Nice article, but the jab at Jefferson is completely inane. Soooo many other nascent societal/cultural forces at work in the 1800s/early 1900s that coalesced into the suburban office park. Without knowing the context of the quote, it seems even Jefferson was off in directly equating corruption with the centerpiece of human civilization. It's also a seemingly colloquial letter to a friend. I'm also probably reading too much into this now.
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
#12> 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…
Marriott International plans to relocate within the general area, though it seems the exact location is still up in the air, with a focus on somewhere more urban and accessible via public transit.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/digger/wp/2015/03/01/marr...
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#13Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
I'm betting they're using smaller offices closer to downtown or urban centers. Mainly because I can't imagine the same large scale offices being cheap for any company downtown.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#14> 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."
I suspect it is driven partly (mostly?) by a reduction in square footage per employee, as a cost-cutting measure. Companies either downsize the space without downsizing their workforce, or do not upsize their space when hiring after they downsized both workforce and space during the recession.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#15Even Silicon Valley has these abandoned SOPs, just look at South San Jose. Most of these offices have been vacant for years.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#16I would love to see stats on where these companies are moving to. Are many of them transitioning into remote teams? Did some go out of business? Are they moving elsewhere?
Does anyone have stats on this?
New business formations are on the decline (http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/009854.html) and more businesses are closing shop each year than are forming (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/05/05/u...).
Are these some of the reasons we are seeing vacant commercial buildings in a lot of areas?
"I think, as with many other things, our younger folks are more inclined to be Metro-accessible and more urban"
I do believe that to be true. I wonder if some of these can be turned into more modern co-working spaces that can be rented by the desk. Add a coffee shop, gym, etc into them and I think they would appeal to the younger generation, smaller service type businesses and start-ups. Just a thought.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#17> 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 US Federal government is not shrinking and they are not moving into cities.
If you were the newly confirmed head of the Fish and Wildlife Service would you want to stay in some dingy, 30 year old office building, or build a brand new office farther out from the city?
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/breaking_ground/2015/0...
5 of the 6 highest average income counties in the US are in the suburbs and exurbs around Washington DC:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-income_countie...
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#18> 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…
Here in Raleigh/Durham, home of Research Triangle Park, a business park that historically housed IBM, GSK, and tons of other big companies, and which was founded to take advantage of the three major universities: NC State, UNC and Duke, by locating itself in the middle of all three (and next to none), we are seeing many companies build large downtown office buildings in Raleigh, rather than The Park. These include RedHat and Ipreo.
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#19Thomas 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 p…
I agree with part of your post, but not all of it. Subsidies and zoning laws? Definitely. Suburban land was cheap, automobiles and fuel were cheap, hence Suburbia. The post-war US economy was booming, so you had families with higher-than-now purchasing power.
Are people moving to cities because fuel and automobiles are more expensive compared to stagnant incomes? In some cases. It probably also helps that people value their time more (commute time/distance to services and social venues) and that there are more opportunities for work in cities than suburban and rural areas.
I am curious to see what happens with remote work; I see a big push happening right now, at least in the tech sector. Not everything can be done remotely, but if the advantages are truly great enough, companies will compete against each other to hire quality remote workers (who can live anywhere its convenient for them).
Re: The old suburban office park is the new American ghost town
#20> 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 US Federal government is not shrinking and they are not moving into cities. If you were the newly confirmed head of the Fish and Wildlife Service would you want to stay in some dingy, 30 year old office building, or build a brand new office farther out from the city? http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/breaking_ground/2015/0... 5 of the 6 highest average income counties in the US are in the suburbs and exurbs a…
So...they're moving from these office parks...to other, more distant office parks?