'Google Buses' Are Bad For Cities, Says New York MTA Official

An anonymous reader writes "The Director of Sustainability for New York's MTA is calling out Google, Apple, and Yahoo for 'deliberately' building their campuses away from public amenities like restaurants, and public transportation. 'With very few honorable exceptions like Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, who recently moved his company headquarters from suburban Henderson to downtown Las Vegas, tech companies seem not to have gotten the memo that suburbs are old and bad news,' he writes. Instead of launching their own bus services to ferry people from the city to their campuses, as the tech companies have done, the Googles and Apples of the world should 'locate themselves in existing urban communities. Ideally, in blighted ones,' says Dutta." Maybe cities just don't have the right mix of amenities, price, space, parking, and other factors to make them better places to put certain businesses.

Ya think so?

[east coast]

So tech companies don't want to be in high crime locations in the middle of neighborhoods that most of their workers wouldn't want to live or send their kids to school? Who woulda thunk it?

I'm already in the suburbs today and if I have to look for a new jobs I'm going to start to look even further from the city I live around. There is zero appeal to working in a city much less living in one.

Re:Ain't no body got time for that

[jeffmeden]

Ummm... people move to the outskirts of a city so their kids don't have to fear getting mugged or shot in crossfire between inner city gangs. You cannot raise children in almost all US cities safely, so virtually any fit parent has to do the suburban thing so the strays the kid sees are puppies and kittens, not .40 rounds.

You are confusing the downtown (city core) with the blighted near-suburbs. Few cities have truly crime-ridden core areas, but many have suburbs that are so. They also have a core and near-suburbs that are much safer (and naturally higher cost) which is where the truly affluent (or perhaps single/childless) live, while the rest endure the commute in favor of the extra space they can afford in the far suburbs.

Re:Ain't no body got time for that

[interkin3tic]

Not only that, but when corporations and their employees DO move into urban areas, they get shit for that too. [theguardian.com]

There's no pleasing everyone.

not sure which Atlanta you refer to

[Anonymous Coward]

but the metro area I live in (Georgia) is not safe for kids in town. to be fair it's a lot less bad than it was when I was a student at Georgia Tech in the late 80s but most people w/kids & good jobs lives in east Cobb (us) or north Fulton (which has been trying for decades to split off from south/city). and before you say I don't know what I'm talking about I spend plenty of time in town - I work in Buckhead & have had GT season tickets for 15+ yrs/seen Midtown's renaissance (was actually working in Biltmore in early 00s when all that started). great to eat & visit but raise kids? no way...

Re:Ain't no body got time for that

[jwdb]

No, it's because those of us who have bought such homes do not want to follow the Japanese model. It's the only thing I've ever heard a frenchman say that I will quote - "the Japanese? Why would we want to live like the Japanese? They live like ants!".

There is a middle ground, you know?

That Frenchman probably lived in a "row" or "terraced" house: each house shares two walls with two neighbors. Very common in Belgium in all but the rural areas, and a far more efficient use of space. The houses are larger than those in Japan, so you don't feel like an ant.

Re:Foxconn and friends were faster

[afidel]

Uh, 20% of Foxconn's workers don't return, not 20% of China's population.