Ft. Meade confronts transportation challenge
Bert Rice, director of transformation at Ft. Meade, who says the construction is nearly complete. Now, as he tells Federal News Radio, it\'s time to focus on the...
By Suzanne Kubota
Senior Internet Editor
FederalNewsRadio.com
Even from before the moment the Defense Information Systems Agency’s new Ft. Meade headquarters opened last month, the traffic challenges associated with the move have been a worry for the agency. RealyBizNews reports the director of DISA, Lt. Gen. Carroll Pollett, acknowledged his concerns addressing the ceremony, “even mentioning his regret that a local chaplain couldn’t make it to the function on time due to being held up in traffic.”
Other than hoping for divine intervention in the form of funding for local road improvements, Bert Rice, the director of transformation at Ft. Meade, told Federal News Radio there are things commuters moving in from DISA, the Defense Adjudication and the Defense Media Activities can do to help ease the congestion.
Carpooling, van pooling, telework, alternate work schedules, compressed work schedules, use of mass transit. We have a shuttle now, that we started in January of this year, from and to the Odenton MARC (Maryland Area Regional Commuter) Station. That is working very well, so that if people use MARC to the Odenton station, they will have a ride from there to their place of work.
Rice said there are internal shuttles crossing the installation. “So they can help themselves and help us at the same time if they will consider some other ways of getting to Fort Meade other than a single occupancy vehicle.”
The completion of the move by mid-September deadline is a given, said Rice. “There’s no question about that.” The question, according to Rice, is how much ahead of the deadline the move will be. Right now, he said, the schedule indicates completion of the move by the end of August.
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