Skip to content
Grist home
Support nonprofit news today

Articles by Christine Shenot

Featured Article

The Feeding the City series is profiling several cities with thriving urban-agriculture and alt-food scenes.

The Baltimore Farmers Market on Saratoga Street is one of several in the city.Photo courtesy Jeff Kubina via Flickr

Shows like “The Wire” have made abandoned areas like this one in east Baltimore the image most people have of the city. Photo courtesy urbanfeel via FlickrFor many Americans, any mention of Baltimore conjures up images from two popular TV dramas set in the city: NBC’s Homicide: Life on the Street and HBO’s The Wire. For nearly two decades, those glimpses of Baltimore’s drug trade and violent crime helped define the city.

But that era is fading. In some circles, there’s now a lot more talk of sustainability and green living than of the murder rate, and it’s an agenda that goes beyond the traditional focus on parks, transit, affordable housing, and other longstanding goals. Likewise, the hand-wringing over Baltimore’s unimpressive high-school graduation rates — about half those of its suburbs in recent years — is starting to give way to ambitious planning around workforce tr... Read more