Bob Keith, a well-known activist on mass transit issues, was found dead Tuesday at his Fells Point home Tuesday, according to close friends. He was 78 and was undergoing treatment for emphysema.

Keith was a member of the Red Line Advicory Council and a persistent critic of the Maryland Transit Administration's plans for the east-west transit line. He was a familiar sight at Red Line hearings and meetings, where he would appear in nobviously fragile health, using a walker and portable ventilator but contest issues as vigorously as if he were a 20-year-old with excellent prospects of using the proposed line.

Fellow transit advocate Gerald Neily said he knew Keith as "a great and tireless champion for Baltimore."

"I got to know him, first when I was at the Baltimore City Planning Dept. working on Fells Point issues, and then working together with him as citizens," Neily said. "He was always creatively, intelligently and open-mindedly looking and advocating for better ways of doing things, and he always truly appreciated that which is great about Baltimore, and I will really miss him"

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