Employees at the National Science Foundation will have a little more elbow room to do science stuff.

Two buildings are under development to serve as a 600k SF HQ for the NSF in Alexandria. The General Service Administration has reached a deal to expand the NSF’s lease at one of the buildings at 2415 Eisenhower Ave by 14k SF, GlobeSt reports.

The expansion was not free of wrangling between the GSA and the American Federation of Government Employees, which had raised concerns about space allocation for employees set to be relocated to the new digs. Initial plans called for 120 SF offices for more than a 1,000 employees, and 64 SF cubicles for a shade over 400. With over 2,000 employees scheduled to relocate, the union expressed a desire for larger offices and cubicles.

The NSF HQ is scheduled to deliver later this year moving from its current HQ in Ballston. The two-building property was bought last year by Jamestown, which is aggressively trying to find a tenant to fill the hundreds of thousands of square feet being vacated. The NSF's new site is just across the street from 2461 Eisenhower, which was acquired by David Rubenstein’s real estate company for $58M last September, with an eye towards a large-scale renovation project. [GS]