Fort Belvoir, Va. (Oct. 16, 2014) - A new fire station is being constructed on Fort Belvoir's South Post that will enable the Directorate of Fire and Emergency Services to better serve the installation.
The new station, which should be completed no later than Mar. 13, 2015, will be located at the intersection of Gunston Road and 16th Street on the north side between 16th and 15th streets. It is a result of a new expanded fire capability requirement introduced by the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission.
"We have more firefighters on the installation post-BRAC," said Chris Landgraf, Belvoir Directorate of Public Works, deputy director. "We have a dual response requirement with Fairfax County, too, so if we are closer to an incident off post, we have to respond."
The blueprint for construction is based on a Corps of Engineers Centers of Standardization design, according to Landgraf. The station must meet requirements for total size of parking bays, total number of rooms and square footage for those rooms, break room size and kitchen size.
"It builds and creates a template for how big a footprint you need," said Landgraf. "The facility meets that requirement for a two-company fire station. You can modify the exterior a little bit to meet your requirements, but the interior footprint is standardized to meet Occupational Safety and Health Administration requirements in regard to safety for moving around the vehicles, locker locations, scuba gear storage."
The idea behind the requirement standards is in the event an outside fire unit were to ever need to use the station, according to Landgraf.
"The idea is anybody could work at any fire station. They could drop in here and everything is similar for them to be able to do their job, without any kind of transition," said Landgraf.
The building is oriented so FES personnel can backload from 15th street and can exit out to 16th street. They can go in either direction on 16th street when leaving the station, and are centrally located on the south side of the installation to be able to hit Belvoir and Gunston roads, said Landgraf.
The layout of the new station will allow fire responders to do their jobs more efficiently, according to Frank Hentschel, Directorate of Emergency Services, deputy director.
"The old fire station was difficult to get in and out of," said Hentschel. "The new one will have the new state of the art equipment that can help expedite a fire response."
The exterior of the new station will look similar to the North Post fire station, and will look like some of the buildings around it, considering its location on post, said Landgraf.
"We added elements to make it look more like some of the historic features across the street," said Landgraf.
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