Federal Hill Park

Federal Hill Park is a 10.3 acres park located in Baltimore, Maryland, on the south shore of the city's Inner Harbor. The park is a signature Baltimore landmark and offers visitors prominent views of the city, which is often photographed from the park, looking north to the downtown skyline of skyscrapers, across the Inner Harbor of the Northwest Branch of the Patapsco River / Baltimore Harbor. The Federal Hill neighborhood surrounds the park, to the west and south, and is named for the prominent hill. Federal Hill and a number of adjacent neighborhoods were once commonly known as South Baltimore.

The park's current landscaped hillside, chiefly lawn, was originally jagged cliffs and bluffs of red clay, the latter which was mined in the 18th and 19th centuries after being first sighted and described by Captain John Smith of England on his voyages of exploration of the Chesapeake Bay from the first English colony at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1608.

The park today is bounded by Francis Scott Key Highway (Key Highway / Maryland Route 2) along the waterfront to the north, Battery Avenue to the west, Warren Avenue to the south, and Covington Street to the east.

The City of Baltimore acquired the hill as public property in 1880 after it was used as a fort, and fortified with heavy artillery (Fort Federal Hill) by the Union Army during the American Civil War (1861–1865). It was established at that time as a city park, operated and maintained by the city Department of Recreation and Parks.

A pocket park, Robert Baker Park is located just to west of Federal Hill Park, along the Key highway, commemorating Robert Lewis Baker (1937-1979) — a prominent resident of the Federal Hill neighborhood; chief early activist for Federal Hill and the neighborhoods of South Baltimore. Federal agencies had proposed multi-lane expressways that would severely impact the Federal Hill neighborhood, and drastically impacted Baltimore's character. Ultimately, a National Register of Historic Places Section 106 Review was invoked requiring the Department of Transportation to assess the effect of its actions on historic resources, resulting in a considerable downsizing of the Key Highway at Federal Hill from 14 lanes to four, averting tunnels under Federal Hill Park.