Apple has been pushing for return to office for the last year. If they are finally realizing it, they need to reverse their policies first.
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Apple Pauses Work on Planned North Carolina Campus
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If our area got their stuff together and worked on getting a light rail in place, I'd be all for it. As it is, driving around here is painful enough as it is. Just hire 6,000 people in NC, tell them they can work from home, and save the money air conditioning 700,000 square feet of office space on putting more cool stuff in my iPhone.
Exactly.
It really makes no sense to build anything office related right now. As someone upthread stated, even though Apple has bags of cash to sit on, these projects are typically financed over time. Given the current economic landscape (historically high interest rates, and an extended economic cycle that is due for a correction) it makes no sense to borrow and build anything other than housing right now. Housing being in such short supply. Unlike office space, which is in a glut and will probably be one of the factors that drives the next economic collapse.
From a bean counter standpoint, it makes sense to just sit and wait. Let the economy take a downturn (which is the reason the Fed has pushed interest rates so high, to induce said downturn in an effort to slow inflation) wait for money to be "cheap" again, along with the cost of labor and materials) and complete the project for less.
This really is a snapshot of the consequences of higher interest rates and inflationary pressures on labor and materials. Smaller and larger projects like this are being shelved or postponed in all corners of the US either because costs are too high or larger players are waiting for more favorable conditions to make long term plans.
Sort of basic economics.
Blaming everything on cancel culture is sad.
I might be in the minority but I think in contrast to Cupertino, it would be great for any satellite campuses to be urban. Much in the same vein as Amazon's globes in Seattle but perhaps even more audacious. Why not a supertall in midtown Manhattan for instance?
A ton of people don't ever want to work in offices anymore. These large companies need to stop trying to force back to office. If you want to work in an office, great! If you don't, also great! Just let people work how they want to work. Now if people are under performing in any way, thats a management issue, not a where-you-do-your-work issue.
Lets hope things arent so bad for Apple that the next generation Macbook Air comes with 4GB of RAM.
georgians? sure.
atlantans? absolutely not.
most of us can't wait for the old guard and their mindsets to die off so we can finally start expanding and improving our rail network. even with generational change, those at the top who will inherit the benefits of "just one more lane bro" construction contract kickbacks and auto maker lobbying will still try to prevent expanding fast, reliable, and safe public transit. hell, the atlanta beltline, which was designed and funded to be an alternative transit corridor with light rail is now basically a glorified sidewalk of gentrification where the well-heeled are now trying to prevent rail from being built. the faster way to achieve expanded rail and increase density where appropriate is by adding more people who have higher education, empathetic outlooks, politically centrist views, and are environmentally conscious to the population. if people don't like a city functioning the way a proper city should, they should move to any one of the large suburbs or exurbs that are more in line with their preferred lifestyle.
the average georgian thinks building more rail means unaffordable taxes, more crime, and taking their oversized trucks and SUVs away from them... while sitting in construction traffic for revamped interchanges on a two hour commute in a gas guzzler they have to put $100 in a week while paying road tolls. they fail to realize expanded rail means that those who do choose / need to drive will have less traffic to deal with if those who don't need to can take rail. also, property values increase around rail stations.
microsoft had to press pause on their expanded mixed use campus on the westside of atlanta, but they aren't selling that land due to it's proximity to GA tech, midtown, and a rail station.
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I know it's not the same everywhere in the state. I knew some people from Douglassville who were quite different from the old guard.
When I moved from Philly to Orlando, I started to take trips to see relatives in the midwest via I-75. I would cringe on every trip through Georgia. I spent 2-3 hours in Atlanta traffic. If I stopped for food, I tried to stop near state lines, as I'd seen more dirty restaurants in the state than anywhere else. The whole Southeast needs to move into the 21st century.
Truth is, California is just as bad. Where I am, I hear things that I never expected to hear in a diverse state.
most atlantans forget we live in georgia... until we have to fill up on gas on a trip before leaving or just arriving past state lines 😫😭😖
That was good for quite a laugh. People are flocking to much of the Southeast, including my state of NC, from mostly northern states because they cannot tolerate living in them anymore. The entire South is rising again. Look at a map of net migrations state by state.
Not to mention, Nvidia CEO stated he doesn't care if his workers go into the office or not. He is good w/ remote work. He simply wants the best talent. Pulling worker back has zero to do w/ work but trying to enforce power.
If Apple goes ahead with this development, I'd like to know how many trees they need to cut down to satisfy their need for yet another new campus. Several kilometres of forest will need to be destroyed to support the development. Like all the other Big Tech companies, they pretend to care about the natural environment, but they really don't mean what they say. 🙂
