The statistics translate into a half-day beehive of activity when the farmers arrive with their loaded trucks, collapsible tables and green shade umbrellas.
"The only reason I haven't been selling out earlier is that I've been bringing so much more," said Joseph Bartenfelder, who sells produce at his Preston farm on the Eastern Shore and is also a member of the Baltimore County Council. "I think people are staying closer to home this summer and that that they are scared by all the produce shipped in over great distances."
While Baltimore's principal farmers' market opened downtown on a Sunday in the 1970s, its typical audience - sandwiched under the Jones Falls Expressway - has enlarged this season. Its organizers say that it has been crowded since opening this year in June.
As bells at the nearby Zion Lutheran Church call worshipers to service, market shoppers overlook the gritty setting under the highway to spend a couple of hours lining up for coffee and breakfast items. The tote bags bulge with fruit, vegetables, cut flowers and plants. This sprawling market stretches from Gay Street northward.
The downtown market's organizers note increased numbers of downtown dwellers residing in the Harbor East and other adjacent areas, but they also credit other issues.
"People are aware of the carbon footprint," said Carole Simon, who coordinates the Downtown Farmers' Market. "They look at a tomato and know it was just picked off a vine and that it was not gassed to make it appear red."
Organizers say food safety is driving the success of the markets.
"I simply feel very comfortable shopping here because everything is fresh," said Juanita Sowell, who lives in Charles Village and walks to the Waverly market. "You know what you are getting."
Janna Howley, whose Farmfresh group organizes markets in Washington's Dupont Circle, as well as St. Michaels, Annapolis and Silver Spring, says her organization counts attendance - which is not done in Baltimore. In 2006, her markets attracted 150,000. Last year, attendance increased to 170,000.
Participants at the Waverly market, open for five hours Saturday mornings, see this summer as a boom year.
"Our sales this summer are almost double what they were last year," Umbarger said this week. "After a national ground beef scare last winter, I sold more ground beef than ever. I almost ran out."
