A billboard is rising on property by the Jones Falls that developer Seawall intends to buy
Resurrecting a billboard at the Potts & Callahan property disappoints those who had hoped the land would become a green, park-like amenity for Baltimore
Above: Crew on Potts & Callahan’s 2801 Falls Road property prepares to install a new billboard to face 28th Street drivers. (Fern Shen)
When Seawall Development last month announced its intention to purchase property alongside Baltimore’s beleaguered Jones Falls and develop it with community input, stakeholders imagined a lush, green corridor along the waterway, exciting views of herons nabbing fish at Round Falls, enhanced walking and biking paths and, perhaps, residences and cafés.
Overall, a sensitively designed new public waterfront for the city.
It’s safe to say that no one imagined a huge billboard.
But that’s what is rising today on Falls Road on the Potts & Callahan parcels that Seawall has a contract to buy.
Crews began erecting the billboard this week on the construction company’s property, a crane poised to place the sign atop a tall metal pole so that it faces motorists on the 28th Street exit ramp for the I-83 Jones Falls Expressway.
Odette Ramos, the area’s councilwoman, said she had no idea a billboard was going up on the property. A livid Sandy Sparks, president of Friends of The Jones Falls, said the news caught her completely by surprise.
“The problem is that it’s by 83, and billboards are allowed near an interstate. So there’s not a damn thing we can do about it,” said Sparks, one of the leaders of the effort to ban billboards citywide a quarter century ago.
Last September, Sparks and fellow members of her group successfully fought against Mayor Brandon Scott’s plan to move the Sisson Street trash transfer facility to the Potts & Callahan parcel that fronts on their beloved stream.
At a meeting recently convened by Seawall principal Thibault Manekin, Sparks joined local lawmakers, Remington community leaders, representatives of Blue Water Baltimore and others to heed the developer’s call to dream big about the possibilities for the urban waterway.
A billboard rising in the middle of the site, Sparks said, puts a damper on that dream.
“I’ve had a vision of this as a beautiful corner of the city. This billboard is definitely going to be in the way,” she said.
Told that the current owner signed a 10-year lease to allow a new billboard on the property, Sparks said, “I’m sorry to hear he did that because it’s strictly just income for the property owner.”
View of the Potts & Callahan billboard installation from Falls Road. BELOW: Close-up view of worksite , showing also the peeling lead paint that has been falling off the bridge onto the land and waterway below. (Fern Shen)
“Buddy, this is already happening”
Speaking with The Brew, Potts & Callahan President Travis Holub makes no bones about it – he said the extra income has been helpful for the 100-year-old family-run business.
He explained that, in fact, there was a billboard at the vehicle maintenance yard until last June when he had a disagreement with the billboard company over lease renewal terms.
“They wanted to lower the lease payment, and I got into an argument with them and told them, ‘Take the billboard away!’” Holub recounted, explaining that he went on to sign a lease with a competitor, Capital Outdoor.
Did Manekin know that a new billboard was going to be installed before signing the contract to purchase 2801 and 2701 Falls Road?
Manekin referred The Brew to Potts & Callahan.
Asked the same question, Holub said, “I’m not Thibault,” before going on to say he has been”completely honest” with Manekin.
“Before I signed the agreement with him to buy it, I said, ‘You do know there’s billboard going up there, and I’m collecting the rent until you own the property?’” he recalled, explaining that while he and Seawall currently have an agreement, “nothing is finalized yet.”
“I said, ‘Look, buddy, this is already happening. I can’t go back. I signed the lease with Capital Billboard to build this thing,’” Holub continued. “He said, ‘Yeah, well, I’ll deal with that after I own the property.’”
When might the property sale actually be completed? Not for a while, “possibly a year and a half,” Holub estimates.
“We’re not going to close [the Falls Road operation] for quite some time. I have to actually build my new shop on Pulaski Highway where I have a recycling plant,” he said. “I’m trying to move my entire operation to one place and make my life easier.”
Once Seawall owns the property, Holub said, they can decide whether to honor the billboard agreement or buy itself out of it.
“Money is something that, while we can all talk about the good and bad, is always nice to have a little bit more of coming in,” he reflected.