Google Building Tech Center Near Portland

jdray writes "It seems that everyone's favorite search powerhouse, Google, is building a tech center in The Dalles, Oregon. About 45 minutes by interstate highway from Portland, The Dalles is a small, economically depressed city near the world-famous Columbia River Gorge. The $60,000 average annual salary of Google employees is about double the average for Wasco county. With all the outdoor sports (windsurfing, hiking, mountain biking, skiing) in the area, sports-minded geeks should be flocking to apply for a job at the new facility."

45 minutes?!?

[Brian Knotts]

If you drive 120 miles an hour, maybe. It's at mile marker 82 or so. Do the math.

Additional information for slashdotters

[Brian Knotts]

We're all conservative rednecks out here and it's always windy, and we get snowstorms and ice storms.

$$$: Motivation for The Dalles, Oregon

[reporter]

The principal reason that Google's management is building a technology center in Oregon is that building and running such a center in Oregon is cheaper than building and running such a center in Silicon Valley. Similar reasoning applies for why the management chose an economically depressed city in Oregon.

Even now, taxes in California are high, and so is the price of property. Why else would management explicitly build a technology center far away from an elite university like Stanford University or UC-Berkeley?

If more companies would do what Google is doing, then the Californian government will start to lower taxes and to limit the number of legal/illegal immigrants flooding into the state. The latter is the cause of the high prices of apartments and residential homes.

$200,000 gets you an excellent, spacious house in most places in Oregon or Texas. That same $200,000 gets you, barely, a small noisy condominium in Silicon Valley.

I grew up in The Dalles

[Anonymous Coward]

The Dalles is a depressed area that suffers from a heavy criminal activities. Meth labs are common place in the area and meth junkies are prevalent everywhere. The drug has reached epidemic proportions there and I'm amazed google hasn't taken that into considering when deciding where the facility should be located.

Hopefully any geeks that decide to move there are well armed incase of any incidents.

It's a lot cheaper there..

[EvilStein]

"Google, based in Mountain View, California, is expected to pay $1.87 million for the parcel of industrial-zoned land 85 miles east of Portland, with an option to buy three other area sites."

Dude, around here, (Mountain View) 1.87 million will get you diddly squat. 1.87 million for 30 acres near Portland, OR isn't all that bad. That's a beautiful area, not far from Portland or the PDX airport (lots of flights to Seattle and down here to the Silicon Valley every day) and Portland also has a lot of young professional types.

Not a bad move overall. :)

Re:45 minutes?!?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

The Dalles is about 1.25 hours from downtown Portland, I know a lot of people that commute an hour or more up here in Seattle. If you live in the burbs, it's closer. But if I worked in The Dalles, I'd live nearby. Also, The Dalles is not Bumfuck Nowhere, it's a very nice little town near Bonneville Dam, some spectacular vistas in the Columbia River Gorge, and is becoming quite "gentrified" with rich yuppies who are bailing out of the city. It's a two Starbucks town...

Re:Are trees at stake?

[SerialHistorian]

Um. Obviously you've never been there, but I still don't understand why you posted that. There really aren't that many trees in The Dalles. It's mostly prarie-type high plateu... halfway between grassland and desert, and very dry.

Re:Google building a new complex...

[XorNand]

Probably not since that's what they call their existing complex [google.com].

Re:45 minutes?!?

[Anonymous Coward]

My parents live near The Dalles. I went to high school in The Dalles. The Dalles is an economically depressed shithole. However, it is close to good skiing, hiking, mountain biking, and - of course - sail boarding. Hood River is also nearby, which is a much nicer place to live.

Re:$$$: Motivation for The Dalles, Oregon

[cot]

"the number of legal/illegal immigrants flooding into the state. The latter is the cause of the high prices of apartments and residential homes."

Say what now?

What fraction of the homes in california are populated by illegal immigrants? Now, what fraction of the NICE houses? Do you think that most illegal immigrants are taking high paying jobs and moving to Los Altos and Palo Alto and driving up the cost of property? You really think they're having such a dominant effect on the market, or are you just scapegoating?

I'm all for creating and enforcing reasonable immigration laws rather than the current don't as/don't tell open border situation, but someone's gotta pick the lettuce and I'm quite sure that nobody posting here is doing it.

Re:Economics of Bigotry

[cot]

"if there were no illegal immigrants, then the entire American population will starve because no one is picking the vegetables."

This is most certainly not true, but I would think that due to the higher wages required to pay American workers, the cost of food would rise and our overall standard of living would drop.

I have no idea how significant the effect would be just for illegal immigrants into california, but if we decided to stop using any labor from other countries with lower standards of living in areas like manufacturing, we'd see a pretty drastic effect.

But I guess it's cool to have some Asians in a sweatshop someplace far away making our jeans and sneakers, but can't they find a way for Mexicans to work the fields without coming into our country?

Re:45 minutes?!?

[baomike]

I would call it a little nearer The Dalles dam than Bonneville. You may be thinking of Cascade Locks or Hood River.

The Dalles is NOT Portland, it's where the Aluminum smelter is. Weather is diff, it's east of
the moutains, colder, windier, DRYER, etc...
for more on weather see:
http://www.ocs.oregonstate.edu/index.html

Better like rocks and dry grass. If you like wind surfing and snow skiing you are in pretty good shape. Be aware that the gorge in winter can be impassable.

PS the town is called THE DALLES. Makes for strange road signs, ie "DOWNTOWN THE DALLES"," CITY OF THE DALLES"

Re:Oregon = The Anti-Microsoft

[AaronBrethorst]

It's not in Seattle, it's in Kirkland [kirkland.wa.us]. Microsoft is Redmond [redmond.wa.us], and so is Nintendo. Real and Amazon are in Seattle [seattle.wa.us] (as is the Omni Group). Mind you, Redmond and Kirkland are adjaent to each other on the east side of Lake Washington, and Seattle's just on the west side of the lake. Getting to the east side (from downtown/uptown Seattle) takes about 45 minutes during rush hour and 15-20 minutes every other time of day. Meanwhile, the guys from Delicious Monster just sit in a coffee shop [zokacoffee.com] here in Seattle.

is fuckedgoogle.com the anti-slashdot ?

[googisgod]

http://www.fuckedgoogle.com/ [fuckedgoogle.com]

In Slashdot's eyes Google can do no wrong,
and in Fuckedgoogle's eyes Google is going down the well-worn path of dot.com excess and hubris.

Somewhere in the middle is the truth. But fuckedgoogle is a hell of a lot funnier. :)

time to try fuckedgoogle.com? (a real site)

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.fuckedgoogle.com/ [fuckedgoogle.com]

Granted, they are just as one-sided about Google as Slashdot is, except in the OTHER direction. Funny shiat.

Re:$60,000 isn't that much

[GorgeMama]

Greetings from The Dalles! Just wanted to let you know that here 60,000.00 a year is wonderful! The average home here sells for around 75 to 85,000.00.We are a community of ranch sytle home and small farms and orchards.We are famous for our Cherry industry. We have had 3,000 people out of work since the aluminum industry collasped. We have a lot of educated citizens that don't want to leave our great city. We do have a laid back lifestyle and we love what the gorge has to offer.. We do have our problems like other cities, drugs, ect. but on the whole its a great place to raise a family or to retire. We are an hour and fifteen minutes from Portland and the gorge communities have a lot to offer too. Each has its own unique personality. We have a wonderful Community College that has expanded its role in the community in the last few years. Were so proud that Google chose us.