Not so long ago, Rosalie Sellman suffered pangs at night that made her heart thump and her breath quicken. Pulling into her carport in an established neighborhood of suburban ranchers, the recently widowed Ms. Sellman would glance furtively in every direction, then dart inside.
"I was petrified every time I had to go to the back door," she said.
For Ms. Sellman, the panic -- along with her nightly sprints -- ended three years ago when she moved to a development of two-story garage townhouses.
Now, says the 63-year-old retired high school counselor, "I feel infinitely safer."
Like an ever-growing number of residents in Maryland and elsewhere, she feels that way thanks to the modern-day alternative to moats. Guarded gates and fences encircle her neighborhood of Greene Tree and keep the outside world out -- or more precisely, the parts of it nobody living behind the gates wants in.
At Greene Tree in Pikesville, Ms. Sellman thinks fences indeed make good neighbors.
To many like her, living behind gates and fences, in some cases with roving security patrols and surveillance cameras, provides a sense of security they say they couldn't find elsewhere. Crime -- and the perception that it is becoming more uncontrollable -- is prompting many to seek refuge in such communities. There are more than two dozen of them in the Baltimore metropolitan area, many with homes under construction.
To builders and developers, the closed, typically private communities represent a potential gold mine of largely untapped, but mushrooming demand as security concerns spread to the suburbs. Not only can they sell security, builders say, they can sell the instant prestige that comes with a gatehouse.
Homebuyers say they're also drawn to the numerous services and amenities in most of the developments -- everything from grounds and street maintenance to tennis courts, swimming pools and playgrounds. For all that -- and tight security -- 'N residents often shell out more than $200 a month in condominium fees or close to $1,000 annually to a homeowners' association.
Builders have found an especially strong market among empty-nesters and single buyers, especially women, said Robert Lucido, president of Builders 1st Choice, a sales and marketing agency representing homebuilders in Baltimore, Washington and Virginia. Despite the higher costs, more and more developments will likely be designed with gates, he said. Mr. Lucido represents several, including Arborview Condominiums in Harford County and Moorings on the Magothy, $200,000 garage townhouses in Arnold.
"It's definitely a selling point," agreed Mary Miller, a sales manager with Rocky Gorge Communities, builder of Grey Rock, a development of brick and stucco townhouses and condominiums set beyond a pond and grassy field off busy Reisterstown Road. At the bottom of the road leading to the community sits a guardhouse, flanked by a stone and iron fence. "It will keep out traffic. People aren't going to be able to use this as a pass-through. It's a deterrent to keep cars out of here -- and nuisance peddlers."
A guarded gatehouse also will elevate the community's status, say developers, who plan more than 200 homes in less than three years, priced from $134,000 to $260,000.
It shows "we're at a different level, a more upscale community," Ms. Miller said. "Any upscale community now would have to be gated. That's what makes it upscale."
At Greene Tree, from evening to early morning, residents must drive past a guard at the Hooks Lane entrance or activate a gate with a coded card. Only residents with cards can use a second, gated entry way. Visitors must approach the guard.
"Some would say that's a fortress mentality, but we don't have that at all," said Fred Schutzman, a neighbor. "I don't feel like a prisoner."
Neither does Alice Levin, who moved to Greene Tree with her husband from a suburb of single-family homes. In the old neighborhood, she never considered a nighttime walk. Now, with the guards, fence and iron gates -- and her own home and car alarms -- she feels liberated.
"The guard here lets no one in unless you've called him or he calls," she said. "There are no transients. I've come in at eight or nine at night and people are out walking."
Residents of Annen Woods, a development of 600 apartments (( and townhouses just outside the Beltway northwest of the city, say the system of posting a guard part-time at one of two gated entrances works well, even when the guard is off duty.
"When people come though who don't belong, [residents] usually alert someone, and they are asked to leave," said resident Stanley Alpert, an attorney. "Or if someone walks in, they're asked what their business is or who they're visiting."
While homeowners in gated communities enjoy the sense of security, some sociologists, planners and other critics see the migration to closed communities as one more example of Americans trying to escape problems instead of solving them.
"The more you retreat behind gates, the less likely you are to provide universal mutual protection," said Edward J. Blakely, dean of the School of Urban Planning at the University of Southern California. He is studying whether gated communities restrict residents' notions of citizenship.
"We're finding in some instances a reluctance to participate in communitywide activities," Mr. Blakely said. "You've paid to avoid those problems."
Matthew E. Brown, an associate with the urban planning firm LDR International in Columbia, similarly views such designs as "a reaction to an urban problem, but not a solution to a problem. It creates a concentration of incomes and classes. Gated communities, whether suburban or urban, are creating a feeling of exclusiveness."
About 30,000 developments nationwide are gated, according to a survey of community associations by architect and urban planner Oscar Newman, president of the New York-based Institute for Community Design Analysis, and community association specialists.
An institute building feasibility study of the New York, New Jersey and Connecticut market revealed, to Mr. Newman's surprise, that the 50 newest developments were gated, and that although they were priced 30 to 50 percent higher than nongated ones, they were selling briskly.
"Almost every new subdivision we encounter is being built this way," Mr. Newman said. "It is an increasingly common phenomenon. . . . And it's occurring in suburbs where you have the least crime. Middle and upper-income [homeowners] are not reassured by having one-tenth of the crime -- they don't want any crime. Usually both adults are working away from their houses and feel very vulnerable to burglary and don't want their kids coming home to potential crime."
Just last month, MacKenzie/O'Conor, Piper & Flynn announced plans to develop a gatehouse subdivision with 30 single-family lots on 70 acres along Falls Road in Brooklandville, responding to buyers' demands. Anton Woods, off Park Heights Avenue, recently hired its own security patrol after residents were unable to persuade Baltimore County to privatize the streets so residents could close the entrance.
In Overlook, northeast of Timonium, owners of 48 Tudor-style, custom mansions perched on sprawling lots pay $700 a year to keep auto traffic out and streets maintained. To get into the private, secluded community, residents punch a keypad code. Police and fire officials have their own access codes.
"It can be a little inconvenient when guests come in if they don't know the code, or if the operator calls the wrong number," said homeowner Douglas A. Strouse, 43, recalling that one neighbor "had a priest coming for Easter and he couldn't get in and drove home, but that happens very infrequently. Unfortunately, in today's society you have to do these things."
About once a year, during community association meetings, "There are always people who vote the gates be taken down, but the majority of people like it," Mr. Strouse said. "It's a little more security, mainly to deter traffic. What is safe nowadays? We're relatively isolated, but we're really not. We're five minutes from the Beltway."