Around Maryland

While looking for a place to get vaccinated against monkeypox in August, Jack Feng of Baltimore looked to the city health department to try and schedule a shot. Case counts in the state and country were rising, and Feng wanted to be part of the solution and protect himself against the infectious disease. To his dismay, the health department and a private partner had limited doses in their possession, and Feng, a public health researcher and a member of the LGBTQ+ community, could not get an appointment. He also faulted the state and city health department for not immediately launching a pre-registration website, call line or public service announcement campaign to help people learn more about the outbreak. Feng asked himself: Was it worth leaving the state for someplace where shots were more plentiful?

Three scientists, including a Baltimore City school alumnus, jointly won this year’s Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for their work on quantum information science, a “totally crazy” field that has significant applications, including in the field of encryption. American John F. Clauser, Frenchman Alain Aspect and Austrian Anton Zeilinger were cited by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for discovering the way that unseen particles, such as photons, can be linked, or “entangled,” with each other even when they are separated by large distances.

This month, displays detailing the experiences of domestic violence survivors will pop up in libraries, recreation centers and police stations. Each one will feature a pair of shoes and the stories of a particular survivor. Cheryl Kravitz, a survivor and longtime advocate in Montgomery County, shared her story at a news conference Tuesday announcing the Walk in Their Shoes campaign. She pointed to a pair of flats on display. “They’re flat because you need to run quickly to get out of the house when you can,” she said. Kravitz detailed the whirlwind romance that led her to marry a man who, over time, began to push and shove her. Then the violence escalated.

A new study will evaluate connecting the Jones Falls Trail in Baltimore City with the Northern Central Railroad Trail in Baltimore County, creating a protected route for hikers and bikers from the Inner Harbor about 50 miles up into Pennsylvania. At a meeting Monday, the Baltimore County Council voted unanimously to help fund the study, which represents a meaningful step forward for the idea. The connection has long been discussed by cycling advocates, but still has a long way to go. After the study, a final design would need to be completed and funding obtained for its construction.

Baltimore region stakeholders and residents can now provide feedback on another set of transit plans aimed at increasing regional connectivity and improving the region’s economy. In September of 2022, the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) and Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) announced a set of North-South Baltimore City/County transit system alignments (known in the report as alternatives) for public comment and review as part of the rollout of its Central Maryland Regional Transportation plan.

Anne Arundel County Council member Allison Pickard doesn’t often get to go shopping alone. She was thankful her children weren’t present Saturday afternoon as she was ushered through the back of a Timberland outlet at Arundel Mills Mall when a gun discharged in the food court, causing a panic among shoppers. Pickard, who didn’t hear the shot, was at first unsure why she was being evacuated. She was able to get in contact with an Anne Arundel County Police lieutenant who put her mind at ease that no one was shot. But crowds of Saturday shoppers at the mall evacuated fearing the gunfire came from an active shooter.