Northrop Grumman Should Locate Near Metro
COALITION FOR SMARTER GROWTH
PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
January 5, 2010
Contact:
Stewart Schwartz, CSG, 703-599-6437 (cell)
Linking Smart Growth and National Security
Group Urges Northrop Grumman to Locate New Headquarters at Metro Station Site
Northrop Grumman is the latest Fortune 500 company to propose moving its headquarters to the Washington DC region. The company is also seeking the best taxpayer funded incentives it can get. “We urge Northrop Grumman and area officials to select a Metro station location for the new headquarters,” said Stewart Schwartz, Executive Director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth. “Aside from the many other benefits of such a location, Northrop Grumman would be making an additional commitment to national security.”
Northrop Grumman already has its government relations office centrally located near Metro in Rosslyn. By locating at Metro, Northrop Grumman would be maximizing the number of its employees that can use transit, walk or bicycle to work and to meetings, thus reducing oil consumption. The company should also incorporate a full range of transportation demand management policies including employee transit incentives, carpooling, parking “cash out,” and showers/lockers and racks for bicycle commuters.
“Our dependency on foreign oil and overall high rates of energy consumption threaten our national security and our economic security,” said Schwartz. “Since Northrop-Grumman is in the defense business they can set a terrific example for other employers contemplating moving to or expanding in the region.”
With less than 5% of the world’s population, the U.S. consumes 25% of the world’s oil, with 70% of that going to transportation. Sixty to seventy percent of our oil is imported, much of it from unstable parts of the world. “Smart growth and transit oriented development contribute to reducing our oil dependency and our economic competitiveness,” concluded Schwartz.
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