Why? I don't see a reason stated. Does this really help our troops?
You know, they couldn't even get the damn mall completed at Ramstein after about 7 years until it stalled indefinitely, they talked for years of moving the tiny Weather Sqd from Sembach to Ramstein to no avail .
There are so many things wrong with this, but I'll just touch on some of the little things that will cause huge headaches, like the infrastructure in the area.
The traffic alone would be insane. Are they going to widen the A-6, add additional highways too? Have they been to any of the gates at 7:00 am, the line is tremendous, let's add some additional stress for the Docs and Nurse to get to their patients on base. (or make them live in the crappy housing) Unless they plan on adding a new gate entrance and address the pathetic housing, too (ca-ching).
I don't see $400 million covering all that.
And I won't even talk about how this could affect military families on Ramstein.
They can add and improve Lansthul for alot less, it should have it's own location. Just my 2 cents.
I've snipped out a couple of paragraphs that go into some of that, Mrs G. Didn't think the average reader would want the detail, but I encourage you to read the full story.
In general, I think there's nothing wrong with considering combining the facilities before spending $400m on improvements at Landstuhl. That's normal and the fiscally responsible thing to do.
Whether it will end up making sense for all of the reasons you mention (and more) remains to be seen.
I read the article and you're right it is fiscally responsible and it is critical the troops taken by bus for the 15-minute trip to Landstuhl have quicker access to the hospital. However these others issues (traffic, the possible influx of new students at the already crowded Ramstein schools) are forseeable problems, and I hope all is considered. Another clinic on base will help, past firsthand experience, it tooks weeks sometimes longer for military families to get seen.
I'm all for what ever it takes to better treat our wounded I just hope these other issues do not cause problems and delays (common for Ramstein) that could effect them.
All of the insfrastructure issues would absolutely have to be taken into consideration. And they sure aren't trivial. I'd be surprised if this happened, honestly.
As to the bus ride... The patients need to be transported by bus no matter where the hospital is located. I'm not a medical person and could be wrong on this, but I don't think it makes much of a difference if the ride is 10 minutes or 15 minutes.
Commenting by HaloScan
