The 886 acre Belle Mead Depot was activated in April 1942. It had 45 miles of railroad track, 14 warehouses and seven million square feet of indoor and outdoor storage space. During World War II 5,000 tons of equipment was moved in and out of the depot daily and it had a civilian workforce of over 2,500. At various times Italian and German POWs worked in the depot. In 1958 it was acquired by the General Services Administration, which used the depot for the storage and distribution of federal supplies until it closed in 1991. In 2009 a portion of the site was sold to Somerset County for recreation and conservation purposes.