I like how this is finally acknowledging WFH as something that is here to stay but I’m not sure I understand the connection with the housing crisis. From the article:
New York’s famous Flatiron Building will soon be converted from empty offices into luxury residences
Luxury apartments in premium locations is the first thing I would think of too if I were a developer, but their target buyers don’t sound like the sort of people who currently suffer from the housing crisis. But maybe I’m wrong and there will also be developers converting less prestigious office space into affordable housing…
The other thing I don’t get is this: I don’t know Manhattan but I did work in some (I assume) similar business hubs in the middle of overpriced cities and I wonder: are many people going to want to live in expensive converted office spaces if they don’t work near there any longer? I mean if they were given the chance to WFH from anywhere would they still choose Manhattan? Honest question and maybe the answer is yes, because of the restaurants, culture, good schools or whatever… I would personally make different life choices if I could work completely remote, though.
They use the flatiron building because it’s very famous but essentially a nuisance at this point having been vacant for iirc over a decade because of a lawsuit.
Ed: since 2019 but that’s quite awhile for the most famous like 2sq miles in America. (Which is also weird but we’ll talk about that another time.)
Ah thanks for the context, I didn’t know! But doesn’t my point essentially stills stand?
As more people work from home and more Flatiron-like buildings struggle to find businesses looking for offices, developers might find “ex prestigious office to luxury apartments” a more appealing conversion than “ex Walmart to affordable housing”.
Also, my understanding of the housing crisis is that people can’t find an affordable place to live close enough to where they work. In my country there are plenty of small towns that used to be very pretty places to live, that have very affordable housing and that are turning into ghost towns because all the jobs are concentrated in a few big cities.
If you take away the offices, less people are going to need to live in New York, San Francisco or London. Plenty of people might still choose to, of course, but there should be less competition to rent the last bed space in a filthy apartment at ludicrous prices. Or to buy a small flat in a converted former office.
Some people choose a location for the amount of things to do. Like the bigger cities offer more bars, fairs, gyms, and other niche stuff. Meet ups are also a bit easier. This could change as people move out of bigger cities.
uxury apartments in premium locations is the first thing I would think of too if I were a developer, but their target buyers don’t sound like the sort of people who currently suffer from the housing crisis.
It’ll have a domino effect, more apartments in Manhattan means less people in Brooklyn, Queens, etc. meaning prices go down in the latter boroughs. I live in Jersey City across the Hudson from Manhattan and a large part of the residents here are just people who can’t afford to live in Manhattan.
are many people going to want to live in expensive converted office spaces if they don’t work near there any longer?
Yes, I used to live in a converted office building in Newark NJ (not far from Manhattan) and really loved it. And yes people will always want to live in NYC and especially Manhattan. Many people, myself included simply prefer living in cities. I’ve also looked for apartments in Manhattan and it’s completely different than anywhere else.
Yes please. Let’s give corporations a reason to convert their office buildings into apartments so we can all go back to WFH. Plus, the more housing we have in the city the cheaper it gets.
I’m hopeful that a lot of these will turn into condos so people can get into ownership instead of renting.
When you give money to a country that already has funding, they have a habit of reallocating their funds. Also harder to comfortably start an offense when your defenses can be cracked. If you’re still convinced that funding any part of a military doesn’t just make a bigger military, I don’t know what to say.
There are 16,000,000 empty homes and 500,000 homeless. Office buildings aren’t going to be solving any real problem other than the people who own the building being shit out of luck
More supply is more supply. It’ll probably drive rent down a bit, assuming the plan works. This makes little difference to unemployed homeless people and does nothing to address the fact that many wealthy people see homes as a tool to secure their capital, but it’s not nothing. Hopefully it will help some people who are on the brink be a bit more secure in their housing.
The corporate landlords will just buy them up and let them sit empty the way they have done with at least 4 highrises that I can think of off the top of my head in downtown San Diego. Sure they have rented some of them, but the majority of those buildings sit empty.
Please don’t provide this stat without context. It just promotes cynicism and despair. Reality is complex, and our solutions are going to have to be complex.
Many of these vacant homes are nowhere near major homeless populations. But office buildings often are.
Watching the Biden admin is wild. At one minute he’ll be escalating the wars in the Ukraine and Palestine, but the next he’ll be funding the NLRB and addressing the housing crisis in a way that improves walk-ability.
It’s like, he has two settings: “actually useful moderate” and “KILLKILLKILLKILL”
Unfortunately, this makes him the best US president since carter
US politicians only disagree (a little bit) on domestic policy, on foreign policy they’re all in lock-step. that used to feel like a truism, but it’s been proven very true.
I don’t know who you are personally, and you may not realise it, but you’re parroting Russian propaganda. The only one here escalating is Russia when they kept bullying Ukraine and illegally annexed Crimea in 2014. The West have been chastised for letting Putin get away with Crimean annexation, instead of further sanction. Many countries have also thought a charm offensive might satiate Putin, essentially appeasing. But history has shown, appeasement never works because an egomaniac will never be satisfied. Putin thought that he’d get away with it again when he invaded the entirety of Ukraine, but didn’t realise it’s the red line for the West, and the Ukrainians put up a stiff fight.
Or you can listen to U.S. Lt. Col. Alex Vershinin retired after 20 years of service, including eight years as an armor officer with four combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and 12 years working as a modeling and simulations officer in NATO and U.S. Army concept development and experimentation. This included a tour with the U.S. Army Sustainment Battle Lab, where he led the experimentation scenario team.
Do elaborate on what it is you’re confused by. Russian strategy has been destruction of Ukrainian army through attrition. Being a much bigger country with a big industrial base, this is the most sensible strategy for Russia.
Russia spent around 9 months making sophisticated layered defences over the past year while massively expanding the army. Ukraine was then forced to use human wave tactics to attack these defences by their western partners to try and show visible territory gains for continued support. This offensive failed miserably resulting in the loss of large portions of the equipment the west managed to cobble together, as well as trained and experienced soldiers. Russia actually ended up gaining more ground during this offensive than Ukraine did.
Now, Ukraine is out of weapons and manpower, and Russia is starting an offensive of their own having recruited over 300k new troops who have been trained and equipped during this time.
On the other hand, western powers are now admitting that they’re not able to keep up with the rate of use ammunition, and Ukraine is now actively drafting women in to the military. Furthermore, many western economies are going into a recession, while Russian economy is showing growth and increase in military production.
On top of all that, we’re now seeing the war in Palestine unfold which necessarily means that Ukraine will get even less support from the west.
Seems to me that this is precisely what U.S. Lt. Col. Alex Vershinin predicted would happen in his article that’s linked above.
Russian strategy has been destruction of Ukrainian army through attrition.
Their strategy was a lightning fast toppling of the government within a week with little to no resistance, such as they saw in Crimea.
Russia is also facing dire manpower issues. With too much drafting from Moscow, Putin’s power is in danger. In fact, Ukraine is betting on these manpower shortages to attrit down to the point where the line becomes untenable. See here: youtu.be/lebWSl49R0cyoutu.be/CqmQPev1Gvg
Gasa is certainly an issue, but with higher artillery production, linked bills, and diverted media attention, it has upsides for Ukraine too. youtu.be/tg7aw3T3nzg
Their strategy was a lightning fast toppling of the government within a week with little to no resistance, such as they saw in Crimea.
Nowhere has Russia said anything of the sort, but you must know something nobody else does apparently. Russia certainly did get Ukraine to negotiate early on, but the west forced Ukraine to break off these negotiations bringing us to where we are today.
Russia is also facing dire manpower issues.
It’s absolutely incredible that people still believe this stuff after a year and a half of it being proven wrong. You must be one of those geniuses who thinks China’s about to collapse as well.
Gasa is certainly an issue, but with higher artillery production, linked bills, and diverted media attention, it has upsides for Ukraine too.
It’s incredible what people end up believing when they just guzzle propaganda on youtube.
In any case, there’s absolutely no point arguing with you since it’s pretty clear that you live in a fantasy world. By next year even people such as yourself will have to start grappling with what’s happening in the real world though.
You take their words at face value? It’s from their actions and game theory of the situation. youtu.be/pBwT-5z9R5A
Did you watch the vid?
Did you watch the vid? It’s a game theory and international relations teacher talking about their area of expertise. I’m guessing anything that disagrees with Russia though is propaganda for you.
You take their words at face value? It’s from their actions and game theory of the situation.
They’ve stated their objectives pretty clearly. Why would I take words of some random youtube troll over the official position?
It’s a game theory and international relations teacher talking about their area of expertise. I’m guessing anything that disagrees with Russia though is propaganda for you.
The narrative this game theory and international relations teacher is feeding you is at odds with the reality we observe. The fact is that plenty of western experts such as Mearsheimer clearly explain what’s happening, and their claims have actually been supported by what’s observed …substack.com/…/the-darkness-ahead-where-the-ukra…
Indeed. Whether the attack is a good thing or a bad thing depends on the casualty and material ratio vs the objectives taken. Which a game theory approach is much better for analyzing than just saying that Russia or Ukraine is gaining ground.
I never made the argument about gaining ground anywhere. What I said was that Russia’s strategy is to grind down Ukrainian army through attrition. The game theory approach for analyzing this needs to account for the fact that Russia has a vastly larger population and massive industrial capacity that Russia inherited from USSR that the west is admitting is not able to match right now.
Also, every credible source such as BBC and Mediazona show that Russian casualties peaked before Ukrainian offensive started and have been falling since. On the other hand, Ukrainian casualties have been catastrophic even by western admissions.
Again, there is no point continuing this since clearly we aren’t going to convince one another of anything. We will simply see who is right when the war ends.
Mearsheimer’s article isn’t talking about territory, and the article from the Spanish paper is talking about the fact that Ukrainian army is in an operational crisis right now. Did you actually read either one?
Did you watch the vid?
I watched part of it. Pretty much everything he says has been proven wrong since the video was made a year ago. The fact that you keep referring to the vid that made a bunch of wrong predictions is fascinating to me.
For example, Stoltenberg has publicly admitted now what the actual cause of the war was:
He also flat out lies claiming that nazis in Ukraine don’t have support of political power when nazis are literally in Ukrainian government military. Top Ukrainian officials including Zaluzhny have Bandera portraits in their offices. Azov nazi battalion is officially part of the military in Ukraine. Western media can’t even find soldiers to interview who aren’t covered in nazi tattoos and paraphernalia. The fact that he ignores all of that shows that he is an intellectually fraudulent individual.
He predicted that Ukraine capturing Crimea was a plausible outcome. We now know that it was not.
The idea that Russia was motivated by Ukrainian resources doesn’t really stand to scrutiny either. Russia has massive untapped resources in the east, and it would be far easier to develop those than to go to war with NATO.
The reasoning he gives for the first strike advantage is directly contradicted by the quote from Stolenberg above. It makes it clear that Russia was in fact concerned about NATO expansion, and decided to take preemptive action to halt it after NATO refused to agree to stop expansion.
Once you bother reading the article I linked, you’ll see that the whole 3-1 attacker advantage he talks about is not applicable in practice because both sides end up going on attack and defence. And as we just saw with the Ukrainian offensive disaster, attacks for Ukraine are far more costly due to lack of artillery numbers and air power.
He frames it as a territorial conflict, which again, as Stoltenberg explains, it is not.
The whole Kiev offensive narrative has been debunked many times already. The idea that Russia was trying to take Kiev with 100k troops is nonsensical given that they dedicated 40k troops to Mariupol which is a city that’s an order of magnitude smaller. What the 100k troops were actually doing was pinning Ukrainian forces around Kiev while Russia consolidated their position in the east.
He claimed that sanctions would cause problems for Russian economy. Yet, the exact opposite is the case. European economies are in a crisis while Russian economy is growing faster than anyone expected.
Pretty much every single argument he’s made was shown to be false. If you’re still basing your understanding of the war on a deeply flawed analysis from a year ago, I can see why you have such a skewed understanding of what’s happening.
The manpower situation favors Russia in every way. First of all, 80% of the casualties come from artillery fire and Russia fires around ten times more artillery than Ukraine. This means that Ukraine is taking far more casualties than Russia in this war. This is reflected in Ukraine now having expanded its conscription to older men and even women. This wouldn’t be needed if Ukraine wasn’t running out of manpower. On the other hand, Russia isn’t doing conscription or mobilization right now, and they raised around 300k volunteers over the past year.
Russian casualties corroborated by publicly available data as of 20 October stand at 34,857. We can also see how the casualties are steadily dropping since March
On the other hand, even western media admits that Ukrainian casualties stand at over 100k now. Again, given that Russia has a much bigger population, it’s pretty clear that this is a catastrophic situation for Ukraine. It’s also important to keep in mind that the trained and motivated troops Ukraine loses cannot be easily replaced. You can’t just throw somebody into training for a few weeks and expect them to be an effective fighting force that’s going to take on a seasoned and experienced army.
Even western media openly admits this, but you keep on coping there buddy. The only clown here is the one who thinks that a country with a population of over 140 million couldn’t recruit 300k people into military service. You know the same way people in US “volunteer” into military service because they don’t have any better options in life.
“publicly” doesn´t mean reliable, especially if it comes from “official” sources on either side.
Certainly more reliable than some dufus on youtube pulling numbers out of his ass. Anybody who is not a certified clown understands that.
also, highly encourage you to watch this 25 min video explaining the state of things by one of the most preeminent experts on the subject www.youtube.com/watch?v=62FCVJycwSA
Russia has more manpower but at the expense of pulling out troops from another theatre, which in turn would diminish Russian influence there, that’s already the case with Central Asia and Armenia and Azerbaijan. Russian businesses is already short-staffed. Even if Russian wins, it is will be a Pyrrhic victory. Future generations of Russians will pay for the financial and human costs. Russia could even be beholden to China, who is keeping Kremlin afloat right now.
Russian propagandists have said so many things before that turned out to be the opposite. We will conquer Ukraine in three days, Russia will win, we have more manpower blah blah. One year and a half later? Who made more progress since the Russians were pushed back? I guess the true fascists are the ones who invaded and killed Ukrainians along the way.
China could only be a good thing.
At least you and I both agree Putin needs to be toppled.
But is this tacit admission of Russia is going to lose anyhow?
The only people who said that Russia wanted to conquer Ukraine in three days are western propagandists. There isn’t single statement from Russia saying anything remotely like that.
Who made more progress since the Russians were pushed back?
Russia literally gained more territory during Ukraine’s offensive than Ukraine did.
At least you and I both agree Putin needs to be toppled.
Who do you think would replace Putin exactly. Putin is a moderate in Russia. You think Medvedev or Karyrov are gonna be more restrained? You’re just utterly clueless.
But is this tacit admission of Russia is going to lose anyhow?
Please don’t put words in my mouth. Only an utter imbecile would look at what’s happening and think that Russia is going to lose.
You admit to wanting Russia to become beholden to China. The only way for that to happen is Russia losing the war in Ukraine, or Russia having lost so much finances covering it. So, you do admit that Russia will lose or it becomes too costly that Russia will become China’s subservient.
Da klon? Every post you make, acting like a clown and are pretending not to know things, will fund your dacha? Da? 🤡 Remember though, Ukraine gained more territories in three months than Russia has with failed offensives in Adiivka and north Donetsk. Not even your comrades will deny that despite your pretending ignorance that Putin thinks he will conquer Ukraine in three days. But keep talking, I will help you fund your dacha.
You tell me tovaricsh if you are pretending not to know and stupid. But then again, propagandists are paid too deep and filthy like animals to tell the truth.
Russians are interesting lot, even both Russian communists and neo-Nazis are imperialists and genociders who support Putin, despite the lack of ideological commonalities. The only common denominator is being ultranationalists. It just confirms anyone’s observations that Russians are nationalists first, and whatever second.
Don’t worry, keep talking mud. I am helping you fund your dacha somewhere in Siberia when Russia collapse again for the second time in thirty years so you could stay nice and safe there.
You said there was a quote from Putin, and I’m waiting for you to show me that quote. Since we both know this quote doesn’t exist, that makes you a liar and the fact that you continue trolling here makes an idiot.
Also, hilarious that a Canadian would bleat about genocide. Canada is the home of genocide and continues to commit genocide against the native population last I checked.
Finally, I’m a Canadian living in Canada, but good to see you expose yourself a racist scumbag that you are here.
Seems like Russia is still stuck in the 19rh century to think imperialism and genocide is still normalised then?
Sure you are a Canadian, tovarisch. Keep posting and spewing bs. I will help you buy a dacha eventually. For every nonsense you spout, you get paid a cent. Da?
By the way, you never answered the question. Have you spoken to those imprisoned during the Soviet Union? Or will you keep lying that there were never any arbitrary arrests?
You’re a curious specimen. How’s it going there in St Petersburg without Prigozhin?
Lol, spoken like a true Krembot with the whataboutism! Oh you crack me up. I’m asking you non-playable character with repeating script. You keep lying that mass arrests never happened in the Soviet Union. Have you spoken to the former detainees? I’m not denying that the genocide of Native Americans, you’re the one denying that there was no arbitrary arrests and promoting genocide of Ukrainians. Have you spoken to former detainees? I’m not even Canadian nor live there, you’re the one who claims to be one.
Tell, me what it’s it like being a genocidal settler in Canada Ukraine who steals land from the native people and then systematically eradicates them. Tell me what it’s like being a propagandist despite falling value of ruble? See, I am helping you buy a dacha by keeping you engaged. Many Russians never had it so good, am I right? All the blood money from killing and promoting the genocide of Ukrainians lets buy you Audi and pick up truck for your mommy and daddy in a Siberian village? Da tovarisch?
Have you spoken to former detainees in the Soviet Union? Putin commemorated the former gulag inmates you know? So you can’t deny that mass arrest never existed. Scramble now for whatever script you’ll be given comrade on how to respond to that.
I see you’ve got nothing new to say, but you really are bothered because every time you respond with a word salad. Imagine living in a nation that’s built on the genocide of the native population, that operated concentration camps for kids into the 80s, and that currently continues to occupy unceded native land, and brutally repress native population, and bleat about USSR. What an utter hypocritical imbecile you are. What a complete and utter piece of human garbage Canada managed to produce. The most hilarious part is that you don’t even realize what you are.
I don’t live in a settler country. Did one of your agents forget who you are speaking to? Trolling multiple people at the same time?
Imagine being paid to spout word salad, dodge questions, and promote the dehumanisation and genocide of neighbours, all in the name of Putin and a country who is going to lose and be a puppet of China.
What a human garbage Kremlin has produced. I hope you realise what you are-- a genocide denier and a misinformation whore paid a cent per post. How do you sleep at night knowing you are brainwashing people and twisting history and the future of society? Have you spoken to former detainees of USSR? How would your handlers spin Putin admitting the crimes of your country with its gulag?
There are sometimes some strange issues with office construction.
There might be no plumbing in the locations people will want for toilets and baths and kitchens in the individual suites away from the core of the building. Same goes for retrofitted laundry facilities.
HVAC systems (in the US anyways) are often centrallized and might need a lot of retrofitting to make it work like a condo/apartment.
Kitchen ventilation
Windows might not open, can’t get to a fresh air source
Aside from that stuff, the issue of empty office buildings while we are experiencing unsustainable housing markets is begging for a solution to address the demand.
There will probably be a handy sum to be earned for construction companies who get efficient at conversions.
I wonder if it would be possible to require all future construction to be designed in a way that it could easily be switched between commercial/residential. Like each floor of an office building has to have plumbing roughed it to support x number of toilets/showers on each floor, stuff like that.
It’s not that there might not be plumbing, it’s that there is zero plumbing in most office buildings aside from one clustered section for floor where there’s 5 to 10 toilets for each gender.
On top of that, you have completely different mechanical systems. An office building for instance may have one single mechanical system for the entire building, whereas an apartment would need separate mechanical systems for each individual apartment.
Then you have the kitchens, bedrooms and interior partition walls that are vastly different than an office building, plus the requirements for exterior windows which precludes larger office buildings with deeper floor plates from being converted at all without demolishing the interior portion of the building. Curtain wall systems that may or may not be compatible between an office and residential building (non-operating windows)… Not to mention the stair and elevator systems are probably not going to work either.
So in the end you’re probably looking at gutting the building down to the structure and removing every piece of the building including the outer envelope, roof, all of the electrical plumbing and mechanical systems… In the end it may or may not be cheaper just to build a new building from the ground up.
Source: am architect. And yes, I have done conversions like this in the past.
Also offices don’t require that all the rooms have access to natural light the way residential buildings do. That’s why office towers can be thicc blocks while apartment buildings often need to be U-shaped.
I like Biden. Giving taxpayer money to developers is another thing, but I’m happy to hear that the US govt is off the RTO madness train, at least in this particular situation. There were those articles about Biden wanting federal workers to return though…
There was a leaked OPM memo that was going to require DC govt workers to RTO. It obviously made a bunch of waves and they backed way off of it.
This is probably their compromise solution. Because the DC mayor and all of those poor unfortunate corporate commercial landlords were losing money. And businesses weren’t getting the foot traffic from office workers anymore.
The talented govt folks would walk. They already don’t get paid what their equivalents do in the private sector. RTO would have screwed the administrations ability to get things done.
I worked in a few skyscraper type offices and they are pretty awesome. The view was always crazy and there were always good food options nearby right in the middle of the city. You could make a nice house in there. Just need the bathroom and kitchen to be near the center of the building. You could probably fit 4 nice size units on each floor of my old building. But they would want to make a ton of tiny overpriced ones instead so they will say there isn’t enough plumbing lol.
How about… let those corporations EAT those fucking buildings and let’s put that money to use IN THE HANDS OF THE PEOPLE. First time home buyers. Put some federal controls on real estate; mortgage rates; put the skids on the goddam prime rate - there is NO need for that shit… the economy is suffering from PROFITEERING - NOT inflation.
I realize half or more of our elected officials will have to give back bribe money in order to do something for the people that doesn’t doubly do something for their wealthy sponsors.
One popular option is floor level businesses with apartments above them. Doesn’t necessarily have to be as tall, many of these skyscrapers take a lot of space for landscaping that could be used for square footage. On top of this, other areas could also be rezone and recreated into city parks to make up for the over indulgent landscaping.
Is that something the government needs to figure out? Seems like something will eventually be done with the buildings once the current owners get tired of losing money.
They belong to corporations. The corporations don’t get tax breaks if the buildings aren’t used - but they still need to be paid for… which is a huge monetary outlay. Honestly, I don’t care what happens to them and neither should anyone else. Am I sorry that corporations, the SAME corporations fleecing the planet right now with profiteering, are losing money? Hardly. They made the rules - they bought the politicians to enforce the rules- they made their own mess.
Converting office space to living space strains infrastructure in ways not intended by the original intent of the buildings. They can’t put thirty apartments on a single floor of a high rise and have those residents use the same four bathrooms per floor that the offices had. Same with sewage. Same with electrical.
And I reiterate - as soon as the money is distributed to the “developers” - that money - OUR money - is gone… whether it is used for the purpose intended or not.
Keep in mind that trump is a ‘developer’. Do you really think if Biden gave trump “three billion dollars” that trump would use it for what it was intended? Or do you think he’d pocket most of it? And he is a typical ‘developer’ as far as ‘honesty’ is concerned.
Converting office space to living space strains infrastructure in ways not intended by the original intent of the buildings. They can’t put thirty apartments on a single floor of a high rise and have those residents use the same four bathrooms per floor that the offices had. Same with sewage. Same with electrical.
Water and sewage is a real question, that’s true. From the projects like this that I’m aware of, fire safety is actually the bigger issue, though. Usually sleeping areas are required to have an easier escape route than would be typical in the middle of a big office building. I guess you can add pipes and pumps without too much modification, and offices use plenty of electricity, although probably not in the same pattern.
As for the systemic issues, governments do manage to get things done sometimes. The exact details of such a legislation are more granular than I really would want to hammer out on Lemmy.
I would think a commitment to intelligent solutions such as converting unused warehouse spaces rather than sticking billions of dollars down the “developer” black hole (trump is a “developer”… did you know that? Yeah, that criminal guy - he’s kind of the cream of the crop).
So while government considers once again giving huge handouts to rich property owners does sound appealing, it’s not really.
I would venture a guess that 10% of the “bailout” cash might get used towards… something related to conversion. And that would be that.
How about we NOT bail our some stranded ass rich assholes with our tax dollars and use those dollars wisely - towards fixing the problem rather than making another tax dollar hog trough.
Corporations already do hold onto buildings without using them. Because typically real estate goes up in value, especially when there’s scarcity, which there will be if corporations are holding property. This isn’t the solution you think it is.
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