Google is reportedly looking into plans for building a new campus headquarters for the company, one that might be more fitting for their size which continues to grow. Their current campus headquartered in Mountain View is already huge to be sure, but according to The New York Times Google may need something bigger than what they already have. They’re apparently proposing the plans for the new HQ this week to the city council although the results of the proposal are yet unknown. Google may also not end up getting approved for building the new campus as the NYT reports that some residents may feel that Google could end up overrunning the city.
Google already employs some 20,000 Mountain View residents who go to work every day at Google’s massive 7.3 million square foot headquarters. The reason there may be an issue with a new campus is because the city is already full up to the brim, and a larger campus would only likely bring in more jobs which means more residents. One resident who was recently elected to the city council in Mountain View, 66-year old Leonard M. Siegel states that “Our problem is that we have too many good jobs, everyone else wishes they were in our situation, but it’s a crisis for the people here.”
While it’s hard to think of having too many good jobs as being a problem,(the city also reportedly has an impressively low unemployment rate of 3.3%)Mountain View already faces issues with excruciating traffic, which a larger campus to allow for company and employee expansion would likely only make worse. All the city approval stuff aside, if Google continues to expand like they have been they’ll need a larger campus eventually, and when they finally get things settled on a location, it seems they already have plans for the design as they’ve tasked Heatherwick Studios which is a popular design firm based out of London, as well as Danish architect Barjke Ingels with designing the campus buildings, which are being described as having a series of canopy like buildings. For now Google still seems to be waiting on approval for the new space.