News 3 Special Report: Bird's Eye View of BRAC

On a cold February morning I met a delegation from Fort Benning for an exclusive flyover of the reservation.  After a debriefing in the hangar, we headed outside to our awaiting Black Hawk helicopter.

Lieutenant Colonel Chris Kennedy, Fort Benning's Operations Officer, was my aerial tour guide.  For an hour and a half I got a bird's eye view of what billions of dollars in BRAC construction looks like.

One of the first areas of construction LTC Kennedy pointed out was on Main Post where Building 4 is being renovated.  It is being transformed into the headquarters of the Maneuver Center of Excellence.

A new building adjacent to it will house what is being called the Future Section which looks at how the Army will fight in the future.  LTC Kennedy points out that these two projects will cost around $150 million.

Major General Robert Brown, Fort Benning's Commanding General, will soon be moving into the new Maneuver Center headquarters.  "People have been very patient with BRAC, all of us.  It's really neat.  It's here, finally!" says Brown.  "When you see the expanse from the air, that's the first thing I think is, thank goodness we did it right so soldiers will go into harm's way as well trained as they can possibly be."

The Harmony Church area is where a huge chunk of the three-and-one-half billion dollar BRAC budget is being spent.  An explosion of growth and construction has resulted in what is now called the new home of the Armor School.

Also located at Harmony Church is the maintenance training complex.  Gen. Brown says, "I just came from Europe last year, and they would have an old tank under a tin shack out in the cold.  Well, we have the engine separate, the systems separate.  They have tremendous facilities, climate controlled.  They can use the latest techonology to learn.  So that young soldier is going to fix that tank right, or that Bradley fighting vehicle.  When he's on the ground in combat and it's gotta be fixed, he'll fix it right."

The simulations training center at Harmony Church houses about $30 million of high-tech equipment.  It's where the tank and Bradley simulators are.  LTC Kennedy calls it probably the biggest simulation facility in the Army.  When the center is complete it will include about 75 simulators.

MG Brown says it costs $300 per mile to operate an M-1 Abrams tank.  Of course, the investment in simulators is expensive up front, but the General says it saves you a lot of money in the long run.

It's hard to grasp just how big BRAC really is, but here's a comparison.  The KIA plant in West Point, Georgia was a one billion dollar investment.  BRAC is over three times bigger.

Soldier facilities aren't the only new things taking shape at Fort Benning:

• More than half a billion dollars has been spent on new home construction and refurbishment.
• Millions of dollars are also being poured into new roads and bridges... 13 new bridges and 140 miles of new roads and trails.

And Gen. Brown says the environment is not being forgotten in the construction process.  "We had a concrete road for tanks to drive on getting to a range, and we had to divert it around a red-cockaded woodpecker colony.  That's the level we go to.  I think you have to.  It's very important."

Soldiers assigned to the armored vehicles will find their training ground on the Fort Benning reservation fit for the task.  "We have a series of ranges and maneuver areas developed for the Armor specifically," says Brown.