The Blue Route

The BBN campus in Cambridge is actually a set of interconnected warehouses, plus a newer (relatively) office building built on the former site of a laundromat once located on Concord Avenue. This does not include their sites in Mystic, CT or Arlington, VA.

The buildings are all interconnected, either abutting directly or with enclosed walkways or bridges. They are numbered from 6 (the 7-story office building) down to 1, where the Applied Physics department is located. Arch, the Swarthmore alum who put me in touch with Tom the recruiter, is in that department. Laura, a Swat engineer from the Class of 2003, is currently working for him as a summer intern in between her Masters and Ph.D. programs at MIT. So many Swatties in Boston…

The office building is actually pretty interesting architecturally; since it was designed in the early ’70s, at the peak of anti-Vietnam protests, the building was built to be truck bombproof. There is an open parking garage beneath the building, and the central core is set back from the walls, which on the garage level are supported by large concrete pillars. The first floor has no windows, except at the lobby entrance, and the building is surrounded by a dry moat that is on the same level as the garage. The moat contains only HVAC units. On top of that, there is a slight burm between the moat and the sidewalk along Concord. The only connections are the bridge that crosses to the entrance, and the bridge that connects buildings 7 and 6.

So as to avoid people (employees and visitors) getting lost in the maze of hallways, there is the Blue Route. The hallway that goes from the lobby at 10 Moulton Street, through buildings 4, 5 and 6, past the cafeteria and library in building 3, winds through the upper floor of building 2 (I work in the basement of building 2), through the lobby at 50 Moulton Street between buildings 1 and 2, past the security office, and down the long straightaway to the far end of building 1 is painted blue (I believe the shade is PSC 347, but I’d have to check the Proper Logo Use website) its entire length, as opposed to the off-white (bone? ivory?) hallways elsewhere. I wonder if any of my department’s software could have handled that truly heinous sentence…

I actually have my own office in the cross-lingual question answering group’s work are in the corner of the basement of building 2. Sure, it’s a closet with no windows, but it has enough wall space for my collection of Star Trek posters. And really, all I needed was the desk space for a computer, so I’m certainly not complaining. It allows me to change from bike clothes to work clothes easily, as well.

I’ll find out if I’m allowed to take pictures at work. If so, I’ll be able to snap a few shots of my office. Something tells me that if the Pinkerton Government Security people saw me wandering around with a camera, they wouldn’t be too happy, but on the other hand, I haven’t seen any posted signs saying otherwise, and there’s nothing in the employee handbook. Hmm…


Comments

3 responses to “The Blue Route”

  1. Laura, a Swat engineer from the Class of 2003, is currently working for him as a summer intern in between her Masters and Ph.D. programs at MIT. So many Swatties in Boston…

    Yes, there are. This is Laura Zager, I assume? Say hi for me. :-)

  2. tell her she’s hottt for me.

    if you dare!

  3. Now wait, is she “hottt for you” or that she’s hottt, from you?

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