Remote work is here to stay: Manhattan may never be the same

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by jbermingham123

This could be an enormous blessing in disguise... in fact this might actually reverse suburbanization:


First of all, rents in the cities will drop as businesses cut half or more of their space requirements.

Secondly, many companies with large numbers of employees have historically relegated themselves to the suburbs under the following two assumptions:

-cheap land means you can build corporate campuses that are big enough for your entire workforce
-closer proximity to where your workforce lives

Most companies that moved to the suburbs did so from the 70s to the 90s, so an enormous number of suburban corporate campuses in this country are between 30-50 years old. If half your workforce now doesnt need to come into the office, why not just abandon your shitty aging office park and move into a smaller, newer office downtown.. especially if downtown rents are at an all time low!?? If people only have to commute to work 3 times a week, then they wont care as much if said commute is a bit longer.. not to mention the fact that the view from the new office is no longer a strip mall or a parking lot.. and you can now get approximately 37 different kinds of food on your lunch breaks

Also, if half the city's workforce is no longer actually in the city on any given day, then the trains and bridges wont be as clogged, so the train commutes will be more pleasant and the drives quicker... Further incentive for the small downtown office.

Most places aren't dealing with clogged trains though, they are dealing with barely used transit systems.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by homebucket

That does kinda remind me of one of those children's discovery museums where there's a lot of colorful and tactile, sensory objects to tinker with.

One of my brothers was interviewed for an office job at Lyft. He said that the room he was interviewed in had a bunch of neon-colored slinkies hanging from the ceiling.

This is what young people find amusing since we no longer have rock & roll.

[Camelback]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

working from home generally sucks, its alienating and unproductive and distracting. You lose the learning by osmosis and random interactions. Maybe for some tech dudes who want to turn somewhere in Idaho into Galt's Gulch it might work. but for standard office jobs its not ideal.

Working from home does suck and feels like a prison at times, you cannot escape your significant other, especially when they're doing the same thing.

The time it takes to shower-dress-morning breakfast-coffee-poop-clean the dishes, prepare the kids and then on top of it a 30 minute commute (if lucky) in all weather types to an office to then have to socialize with similar office space co-workers doing the same thing and talking about the same thing every single day, sucks even more.

[SIGSEGV]

lol @ the whining on hackernews on Google + Amazon's decisions to return to offices:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26653867
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26650430

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Camelback

The time it takes to shower-dress-morning breakfast-coffee-poop-clean the dishes, prepare the kids and then on top of it a 30 minute commute (if lucky) in all weather types to an office to then have to socialize with similar office space co-workers doing the same thing and talking about the same thing every single day, sucks even more.

Getting drafted, shot at, then spending a few months or years in a POW camp before coming back with a permanent injury would suck.

Office work is a paradise by comparison. People used to routinely sustain terrible injuries while farming and working other outdoor and indoor jobs.

Right now is the best time to be alive, ever.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Camelback

The time it takes to shower-dress-morning breakfast-coffee-poop-clean the dishes, prepare the kids and then on top of it a 30 minute commute (if lucky) in all weather types to an office to then have to socialize with similar office space co-workers doing the same thing and talking about the same thing every single day, sucks even more.

the bolded is 100% the opposite for me.

of all the things i miss about having a job (and there are plenty, like a steady paycheck and health benefits), my old daily bike commute is one of the intangibles that i miss most.

i try to motivate myself to get on my bike and ride every day, but it's just not the same without an actual destination that i have to be at come hell or high water, no pansy-ass excuses.

when you're going through the motions of doing something just to do something, it's not the same.

it's just not.


i really liked having an obligation to be somewhere every workday, even if i didn't really want to go. it was good for my soul.

[mrnyc]

manhattan office space availability hits an all time high for Q1 — 16.1%:


https://therealdeal.com/2021/04/01/m...me-high-in-q1/

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Camelback

Working from home does suck and feels like a prison at times, you cannot escape your significant other, especially when they're doing the same thing.

The time it takes to shower-dress-morning breakfast-coffee-poop-clean the dishes, prepare the kids and then on top of it a 30 minute commute (if lucky) in all weather types to an office to then have to socialize with similar office space co-workers doing the same thing and talking about the same thing every single day, sucks even more.

I've done both. As much as I enjoyed working from home and not having to commute or dress up for 10 years, I missed the camaraderie and sense of belonging of a physical work environment.

[mrnyc]

80k municipal employees return may 3rd:


https://www.fox5ny.com/news/80000-ny...ting-may-3.amp

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by JManc

I've done both. As much as I enjoyed working from home and not having to commute or dress up for 10 years, I missed the camaraderie and sense of belonging of a physical work environment.

That's probably where a situation like 2 days of WFH and the other 3 days work in office is a good hybrid model.

[SIGSEGV]

And here's another NYT article: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/r...t-revival.html

[DCReid]

And i found this article: https://money.yahoo.com/top-cities-f...195531419.html

Even my Fed agency in the DC suburbs is considering a hybrid model and many staff said they would like to leave the region to work from home.

[mrnyc]

the covid stricken corner has been turned:


https://dnyuz.com/2021/04/02/for-new...ns-of-revival/

[dktshb]

It may be anecdotal but my employer about 6 months ago was talking about the possibility of remote work being somewhat permanent. Flash to today and they're all about us getting back to the office by Labor Day and are pretty much eliminating the idea of remote work even on a limited basis.

[mhays]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

One of my brothers was interviewed for an office job at Lyft. He said that the room he was interviewed in had a bunch of neon-colored slinkies hanging from the ceiling.

This is what young people find amusing since we no longer have rock & roll.

I can think of numerous similar examples of this in recent tech TIs in my area. This is a design trend. Bicycle wheels, whatever.

[JMKeynes]

Remote work’s future is dim.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56614285

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by dktshb

It may be anecdotal but my employer about 6 months ago was talking about the possibility of remote work being somewhat permanent. Flash to today and they're all about us getting back to the office by Labor Day and are pretty much eliminating the idea of remote work even on a limited basis.

Thats good! (I hope you agree lol)

[twister244]

Originally Posted by JMKeynes

Remote work’s future is dim.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56614285

I don't know.....

I think you're going to see a tug of war now between employees and employers. For some positions, yeah, it's best to be back in the office. But, if you have a good working relationship with your team, your aren't managing people, etc, there may not be a pressing need to get back into the office. It's all going to depend on company culture too.

My company has become so distributed with employees everywhere now that it's going to be really hard to get even half of our people into an office now given they are spread all over the country, and the world.

Some of us have gotten so used to remote work, that we have now carved out a plan for remote work moving forward. I am literally about a month from hopping into my car and working remotely from Chicago this summer before doing Europe/Tel Aviv this fall. I'm sure many others have already made these plans. Once you open those flood gates, it's pretty hard to undo giving people that option.

[eschaton]

One thing people I think are not considering is that to the degree some WFH becomes permanent, it will affect suburban knowledge jobs just as much as urban ones. I mean, I don't believe office workers post-COVID will be anywhere near as "transit averse" as they have been over the last year. Thus you sort of return to the pre-COVID norm - where urban offices are just more desirable due to having other convenience surrounding them (restaurants for lunch rather than a corporate cafeteria, after-work nightlife, etc.)

Of course, suburbs do not rely on tax revenue from office parks to the degree that a city like Chicago or NYC relies upon tax revenue from its office areas. On the other hand, repurposing commercial highrises into apartments isn't anywhere near as difficult as transforming a suburban office park into something more attractive.

[twister244]

While Google and Amazon may be jumping the gun to start telling people to come back, Ford (yes, Ford), announced just a couple weeks ago that they will be letting a huge chunk of their employees work remotely indefinitely.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephan...h=714d00761a1c

I like the previous post discussing office patterns. It's safe to assume that suburban office parks may suffer greatly, but inner city areas may bounce back with younger people wanting to be around people. Instead of seeing companies with a large presence in any given building, you may see large chunks of co-working spaces that companies can fill in when necessary for their employees that may come in a few times a week. Or, you will also see co working spaces for those of us (like myself) that just want a place to go and socialize with other professionals.

It's still very hard to see how exactly this plays out, but it's super interesting to see how companies are evolving right now as it's becoming very obvious we are weeks away from entering the post-pandemic era.