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Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

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Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#41
post #29

This is in addition to their new giant HQ in SF? Uber has an awful lot of overhead for a taxi company. [1] http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/28/uber-new-hq/

No no they aren't a taxi company. They are a marketplace that matches people selling space in their car with people who need space in a car.

Until they get their self driving cars, and then the are a transportation and logistics company.

But they definitely aren't a taxi company

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#42

Oakland is already an attractive new location for tech companies. It is my sincerest hope that the policy-makers in Oakland see what happened in SF with housing, and are proactive in controlling rent to avoid displacing low-income people and most importantly, the people who contribute to the city's culture.

Because tech workers clearly fail to "contribute to the city's culture."

Culture is usually neither better or worse. Some subsets of cultures promote one thing over another and sometimes some outsiders fetishize some of those things (i.e. non-mainstreamers might fetishize upward mobility, consumerism, etc, mainstreamers might fetishize grit, hard-knock lives, etc. Some mainstreamers believe their culture is fraudulent, as if any culture can be classified as "genuine". Only ossified cultures can be genuine. And Non mainstreamers will, naturally seek to enter the mainstream but with a wish to hold on to the familiar (ie. culture)

People with straight hair want curly and curly haired want straight hair.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#43
post #21
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because that would decrease housing prices. What will happen is homeowners will talk about the need to keep Oakland's character, which is codeword for stopping development of housing to increase home values.

And the renters (like me) will complain that the city (well, the permitting process they approve) is only promoting units for the financially relatively better off and is not subsidizing enough low rent units. So they scuttle low income housing to spite middle income housing.

Why should a city subsidize housing? That seems like something the market should drive primarily. For that same reason, I'm skeptical about whether zoning and permiting are a good thing in general.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#44

I saw teo people shot not far from here, the windows of Obama's campaign HQ smashed in with hammers down the street, and a homeless man crap on the steps of city hall in broad daylight. Welcome to Oakland Uber.

No difference from just around the corner of the Twitter building. This isn't a homeless man crapping problem, it's an insufficient bathroom infrastructure problem, and yes most mid to large size American cities have it. Which is exacerbated by laxative type drugs. 'Hello Alcohol, Hello Heroin, I'm talking to you two.'

Heroin, like pretty much all opioids, is actually the exact opposite of a laxative. Imodium (Loperamide), a common anti-diarrheal, is actually an opioid like heroin, and works by binding to and activating your body's opioid receptors. It just only binds to receptors in your large intestine, so it doesn't get you "high" like other opioids.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#46
post #28
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious, but how does someone get away with stealing a laptop during rush hour? I've lived in Oakland for about 6 months and I haven't seen anything like the crime you describe. Your description of congestion is spot-on, though.

Away from the station. On the sketchy block of Harrison between Grand and the Whole Foods. In the first incident, someone came running at me at full speed holding a laptop bag across his chest; I thought for about 300ms as he ran toward me about putting him on the ground because I thought he was running at me to attack me, but I moved to the side behind a pole and he kept running, then a (very very slow) security gua…

Ugh please stop. So much fake going on. Oakland is just like any city in the last 20 years. Just fine but still remembered for their past.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#47

I saw teo people shot not far from here, the windows of Obama's campaign HQ smashed in with hammers down the street, and a homeless man crap on the steps of city hall in broad daylight. Welcome to Oakland Uber.

No difference from just around the corner of the Twitter building. This isn't a homeless man crapping problem, it's an insufficient bathroom infrastructure problem, and yes most mid to large size American cities have it. Which is exacerbated by laxative type drugs. 'Hello Alcohol, Hello Heroin, I'm talking to you two.'

This might be a nice way to comfort yourself about living not only in CA but in either SF or Oakland, but it's not real life. I've worked in the downtowns of multiple major metropolitan areas, and have never seen anyone defecate in public, nor have I witnessed a robbery.

I was once pressed to buy crack in the Crossroads District of KCMO, but that's pretty much it. I used to walk from Crossroads to Crown Center for lunch and back again every day. Second most eventful walk: a couple of birds swooped down and tried to take some of my hair.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#48

I saw teo people shot not far from here, the windows of Obama's campaign HQ smashed in with hammers down the street, and a homeless man crap on the steps of city hall in broad daylight. Welcome to Oakland Uber.

That never happens in San Francisco.

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#49
post #46
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Away from the station. On the sketchy block of Harrison between Grand and the Whole Foods. In the first incident, someone came running at me at full speed holding a laptop bag across his chest; I thought for about 300ms as he ran toward me about putting him on the ground because I thought he was running at me to attack me, but I moved to the side behind a pole and he kept running, then a (very very slow) security gua…

Ugh please stop. So much fake going on. Oakland is just like any city in the last 20 years. Just fine but still remembered for their past.

Currently #2 in US. Hardly the past.

http://lawstreetmedia.com/crime-america-2015-top-10-dangerou...

Re: Uber shakes up real estate market with massive lease in Oakland

#50
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh please stop. So much fake going on. Oakland is just like any city in the last 20 years. Just fine but still remembered for their past.

Currently #2 in US. Hardly the past. http://lawstreetmedia.com/crime-america-2015-top-10-dangerou...

I'm not even arguing that Oakland as a whole is dangerous; it's specific blocks in the good/high-traffic areas, and then large areas (Oakland is huge geographically) which are bad-but-no-one-goes-there. There's some street crime on top of that, but not actually much more than similar areas in SF. Way more than, say, Salt Lake City, though.

Most of the serious crime in Oakland is in places you won't accidentally go (although there's a sketch area a few blocks away from downtown, and on the other shore of Lake Merritt), by and against poor people, often one or more involved in gangs/drug entrepreneurship/whatever. Same as most cities.

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