U.S. Geological Survey finds its way to UMBC

The research park at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County is getting its newest tenant in the form of a federal geological research agency, set to occupy the park's third building, a $4.2 million facility to break ground this summer.

The one-story, 23,500-square-foot building will house the United States Geological Survey Maryland-Delaware-D.C. Water Science Center, with which the university's researchers have collaborated over the years in analyzing the region's water resources and how to preserve them.

Columbia-based Corporate Office Properties Trust is the UMBC Research Park Corporation's partner in developing the facility, and has reserved the right to add a second, four-story, multitenant building in the future on bwtech@UMBC's 41-acre campus.

Hydrologist Claire Welty, director of the university's Center for Urban Environment Research and Education, said collaboration between the school and the federal agency should flourish once they become neighbors.

And before the deal even was finalized, she added, rumors of it have helped in earning federal grant money from agencies like the National Science Foundation.

“This has been in the making for quite some time,” she said. “I think that's been helpful in building some of our new programs. It has a lot of meaning to funders.”

The move holds meaning for the Water Science Center's 60 employees as well, Welty said. The researchers, who have been working out of a strip mall in White Marsh, will have an entire building of their own, complete with state-of-the-art labs, when the facility opens in 2007.

The current office “is not an optimal place for these scientists to be,” she said. “Moving to a campus with academics should be a huge boost.”

James M. Gerhart, director of the Water Science Center, said in a statement he expected the new proximity to give birth to new partnerships with UMBC, and give each party access to the other's resources.

“I am confident that the move of USGS to UMBC will be a win-win situation,” Gerhart said in a statement.

Like the region's other academic research parks, bwtech@UMBC's mission in part is to foster partnership between its researchers and public or corporate tenants.

The park's second building includes space for researchers from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, who collaborate with UMBC scientists.

So far, 36 UMBC faculty members are working with the park's tenants on various projects, as are 100 students and 54 alumni.

Another University System of Maryland campus research park embarked on a new federal partnership yesterday, as the M-Square Research and Technology Park at the College Park campus hosted the groundbreaking of a new center for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA.

The 268,762-square-foot center, to open in 2008, will host 800 employees of NOAA's Satellite and Information Service, Air Resources Laboratory and the National Centers for Environmental Prediction, an office of the National Weather Service.