The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
washingtonpost.com
The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
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Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#2> There are 71.5 million square feet of vacant office space in the Washington region, much of it piled in office parks.
> Last year, federal agencies vacated 7,315 buildings, abandoning 47 million square feet of office and warehouse space, Federal News Radio says.
So the amount of vacant space in the area tripled last year, going from 24 million SQFT to 71.5 million SQFT?
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> Another 1 million square feet of office space will flow onto the market over the next seven years, as Marriott International moves out of its Bethesda office park
Where are these companies moving to? Are they moving out of these office parks and into city centers? This article only tells half of the story.
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> With its space-hungry bureaucracies and contractors, Washington became a colossal hive of office parks, especially during years of government expansion — most recently the post-Sept. 11, 2001 period, when the military ramped up and the national-security apparatus spread along the Dulles Corridor.
> The U.S. government hasn’t signed any major leases this year, ... but it maintains 98 million square feet in the District alone (411 million if you throw in Maryland and Virginia).
Is the government portion of this solely from governmental contraction and shrinking of programs?
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#3Saw an article a while ago that about how one of the big retail/office buildings in St Louis has emptied out almost completely, and now there's just a tech incubator sitting on 12 abandoned floors:
http://www.urbanreviewstl.com/2013/07/lots-of-entrepreneursh...
Never can build where there's demand, though.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#4> There are 71.5 million square feet of vacant office space in the Washington region, much of it piled in office parks. > Last year, federal agencies vacated 7,315 buildings, abandoning 47 million square feet of office and warehouse space, Federal News Radio says. So the amount of vacant space in the area tripled last year, going from 24 million SQFT to 71.5 million SQFT? --- > Another 1 million square feet of office…
> Is the government portion of this solely from governmental contraction and shrinking of programs?
Not necessarily. The Department of Defense, for example, has been making a concerted push over the last few years to disperse a bunch of offices that used to all be clustered in the D.C. metro area out across the country at large. As a result, neighborhoods in Northern Virginia like Pentagon City and Crystal City that used to be nothing but endless blocks of government-leased office space have started shifting towards more high-end residential development and the lifestyle businesses that high-end residential development attracts -- trendy restaurants and bars and so forth.
This has led to the somewhat bizarre sight of Crystal City, which was built in the '60s as a sort of dystopian Brutalist Disneyworld of giant, blank office towers connected by a warren of underground tunnels, suddenly looming down disapprovingly on outdoor concerts and tapas joints.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#5Thomas Jefferson is to blame and not one mention of taxes? I would be really surprised that some research wouldn't find that many of these office parks are built outside of the borders of major cities to avoid paying taxes, or were provided incentives by neighbouring municipalities to build further out and pay lower tax. The lower cost is attractive and allows the company to operate in a big shiny building that immediately lends credibility to the company. Further, there is no mention of ample amounts of free parking. I think this article is very lacking, the for lease signs on suburban office parks across much of North America isn't really a mystery.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#6> There are 71.5 million square feet of vacant office space in the Washington region, much of it piled in office parks. > Last year, federal agencies vacated 7,315 buildings, abandoning 47 million square feet of office and warehouse space, Federal News Radio says. So the amount of vacant space in the area tripled last year, going from 24 million SQFT to 71.5 million SQFT? --- > Another 1 million square feet of office…
The article doesn't have any concrete numbers for where companies are moving, but it does offer this:
"People telecommute. People move into the city or into faux-urban areas that are friendlier to pedestrians, that aren’t barnacled on a highway. Younger generations don’t want to be stranded in a “Dilbert” cartoon. They want cozy nooks and nap spaces, walkable commutes, the tastes and conveniences of the city."
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#7> There are 71.5 million square feet of vacant office space in the Washington region, much of it piled in office parks. > Last year, federal agencies vacated 7,315 buildings, abandoning 47 million square feet of office and warehouse space, Federal News Radio says. So the amount of vacant space in the area tripled last year, going from 24 million SQFT to 71.5 million SQFT? --- > Another 1 million square feet of office…
> Is the government portion of this solely from governmental contraction and shrinking of programs? Not necessarily. The Department of Defense, for example, has been making a concerted push over the last few years to disperse a bunch of offices that used to all be clustered in the D.C. metro area out across the country at large. As a result, neighborhoods in Northern Virginia like Pentagon City and Crystal City that…
The DOD also abandoned and tore down a couple buildings in Arlington in order to make space for an expansion of Arlington National Cemetery.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#8On Silicon Valley:
Yet Facebook, Apple and Google — companies that brag about their forward thinking — are trying to reinvent this template of the past. They have commissioned high-profile architects to design versions of the ultimate office park in Silicon Valley, an hour-plus shuttle ride from San Francisco. [...] They will be movable, lightweight structures instead of blocky concrete buildings. Anything to attract brilliant minds and assure employees that they’re living in the future, not a glorified version of the past.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#9> There are 71.5 million square feet of vacant office space in the Washington region, much of it piled in office parks. > Last year, federal agencies vacated 7,315 buildings, abandoning 47 million square feet of office and warehouse space, Federal News Radio says. So the amount of vacant space in the area tripled last year, going from 24 million SQFT to 71.5 million SQFT? --- > Another 1 million square feet of office…
The article doesn't have any concrete numbers for where companies are moving, but it does offer this: "People telecommute. People move into the city or into faux-urban areas that are friendlier to pedestrians, that aren’t barnacled on a highway. Younger generations don’t want to be stranded in a “Dilbert” cartoon. They want cozy nooks and nap spaces, walkable commutes, the tastes and conveniences of the city."
The article does suggest that more people are telecommuting, but given the amount of resistance that all employers have to telecommuting, I'm hesitant to believe. I really doubt that, all of a sudden, tens of thousands of federal employees are working from home.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#10Thomas Jefferson is to blame and not one mention of taxes? I would be really surprised that some research wouldn't find that many of these office parks are built outside of the borders of major cities to avoid paying taxes, or were provided incentives by neighbouring municipalities to build further out and pay lower tax. The lower cost is attractive and allows the company to operate in a big shiny building that immed…
You can also blame subsidies and zoning laws. Free highway and road construction counted as a massive subsidy for sprawl, and zoning laws force sprawl in many cases by outright prohibiting the location of any place of business where people live or any mixed-use development.
Excessive sprawl is not a result of pure free market activity. The 'burbs are heavily subsidized, legally encouraged, and heavily regulated. My personal hypothesis is that the 'burbs served (intentionally or not) as a massive post-WWII work project to employ vast numbers of people in construction and real estate.
(Not necessarily a free market fundamentalist ideologue, but this is one thing you can't blame on them.)
I do agree with the article to a point though. America certainly has a nostalgic preoccupation with agrarian and rural life that has been used to sell the faux-ruralism pastiche of suburbia. It's a contributing factor in that it makes these ridiculous wastelands marketable.