Taking cues from 1980s-style office parks, UMD is forging ahead with the next phase of M-Square (see interactive map) – its suburban office complex steps from College Park’s metrorail Green Line station. Not only does the proposed three 150,000 square foot building, 1,114 parking space development ignore its relationship to the Green Line, it fails to acknowledge a planned Purple Line light rail station directly at its front door. The plan misses or puts off indefinitely several opportunities to make critical pedestrian, bicycle, and vehicle connections in the area. The College Park City Council will discuss the plan in Tuesday’s work session and the Prince George’s County Planning Board will hear the application March 8th.

While the proposal conforms to the 1997 College Park-Riverdale Transit District Development Plan (TDDP), it stands in direct contradiction to the University’s sustainability goals. The design is completely legal and within the bounds of current zoning, but it abandon’s UMD’s moral obligation to Prince George’s County, College Park, and Riverdale. UMD should immediately remove this detailed site plan from consideration and wait for the completion of TDDP update (which will begin this summer) and M-NCPPC Purple Line TOD Study. According to M-NCPPC, these studies seek to address several issues confronting this area of town:

• Most of the properties near the station are within the Aviation Policy Area (APA) 6 portion of the College Park Airport, and are subject to certain height and notification requirements.
• Existing and proposed development in the M Square research park is not transit oriented or supportive, and lacks cohesive pedestrian- and transit-friendly design.
• Federal tenants (FDA, NOAA, Center for Advanced Study of Language) require secure compounds detrimental to pedestrian and bicycle connectivity.

See the current M-Square Master Plan HERE.

The Development Update is a bi-monthly newsletter prepared by the City of College Park Planning, Community and Economic Development Department covering development activity in the City. This edition features updates on the Maryland Book Exchange redevelopment, Domain at College Park, Cafritz Property, and The Varsity. If you have any questions or would like to subscribe, please feel free to contact Michael Stiefvater at (240) 487-3543 or mstiefvater@collegeparkmd.gov.

The College Park Development Update is a bi-monthly newsletter prepared by the City of College Park Planning, Community and Economic Development Department covering development activity in the City. Please feel free to distribute this information as you see fit. Questions or comments can be directed to Economic Development Coordinator Michael Stiefvater at (240)487-3543 or msteifvater@collegeparkmd.gov.

The University of Maryland and Lockheed Martin Corp. last Friday announced a new partnership that would potentially help fill more research and office space at the M-Square research park. The Fortune 500 global security company and the university have ties that go back 60 years. Lockheed Martin has committed to spend $1 million dollars per year for three years with the possibility of continued support in the future.

The new agreement provides a strategic framework for current and future cooperation that leverages the resources, talent, and ideas of both institutions to produce innovative solutions for global and national security challenges. The agreement provides for work in three key areas: Centers of Collaboration, Joint Pursuit of Business Opportunities, and Enhanced Research and Development.

It is currently unknown if the partnership will require space at UMD’s M-Square research park. There are three additional buildings that have not broken ground yet. The key focus areas in the partnership would be a perfect fit at M-Square.

Officials say a key part of the new strategic relationship is the creation of Centers of Collaboration, which will support sustained cooperative work in mutually agreed-upon areas – initially logistics and sustainment, climate change, and cyber-security.

Current tenants at M-Square include the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity organization, Joint Institute for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, Earth System Science and Interdiciplinary Center, and the American Center for Physics to name a few.

The Gazette is reporting on a new 5,000 square foot Food Safety lab to be in place in the Patapsco building by July of 2011. This is a  joint venture with the Waters Corp. and the University.  The Patapsco location is ideal for a lab such as this since it is directly next to the FDA Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition building.  Scientists will attend two-week training sessions at the new lab which will be called the International Food Safety Training Laboratory (IFSTL).

About 200 foreign scientists will be taught there annually by members of the Joint Institute for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, a collaborative program between the university and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The lab will have a staff of five full-time workers.

The $4 million investment from Waters will build and equip lab as well as help design the program. Waters is a manufacturer of food safety equipment and its investment is crucial to the success of the project.

“Exporting lab-based food safety expertise to other parts of the world will help protect the health of U.S. citizens, as well as people in other countries.  Moreover, bringing hundreds of trainees to Maryland helps support our regional economy.”

Brian Darmody, the associate vice president for research and economic development at the University of Maryland and president of the Association of University Research Parks.

This new Lab is part of a effort to cluster groups of scientific research together. The three areas of technology the clusters focus on are;

• Language and National Security
  • Center for Advanced Study of Language (CASL)
  • National Foreign Language Center (NLFC)
  • Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA)
• Environmental and earth sciences, weather prediction, and global climate change
  • National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) As of June 2010 this is still unfinished due to bankruptcy proceedings.
  • The University of Maryland/Pacific Northwest National Lab Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI)
  • Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center (ESSIC)
• Food Safety and security
  • United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS)
  • UM/FDA Joint Institute for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (JIFSAN)
  • UM Center for Food, Nutrition and Agriculture Policy (CFNAP)
  • Food and Drug Administration Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN)

More details here