Mindgrub CEO: Spring Grove Should Be Mixed-Use Development

Spring Grove is such a lovely open area and absolutely needs much of the land preserved for recreational space and historical purposes. At the same time Catonsville has a huge opportunity it should embrace. We need to consider what the “Millennials” will want and start shifting in that direction. If not, as our current population retires and passes away, West Baltimore will expand and additional crime and dilapidation could take root.

Since the recession there has been a big spotlight on “Main Street” vs. “Wall Street.” The up and coming generation of Millennials want to in fact shop on a main street setting and malls and big box stores are closing in numbers. Columbia has a big plan to fabricate a main street and knock down parts of the Columbia mall. Lucky for us we don’t need to create a main street, we just need to embrace the one we have. The Spring Grove area should expand on that theme, be an extension of the look and feel of our future main street, visually draw consumers off the beltway and into our businesses, and help house, entertain, feed and relax the current and next generation of residents.

New mixed use areas are a growing trend. These involve having commercial, residential and recreational space all in one area. That is what main streets used to do before strip malls, tract housing, commercial high-rises and big box stores took over. We need to embrace this shift back to main street and create total value for ourselves and the next generation of Millenials.

Catonsville has one of the top Technology Schools and Millenial farms in our back yard, UMBC (Ranked 1st in up and coming schools by U.S. News 4 years in a row). We also have emerging companies like Mindgrub in our midst (Winner of CRTC’s Tech Company of the Year for the Baltimore/DC area). We need to create an area that has attractive shopping, dining, entertainment and recreation for not only ourselves but this next crop of residents. We need to do this both with new construction as well as with continued gentrification of our existing main street.

I can’t help notice that the sum of the parts leads us in this direction. There are individuals fighting for more recreational space, others who want historic preservation, UMBC who needs some expansion room, companies like Mindgrub that need larger and hipster office space, all of us that need a quality grocery store, the list goes on. To that note it seems like mixed use is the way we need to go, with the theme as an extension of our current main street and embracing the shifting trends. I think the only question that remains is if the builder who does develop that land is going to do it right? 

Todd Marks 
CEO and Founder, Mindgub Tecnologies