Getting to Market Through Herring Run Park
​Coastal Plain Land Favored Farming
Land in Herring Run Park east of Belair Road is described as a coastal plain. The land is much flatter and the river broader than upstream. A coastal plain is a flat, low-lying piece of land that sits right next to an ocean or a large sea. This area  is typical of a coastal plain, featuring sandy soil, marshes, swamps and wetlands sitting at sea-level.

This land area was conducive to agriculture and early records show many farms in the area that is now called “Gardenville.”

Belair Road was a major transportation route for bringing farm products into the city’s market center.  The so-called “auto lodge “ at Belair and Parkside Drive provided farm families both parking and camp sites for when they brought their harvests from Harford and Cecil counties and northern Delaware into Baltimore to sell at one of the public markets.  See more about the auto lodge here

Herring Run Park was a welcome respite for those who made the journey.
 Sources:  
 Holcomb, The City as Suburb, A History of Northeast Baltimore since 1660, 2008  
 Ferretti, Jennifer A. As Curator for former Maryland Historical Society.