The Pentagon is located in Arlington, Virginia. Other than highways, parking lots, and the DC metro it’s most notable neighbors are a lagoon in the Potomac river (built during the Pentagon’s construction) and Arlington National Cemetery. When it was completed in 1943 its 6,600,000 square feet (3,705,793 square feet of usable office space – more than three times the available area in the Empire State building) made it the world’s largest building by floor area.
Today it still ranks as the 13th largest by area. The twelve larger buildings include 21st century multi-purpose buildings, airport terminals, and the Aalsmeer Flower Auction building. The last, which houses the largest flower auction in the world (with 20 million flowers sold each day) is only the fifth largest by floor area, but at 243 acres it has the largest footprint of any single building. Interesting aside, the flowers are sold via a Dutch Auction in which the price starts high and is lowered until the item is purchased or the reserve price is reached.
Ten interesting Pentagon facts.
- Daily workers peaked at nearly 40,000 people during wartime, but roughly 24,000 work there today.
- There are only 8,770 parking spaces, but the Pentagon is host to the busiest subway stop in Virginia and has ample bus service.
- You can quench your thirst at one of 691 water fountains. If you drink too much you can relieve yourself at any of the the 284 restrooms.
- More than 200,000 daily phone calls are made over 100,000 miles of phone lines.
- Laid end-to-end its corridors would stretch 17.5 miles.
- With over 4,200 clocks it’s hard to lose track of time.
- Completed in 1943 (after just 16 months) it’s cost of $83M equates to approximately $1.137B in 2015 dollars.
- For those of you concerned about the Masonic conspiracy; in addition to the Pentagon’s 5 sides, it’s built in 5 concentric rings, each ring has 5 stories, it’s divided into 5 wedges, and its inner courtyard covers 5 acres (interesting aside #2 the Washington Monument is 555 feet tall).
- The cafe in the center of the inner courtyard is known as “Cafe Ground Zero.”
- Despite its immense size no two places in the Pentagon are more than a seven minute walk apart.
(For additional facts and even more detailed information about the Pentagon and its construction please visit Globalsecurity.org)
According to this Washington Post article George Marshall, Eisenhower, and Dick Cheney all got lost in the Pentagon. The key to the seven minute cross-Pentagon trip is understanding the naming scheme.
Navigating the Pentagon
A typical room number looks something like this: 2C127, which corresponds to the second floor, ring C, off of corridor 1, room 27. Pretty straightforward, right? During my service I visited the Pentagon several times. I never got lost. Admittedly as a visitor I was always accompanied by someone who worked in the building.
That brings us to our featured map which illustrates the ring and corridor system of the Pentagon (courtesy of the US Army). I apologize for the fuzziness, but for whatever reason I had a difficult time finding a well labelled and usable map of the Pentagon. Please see the extra Pentagon graphic at the bottom of this post.
As always thanks for reading.
Armen
Note to pay the bills: While the Warders series doesn’t feature the Pentagon, it does feature several maze-like elements ranging from underground cavern complexes to massive ancient ruins. If you’re interested in a James Bond-like thriller in a fantasy setting, then, check out a summary of the series here or find links to purchase books here.
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To make up for the lower quality of today’s map, here’s an extra graphic courtesy of Wikipedia showing the size of the Pentagon relative to other large objects.
Grey = The Empire State Building
Red = The supertanker, Knock Nevis
Pink = RMS Queen Mary 2
Yellow = USN USS Enterprise
Dark Blue = Airbus 380
Green = Federation Starship USS Enterprise (TOS)
