The Cross Street Market, a historic marketplace built in the 19th century, continues to serve residents and is the primary social and commercial hub for the neighborhood.

As of late 2016, the City of Baltimore has entered into an agreement with Caves Valley Partners to renovate Cross Street Market.

[5] The primary business district is bounded by Montgomery, Ostend, Light, Charles and Hanover Streets, and is home to a large number of restaurants of a wide range of taste, quality, and price, and many small shops as well as a few larger, more practical stores.

The western portions of the neighborhood are within walking distance of the Hamburg Street and Camden Yards stops on the Baltimore Light Rail.

The Charm City Circulator is a free bus system that services central Baltimore and consists of four separate routes.

On occasion a part of a tunnel will collapse causing the need to infill the area if the depression is near the surface of the edges of the hill.

The hill itself was given the name in 1789 after serving as the location for the end of a parade and a following civic celebration of the ratification of the new "Federal" constitution of the United States of America.

A large flag, a few cannons, and a small Grand Army of the Republic monument remain to testify to this period of the hill's history.

Many of the industrial jobs, particularly in the shipyards and factories along the south shore of the Patapsco River, which had long provided the main source of employment for neighborhood residents were in the process of disappearing.

[9] The investment and growth throughout downtown and especially at the Inner Harbor through the 1980s and 1990s only increased the popularity of Federal Hill living over the decades following the initial reinvestment period.