Living in White Marsh?

April 19, 2008 10:18 AM

What's it like living in the White Marsh area, or somewhere along the Pulaski Hwy?

My long-term boyfriend and I are moving to the Baltimore area in July and the position I am hoping to transfer into is near White Marsh. My plans are to eventually apply for law school at Maryland and move to the city if I get in, but in the meantime, we're hoping to save money and commute time by living outside of Baltimore-proper.
Is White Marsh just a big shopping center or is there anything cool* going for it? Is it a worthwhile place to live? Are there any glaring reasons not to live there?
Also, what are the neighborhoods along Rte 40/Pulaski Hwy (I don't know what it's referred to locally, just on Google Maps) like?

*by cool I mean at least a couple non-big box stores, a sufficient number of places to grab food, a drinking hole, at least one small park, a few trees, etc. We're cool with commuting to the city for a lot off stuff, though.

posted by fructose to grab bag (7 comments total)

It's pretty much a typical suburb as far as I can tell, but the caveat here is that I only go there when I need a big-box store. (The Ikea there is subpar, though.) Is it an option to live near 95 in the city (Canton, for example)? That's still pretty far, though.
posted by Airhen at 10:49 AM on April 19, 2008

I guess White Marsh qualifies as "cool" by the standard you listed. how close to Rt 40 do you want to be? Most of the homes that kinda sit on 40 look pretty seedy, unless you get up near delaware

check out Bel Air area, it's about 10 miles north of White Marsh. might qualify as cooler.

Most of what i would consider "cooler" towns on the Route 40 corridor are further north, like Havre de Grace, Perryville, North East and the like. These really have that cool "small town america" vibe, but you are looking at about a 40-60 minute commute to downtown Baltimore ( although the Marc train does run along that same corridor to downtown balto)
posted by Mr_Chips at 10:57 AM on April 19, 2008

It says you're in Austin now. Ouch.

I grew up right in the White Marsh area and it seemed really uncool to me, a kid who had never lived anywhere cool. I can only imagine how lame it would seem to you.

Route 40 is a white-trash hellhole. I never even thought of "White Marsh" as an area, just a mall. You might want to look into Towson, which is a college town of sorts in the B'more suburbs.
posted by drjimmy11 at 3:18 PM on April 19, 2008

I'm going to second drjimmy11 on this. Growing up in the suburbs on the west side of town, I thought I was in the most boring strip-malls-pretending-be-towns tract housing dystopia on Earth. Then we gave a friend of a friend a ride back to White Marsh one night. I stood corrected, or at least sat corrected in the back seat.

If Austin is your speed, I don't think you'll find much to appeal to you south of there in Essex or Dundalk, either. If it were me, I'd live in the city and reverse commute it. Take a look at places in Canton or Butchers Hill.
posted by el_lupino at 5:47 PM on April 19, 2008

Nthing no. I've only lived in Baltimore for about 8 months, but don't think very highly of White Marsh. I recently bought a row house in the Canton/Brewer's Hill area, and am loving it. There are plenty of places to rent in the area. It's close to both Patterson Park and the water, and Fells is a nice walk away. There are pubs and restaurants of all sorts, some quirky stores, and a lovely library. The 11 bus will take you downtown, or up to Charles Village or even Towson if you want a change of pace. Driving, it only takes me 15/20 minutes to get to White Marsh on the expressway to go to the mall (which I try to avoid). Also, Rt 40/Pulaski is not at all pleasant. It is trafficky and gross- full of big warehouses and hilariously (if you don't live there) seedy hotels. In or close to the city it seems much worse than it does further out.

As I said, I haven't been here that long and haven't explored the White Marsh area beyond its big box stores, and haven't yet made it to any of the nice towns mentioned by Mr. Chips.

As a side note, I learned the hard way that Baltimore is not a Craigslist town when it comes to rentals. The best way (if you don't know anyone) to find an inexpensive apartment in a block that isn't half boarded up is to go there and walk around. A lot of people just hang signs off the buildings. These people are often nicer/less misleading than real estate agents and will refer you to other landlords if they don't have what you're looking for. Feel free to memail me if you like.
posted by LizardOfDoom at 1:48 AM on April 20, 2008

As a transplant outsider (who has since moved out of the area), I would say that White Marsh isn't cool at all by your standards. It's basically box-store-mega-mart- and townhome-condo-apartment-building land. There's a "mall" ("The Avenue at White Marsh") that's one of those new-fangled prentending-to-be main-street America set-ups with a couple decent restaurants (the Red Brick Station microbrewery makes a couple darn fine brews), but it's still a soul-less suck fest.

I'm with the above comments that suggest living in the city. The Canton, Brewer's Hill, and even Highlandtown innter-city neighborhoods get you close to to the funky-hip-urban life that is so great in Baltimore but also leave you an commute up the 95.

Good luck. I miss Baltimore.
posted by maniactown at 2:00 AM on April 20, 2008

Haha. I am currently living in Austin, but I grew up about 30 mins outside in what is probably the White Marsh equivalent there-- strip mall and big box land with patches of seedy here and there. Or at least it became that over time as I was growing up. My boyfriend is from a dying small town in West Texas. So, we aren't going to have culture shock living somewhere like that, but from what it sounds like it might be better to try to find a good deal elsewhere.
Thanks for the advice! It's a little disappointing to hear that Craigslist doesn't really work so well up there since it's a great tool for rentals here, but we've done the wander around looking for a place to live thing before.
posted by fructose at 4:53 PM on April 21, 2008