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A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

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Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#121

Post by kylec »

matsemann wrote: post #36

I'd wish they were a bit more futuristic than having 9000 parking spaces. Why not offer buses from where their employees live or other means of transportation? It's easy to say that most people drive, but that's only because everyone always make that the most convenient mode of transportation. With some effort something else could be even more convenient.

Its employees live all over the South Bay. I don't see how you'd provide bus service that services thousands of residents over hundreds of square miles. Most people would still need to drive, and perhaps even people serviced by Apple buses would still choose to drive. I know I would.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#122

Post by asimpletune »

jonknee wrote: post #119
asimpletune wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely agree with your car comment, and to that point would temper that statement by cautioning not to throw the baby out with the bath water. Cars are, presently, an unavoidable fact of life. This is a shame, but all else considered it's the best possible outcome with the present circumstances. Things will improve however, one day. About the open office plan, I don't think that's the case at all. I don't know…

> Cars are, presently, an unavoidable fact of life. This is a shame, but all else considered it's the best possible outcome with the present circumstances. Things will improve however, one day. Indeed, I am currently looking out my window at several Amazon office towers that most employees didn't drive to.

That sounds wonderful, a similar situation here in SF.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#123

Post by Analemma_ »

matsemann wrote: post #36

I'd wish they were a bit more futuristic than having 9000 parking spaces. Why not offer buses from where their employees live or other means of transportation? It's easy to say that most people drive, but that's only because everyone always make that the most convenient mode of transportation. With some effort something else could be even more convenient.

You're underestimating how much people love their cars. I formerly worked at Microsoft (the Redmond campus), which bends over backwards and does pretty much everything possible to keep people from driving to work. They have company shuttle buses, they give you a free card for public transit (and Seattle's is pretty good, compared to the Bay Area's), they pay you a bonus for using carpools/vanpools, and they have bike storage and showers and pay for bike expenses. They still need acres of parking garages, which are full every day. People like driving, and there's only so much the company can do about it.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#124

Post by m0llusk »

matsemann wrote: post #36

I'd wish they were a bit more futuristic than having 9000 parking spaces. Why not offer buses from where their employees live or other means of transportation? It's easy to say that most people drive, but that's only because everyone always make that the most convenient mode of transportation. With some effort something else could be even more convenient.

Most of their employees prefer to drive themselves to work. Trying to force that to change is not their agenda.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#125

Post by dntrkv »

jshevek wrote: post #93
asimpletune wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, how can you say that? There is absolutely nothing but love put into this building. Jobs spent his last years on earth dedicated to it, to every single last detail, because he wanted a home for apple, a real home. It's easy to be cynical, but I think it's hard and therefore admirable to rise above that tendency when something truly beautiful and genuine comes along. Now I don't blame you for feeling that way…

Easy to be cynical, hard to admire? No. It's easy to be a fanboy, hard to take an honest look at how this is just a prettier beehive for the drones.

What is with this cynicism? Bay area tech "drones" are some of the luckiest workers in the world. I work at a pretty average tech company here in the bay and every day I am amazed at how good I have it. I get paid multiple times the country average, I live in a beautiful city, I take at least a month off per year, I work with awesome people on fun projects using cool, new tech. Jesus, what more could you ask for? Most people I know here in the bay feel similarly yet here on HN I only see this cynicism.

Here we have a company that goes way out of their way to build a ridiculously cool campus for their employees and the top comment is talking about how it's no different from what we see in Office Space. Jesus christ are you all really that jaded?

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#126

Post by stephencanon »

teniutza wrote: post #108
chris_7 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple makes employees pay for the company cafeteria.

Ok, on a certain economic level it does make sense to not offer free food for thousands of people. I would expect, however, that a decent meal would not cost as much as it would in a downtown restaurant/café. Are there any infos on prices and food quality?

The food is quite good (better than Google's, by my taste, though reasonable people may disagree), and partially subsidized. Lunch runs you ~$8-12 (typical casual lunch prices for the Bay Area, but with better quality).

Also many of the individual orgs within Apple do have free snacks for their teams; it's not a campus-wide thing.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#127

Post by jonknee »

Someone1234 wrote: post #103
jonknee wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still a car focused suburban office park with an open office floor plan... No amount of love is going to change the fundamentals.

I agree with your car point. The problem is we current have three choices: - Cars - "Company Store"-style housing (e.g. get fired, get made homeless) - Good public transport. The third option is obviously the best but it is outside of any single company's control. To get good quality public transport the entire city (or cities) need to be onboard, invest sometimes billions of dollars, and likely run it at a near loss…

Or a fourth option of not building an office for 12,000 people in a suburban area. It's literally across the street from single family homes and there is not a tall building anywhere close to the campus.

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#129

Post by Someone1234 »

Denzel wrote: post #60
poslathian wrote: post #33

5B for 13k employees - that's ~$384,000 in construction costs per head, operating and maintenance expenses are perhaps 5% of that annually (maybe more!) - taken together this is an office building that's costing apple ~$3500/head/mo . It's a beautiful office, but seriously? Avg apple cash comp is what, 12500/mo? 3500 is almost 30% of that!

Except it makes more sense to depreciate over the useful life of the building (standard: 50 years) which brings you to a more reasonable ~$8k/year/employee cost of building use.

> standard: 50 years

According to this study[0] 50 years is the maximum lifespan of a commercial building, not the standard. Over 50% of demolished steel commercial buildings were under 25 years old.

[0] PDF: http://cwc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/DurabilityService_L...

Re: A Look Inside Apple’s New Campus

#130

Post by justinator »

MattRogish wrote: post #63
timc3 wrote: post #19

I am wondering why I find it kind of odd that it doesn't have a childcare center.

I was talking with a friend about this, that works at a big SV company that is known for high comp. Why don't they have a child care facility? Surely they can afford it! His response was - paraphrasing - "What happens if someone quits, or is fired? In SV/SF, waits for child care facilities can easily take 6-12 months. If someone is terminated from our company, the last thing we want for them to do is have a crisis ab…

> Why don't they have a child care facility?

That decision was made by a man?

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