The handing off of car seats and the pitter-patter of little feet will soon become common sights and sounds at the Village of Cross Keys with the news that childcare center Kiddie Calvert will relocate there.

Kiddie Calvert—an early childhood education center for infants, toddlers, and preschool-aged children currently housed at the Calvert School campus in Tuscany-Canterbury—plans to expand into the North Baltimore mixed-use community of The Village of Cross Keys in September 2021. Area working families in desperate need of more daycare options and community members eager to see new life injected into the aging Cross Keys are likely to welcome the development. The childcare center will go into the space below the previous Donna’s restaurant location, near the store Talbots.

The brainchild of visionary developer James Rouse, Cross Keys opened to much fanfare in the 1960s but has struggled in recent years with increasing vacancies in its commercial spaces. The recent $27 million purchase of the commercial assets of Cross Keys by Caves Valley Partners, which promises extensive upgrades, has been met with optimism by current Cross Keys residents like Marjorie Goodman. In January 2020 she heard Arsh Mirmiran, a partner at Caves Valley, discuss the revitalization plans at a Roland Park Civic League meeting. “Now I’m not going anywhere… I have renewed hope,” Goodman was quoted in an article in baltimorefishbowl.com.

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