Residents of Williams Estates and Peppermint Woods in Middle River say a sprawling commercial development across the street is flooding their homes, drawing rats into their neighborhood, and reviving fears about toxic chemicals buried in the ground beneath it. The project, known as Aviation Station, is planned to include a new Walmart and several other businesses on a 53-acre site that once served as a World War II manufacturing plant.
Paul Treash, who has lived in the community for six years, has documented the problem with his own camera. As reported by WMAR-2 News, photos he has taken show high water levels around the neighborhood and on the roadway, with heavy rains making the construction's impact on the area plain to see. Treash told the station that silt and other material from the development is entering the community, and that Eastern Avenue floods across the road during heavy rain.
Treash is also a plaintiff in a 2025 lawsuit, alongside the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, over potential pollution at the site, the station reports. He said the site's forever-chemical problems have not been fixed and were brushed aside so the project could continue, and that promises to fix water overflowing toward the bay have not been fulfilled.
A Legacy of Military Contamination
The site's industrial history runs deep. It was originally built for Glenn L. Martin Company's B-26 bomber production during World War II, and in the 1950s and 1960s it housed the Navy Reserve Industrial Aircraft Plant, which used polyfluoroalkyl substances, according to Baltimore Fishbowl. The lawsuit filed in March 2025 in the Circuit Court of Maryland for Baltimore County, naming developers Eastern Boulevard LLC and TKG III Middle River LLC, alleges sediment and erosion control violations and the absence of an adequate stormwater management plan, per the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.
Court filings note that runoff from the property flows into Frog Mortar Creek and the Middle River, a waterway network where adjacent rivers have lost roughly 1,500 acres of underwater grass habitat since 2022, grasses the foundation says provide critical habitat for Chesapeake Bay fish and crabs. The Maryland Department of the Environment had maintained a 10-year water contact advisory along Frog Mortar Creek due to chlorinated solvents from historical aircraft manufacturing, lifting the restriction only in December 2022 after groundwater treatment efforts by Lockheed Martin, according to the agency.
Traffic Fears Along a Dangerous Stretch
Delegate Ryan Nawrocki, who represents the area in the General Assembly, told the station the site should require Army Corps of Engineers approval before development proceeds given the land's manufacturing history. To his knowledge, the Army Corps of Engineers has not done that approval work, even as the project has moved forward.
Nawrocki has also raised traffic safety concerns along Eastern Boulevard, noting the stretch has had four fatalities in the past several years and still lacks a sidewalk. More businesses, he warned, will bring more vehicles and pedestrians to an already busy and dangerous road, and he said significant roadway improvements are not being required. Those traffic fears echo an ongoing municipal fight over whether to classify the intersection of Eastern Boulevard and Lynbrook Road as failed in order to halt construction, a designation developer Reich Brothers has warned would block developer-funded roadway improvements, according to Avenue News.
Who's Listening to Residents?
Treash feels the county and state are not doing enough to address community concerns. “Who's gonna help us?” he wants someone to speak up, hear residents, and fight for them, the station reported.
Nawrocki suggested the community's makeup may affect how officials respond, saying he believes officials might take a different approach if the development were near million-dollar homes rather than a mobile home park. Councilman David Marks, who also represents the area, was unavailable for an interview, but his office told the station it has responded to each complaint it has received and that Marks successfully pushed the State Highway Administration to add more traffic lanes in the area. Reich Brothers, the developers of the land, have not responded to an interview request from the station, which said it is working to obtain interviews with the State Highway Administration and Baltimore County.
Permits, Politics and a Revived Walmart Plan
Baltimore County had issued a $25.3 million permit by September 18, 2024, for construction of a 171,190-square-foot Walmart Supercenter at 2810 Eastern Boulevard inside Aviation Station. A Walmart proposal faced community opposition in 2017, and development later stalled, per The Business Journals. The Maryland Department of the Environment has authorized general stormwater permit coverage for construction activity across 15.6 acres of the Walmart site, with that authorization active through June 2026 and requiring operators to design and maintain certified sediment controls.
New York-based Reich Brothers purchased the 53-acre former Martin Aviation Campus for $52.5 million in November 2021, an off-market deal that acquired the property from Baltimore developer Blue Ocean, and committed over $30 million to modernize infrastructure across the 1.9-million-square-foot industrial complex, according to a PR Newswire announcement. Blue Ocean had purchased the vacant site for $19.9 million in 2019 and proposed an indoor athletic facility; during the COVID-19 pandemic, plans shifted toward industrial tenants, per the Baltimore Business Journal. In July 2023, the Baltimore County Council passed legislation sponsored by Marks allowing fire safety systems to be installed at the site's historic World War II aircraft hangar in a way that preserves its architectural integrity, part of the broader push to adapt the former bomber plant for commercial reuse.
