This spring, the new National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency facility under construction in north St. Louis is getting its finishing touches, including wall finishes, room signage, furniture installation, IT installation, landscaping and more, in anticipation of its opening this winter. 

During this final stretch of the six-year construction project — which began with groundbreaking in November 2019 and included the COVID-19 pandemic — the teams from NGA, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Air Force and contracted partners are working to ensure IT, security and facility systems are integrated and operating smoothly, and the campus is outfitted with the equipment, furniture and decorative features needed to maximize employees’ ability to support NGA’s national security mission. 

Earlier this spring, building systems such as select restrooms and all elevators in the new facility were operational. Furnishings and equipment continued to be staged across the building, including fitness center equipment, dining room seating and a variety of meeting-space furniture. The NGA and USACE onsite teams moved out of the construction trailers and into offices in the facility to manage the project. 

NGA’s IT and security teams have ramped up an extensive installation effort for a robust technology infrastructure that will support NGA’s critical missions, said Darren Guttmann, N2W deputy program director. This includes everything from back-of-house tech center equipment to desktop computers, telephones, audio-visual equipment and business centers, Guttmann said.      

Also being installed on elevator bays and walls throughout the building are decorative wrapping and paint schemes representing sea, land, air and space, to reflect NGA’s GEOINT mission domains and visually mark different floors of the building, easing navigation. Thematic colors range from deep turquoise blues on the lower “sea” level to light grays and yellows on the upper “space” level. Special panels that spotlight special areas of NGA’s tradecraft – from imagery and geography to safety of navigation – also have been placed throughout the building.  
 

Outside, workers have added soil amendments, which are materials that improve a soil’s ability to grow healthy plants, and started planting trees and shrubs. During the spring and summer growing seasons, more landscaping and plantings will be put in place, ultimately resulting in approximately 2,400 deciduous and evergreen trees and approximately 2,400 shrubs, all selected to maximize the outdoor experience at the new campus, said Guttmann. 

To maintain the health of the plantings, about 60,000 linear feet – roughly equivalent of 30 miles — of landscaping irrigation pipeline, with 5,000 sprinkler heads, has been installed throughout the N2W campus grounds.
 

In addition to planted trees and shrubs, the campus will feature19 acres of natural prairie restoration, which will feature native Missouri grasses meant to re-create the area’s original ecosystem.  

At this point in the project, so many disciplines are hard at work, said Guttmann. “On just a single day at the site you may see a painter finishing an area next to an IT technician placing equipment on the desks,” Guttmann said. “Throughout the day we have regular testing of the building systems while outside the landscaping is starting to take shape with hundreds of trees and shrubs being planted.”

Later this summer and fall leading up to move-in, IT and security systems installations will continue. The visitor parking lot containing 350 spaces will be completed, the employee gates will be operational, and a commercial-vehicle receiving facility will be completed.