URGENT: Make your Voice Heard to Save the COMSAT Laboratories Building!
Have you used your cell phone lately? Have you had occasion to employ a GPS (global positioning system) to find your way? You can thank COMSAT (Communication Satellite) laboratories. Established by an act of Congress as a public-private partnership in 1962, it was responsible for launching the first commercial satellite into geostationary orbit. Now there are more than 12,000 of them circling the earth.
In 1969 a set of buildings, designed for the purpose of scientific research and collaboration by the world-renowned architect Cesar Pelli, was constructed in Clarksburg, Maryland. The site was chosen, as was the Atomic Energy Commission in Germantown, to be far enough away from Washington, D.C. to withstand a nuclear bomb – it was during the “Cold War.” The iconic silver and glass space-age looking complex is visible from I-270, on the east side, just south of the Clarksburg exit.
The COMSAT Laboratories building is currently threatened with demolition as it is privately owned by a developer and was denied placement on the County Master Plan for Historic Preservation by the Planning Board, despite being National Register eligible and endorsed by the County Historic Preservation Commission as well as by Montgomery Preservation and many other organizations.
A public hearing by the Montgomery County Council is scheduled for January 21 at Rocky Hill Middle School in Clarksburg (22401 Brick Haven Way). The Council can override decisions made by the Planning Board as it is an elected body. The announcement of the public hearing can be found here: https://montgomerycountymd.granicus.com/MetaViewer.php?view_id=169&clip_id=18433&meta_id=208592.
Please send your plea for the preservation of the COMSAT laboratories building to the County Council before Jan. 20 at: https://www2.montgomerycountymd.gov/CCL_ContactForms/ContactCouncil.aspx with the subject Clarksburg Gateway Sector Plan. Send an additional copy of your letter to the councilmember representing the district that COMSAT is in – Marilyn Balcomb: councilmember.balcombe@montgomerycountymd.gov.
You can sign up to testify in-person or virtually here: https://eventactions.com/eareg.aspx?ea=Rsvp&invite=ge1gd33dcsszuyv47tgw0uk4bz9kvk977szta3sge3wgfxppyvub.
Or call 240-777-7803.
Click here for a sample letter. Use all of the points, or any you choose. Please share this with your organization’s members and anyone you believe will support the preservation of COMSAT.
YOUR VOICE WILL COUNT!
The entire Clarksburg Gateway Sector Plan, including the HPC report, can be found here: https://montgomeryplanning.org/planning/communities/upcounty/clarksburg/clarksburg-gateway-sector-plan/.
More information on COMSAT can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COMSAT or https://www.comsatlegacy.org/COMSATLabsBuilding.html.
Background
MPI testimony in January 2025 helped to convince Montgomery County’s Historic Preservation Commission to recommend designating COMSAT on the Master Plan for Historic Preservation.
In 2006, MPI organized a four-day design charette with architects, planners, and neighbors to demonstrate that the owner’s plans for development could easily share the site with the COMSAT building. The charette was followed with a talk by Mr. Pelli on the impact of this building on his internationally renowned body of work and the work of other architects.
Photo Credit: Tom Vitanza