windsor Mill Road bridge. The date of construction of this long-vanished mill is unknown, but first appeared in documents, as being for sale, in 1784.

Development increased in Windsor Hills, especially north of Loudon Avenue and Alto Road, during the teens and 1920's, with almost all houses built in the single family detached, wood frame and shingle cottage style. A 1916 newspaper advertisement described cottage lots for sale in Windsor Hills as being “restricted against rows of brick buildings, saloons, and all nuisances.” A few rowhouses were built in Windsor Hills, with a group of Daylight houses in the 4000 block of Clifton Avenue advertised for sale by James A. Bealmear and Son, in 1929.

The Windsor Hills Improvement Association was formed during the early days of the community, and served primarily as a social function for the somewhat isolated early suburban pioneers. After a dormant period, the association revived in the 1950's to fight undesirable zoning changes, to protect property owners from unscrupulous block busting real estate salesmen, and to promote orderly integration of the community.

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Chesworlde
The history of the Cheswolde area extends back to the 18th Century. Land north of Western Run in the vicinity of Greenspring Avenue and Pimlico Road was owned at the turn of the 19th Century by Charles Carroll of Carrollton. A house still stands at the northwest corner of Greenspring Avenue and Cross Country Boulevard, and is reputed to have been Charles Carroll's hunting lodge for his surrounding property. At approximately this location on the Western Run a grist mill operated for the first half of the 19th Century. Around mid-Century it was converted to a snuff mill, and operated as such until damaged by flood in 1868. The Pimlico Road dates from the 18th Century, but no record of early settlement along its Cheswolde portion exists.

As with other communities in Northwest Baltimore, much residential building in Cheswolde occurred between 1940 and 1960. Beginning in the late 1960's and continuing into the present, the property that constituted the housing in Cheswolde is largely a mixture of single family detached homes, and of garden apartments. These are located mainly along Clarks Lane and Fallstaff Road, Western Run Drive, and South Green Meadow Parkway.

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Pimlico
Pimlico is an older neighborhood of tree-lined streets, porch-front rowhomes and free-standing houses with peaked roofs and dormers, some with large front yards. Served by commercial districts on Reisterstown Road and Park Heights Avenue. Population, formerly solid Jewish, is now mixed Afro-American and Jewish with both races working for community revitalization.

This neighborhood is probably most famous for its Pimlico Race Course, home of the renowned Preakness Stakes — the middle jewel in the quest for the Triple Crown. The race track first opened its doors on October 25, 1870, making it the second oldest racetrack in the nation behind Saratoga, which debuted in 1864 in upstate New York.

Engineered by General John Ellicott, Pimlico has played host to racing icons for over a century, where Baltimoreans have seen the likes of legendary horses such as Man O' War, Sir Barton, Sea Biscuit, War Admiral, Citation, Secretariat, Cigar and Silver Charm thunder down the stretch in thrilling and memorable competition.

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