Remingtopo is a topographically-inspired traffic calming pavement art project enhancing pedestrian safety and creating outdoor space for community gatherings and small business events in the Remington Neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland. After seven years of advocacy the Greater Remington Improvement Association (GRIA) succeeded in convincing the Baltimore City Department of Transportation to install traffic calming bump outs and high visibility crosswalks at the formerly unregulated five way intersection at 27th Street and Remington Avenue. In recent years the block has been a site of reinvestment, including a large mixed use building with apartments and shops and small businesses like the B. Willow plant shop. With the increased residents and foot traffic, GRIA sought more community space, safer pedestrian crossings, and an investment in public art. The artwork design is based on community input and takes inspiration from the adjacent plant shop and the historical natural landscape.
The Remingtopo design takes inspiration from the historical landscape and vintage topographical maps of Baltimore. Before the blocks of Remington were constructed the landscape featured tributaries to the Jones Falls, including the Sumwalt Run that now flows underground through nearby storm drains. This hidden watercourse is the inspiration for local artist Bruce Willen’s Ghost Rivers project. The Remingtopo design builds on Willen’s narrative of uncovering the lost landscape while highlighting the anticipated flow of pedestrian movement through the space. Curvilinear “rivers” lead walkers and wheelchair riders from curb through bump out to crosswalk; tracing possible “desire lines” through the pedestrianized public space. The pavement art abstractly creates a large “R”, similar to the adjacent large steel “R” sculpture by Dominic Terlizzi. Reverberating from these pedestrian creeks rise topographical lines evoking a hillier terrain of the past.
In addition to designing and installing the pavement art, Graham Projects also provided consulting services to GRIA on the specification of large, traffic rated planters to protect the central pedestrian plaza.
Production team: Graham Coreil-Allen, Melvin Jadulang, Q Batts, Mar Braxton, Maurice McCrimmon, and Kirsten Pamfilis.