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[Deleted member 284]

I don't think Minneapolis has the infrastructure to support a huge company like Amazon. The roads and traffic are awful enough as it is.

But isn't that Target HQ?

 

[killer rin]

*Crosses Fingers* Come on Canada. One of our cities better get this... We need a headquarters for a major tech company.

 

[Hasphat'sAnts]

San Francisco would be the lulziest choice.

 

[Tylercrat]

I would predict either Dallas, Atlanta, or Charlotte (in no particular order).

 

[The Lamp]

Combing through most reactions on the web it appears the top "fit" (culture, cost of living, universities, size, airport, tech scene, etc.) not considering the tax offerings appear to be:

1. Houston, Texas (Massive + Central Location + Access to Key Universities + Bonus points for close proximity to Whole Foods in Austin)
2. Toronto, Canada (I think this illogical given logistics of travelling internationally for all employees in Seattle)
3. Charlotte/Research Triangle, North Carolina (East Coast + Bubbling Tech Scene + Very Low Cost of Living)
4. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (East Coast + Low Cost of Living + Proximity to Major Cities + Encouraging Exploratory Tech)
5. Minneapolis, Minnesota (Health + Retail + Low Cost of Living + Very Liberal)

Less buzz but still interest: Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas/Fort Worth, Pittsburgh, Boston

LOL good luck: Denver, Kansas City, Anywhere in Florida

Not sure if it would be Houston over DFW. DFW is aggressively fighting to recruit company HQs and it's the IT industry of the state. Although Houston does have the ship channel...but I don't think Amazon wants to be slowed down by hurricanes.

 

[darscot]

Word is BC is going to make a push for this, my guess would be outside the downtown core of Vancouver. Considering how often recruiters hit me from Amazon it seems they are looking here as well. Amazon hits me up every quarter like clock work.

 

[AngmarsKing701]

Research Triangle Park in the Raleigh/Durham area. Gonna setup shop on the east coast somewhere I'd wager. Of course NC hasn't been friendly to businesses after the bathroom bill (thanks, McCrory you fucknugget).

There's more than 10,000 IBMers working here, so Amazon could swoop in and make a splash with some hiring.

 

[TalonJH]

May be Erlanger, KY, since they are already building a aircraft hub @ CVG.

And the tax break will be huge.

I do think it's more likely that they go with a medium sized or smaller city. I wouldn't be surprised to see a Ky city on their list. I mean, KY already has CafePress, Dippin' Dots, Fazoli's, Fruit of the Loom, GE Consumer & Industrial, Heine Brothers', Humana, Jif, Jim Beam, KFC, Long John Silver's, Lexmark International, Papa John's Pizza, Purnell's Old Folks Country Sausage, Toyota and so many more.

 

[ElNino]

It's not just employees. Think about how many vendors, AWS customers, clients, etc. visit the campus on a regular basis. Your forcing a lot of these people to now do unnecessary international travel.

Conversely, I'm sure there are quite a few vendors, clients, etc who are on the east coast and a 1-2 hour flight (even international) probably sounds a lot more appealing than a 6+ hour flight to Seattle.

Some of my business partners are in New York City, and they say it is actually quicker for them to fly into Toronto for a meeting than it is to commute into the office in New York.

 

[AP90]

Conversely, I'm sure there are quite a few vendors, clients, etc who are on the east coast and a 1-2 hour flight (even international) probably sounds a lot more appealing than a 6+ hour flight to Seattle.

Some of my business partners are in New York City, and they say it is actually quicker for them to fly into Toronto for a meeting than it is to commute into the office in New York.

Buffalo.. Buffalo!! It's on the western side of NY. =D

We have a tesla solar factory mostly finished.. Now we need an Amazon headquarters, any future tax revenue would be most welcome lol. The buffalo (buf) and Niagara falls airport (iag) are not bad...Jfk is horrible =/

 

[rokkerkory]

Not Cali please we have enough traffic and humans!

Go to a liberal state however

 

[killer rin]

So thinking about things logically. Amazon is going to primarily be looking at locations on the East Coast. I base this off of the fact that Amazon already has an extremely sizable west coast presence. They have HQ1 in Seattle, and they also have a sizable base in silicon valley. In addition, its also the typical expansion path for most companies when looking at regions. West-East-Center or East-West-Center. So with that in mind, I have a couple locations that I think might make it to the short list. In no particular order

- Toronto
- Ottawa
- Montreal
- DC
- NYC
- Houston
- Detroit

Putting aside the fact that I'm Canadian and am desperately hoping we get the HQ, I do think that we have some added benefits compared to the USA. Mainly, our Federal government is heavily pushing jobs in tech through massive subsidies, infrastructure investments, education (both employee and employer-wise).

Since everyone says it, I wont emphasise on this point as much, but we do have a highly educated population in Canada. Within the GTHA alone we have several world class universities that produces talent that Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Apple regularly hires from. On top of that you can get top talent extremely cheaply here. Wages in tech for top talent across canada are often tens of thousands of dollars cheaper per employee. Amazon says they are going to have plenty of people at this office earning more than $100,000, which tends to be the average in the USA but in Canada it's just over half.

These were the statistics for 2017. Now add onto this that Amazon can save dramatically on Employee benefits because they wont have to provide coverage for Healthcare or things like Maternity Leave. There is also significant pressure to get our systems to cover Pharmacare, Dental and Optical so that would be even less medical coverage they would need to provide going forward if it came to be.

Public transit in our major cities are fairly decent and are only getting better as all three levels of government are continuing to expand rail systems and increasing bus frequency. Millennials like not being able to own a vehicle and our systems have been at a point where its an actual reality for awhile now.

Amazon would be lessening their reliance on the USA. This is a major bonus for both Canada and Mexico because currently if Amazon wants to hire someone overseas and bring them over to the USA they are entirely reliant on the USA granting the Visas and proper permits. If they don't approve it, Amazon is effectively screwed in regards to that person. On the other hand, if Amazon expanded into Canada or Mexico, they now have a second route to attracting talent since they can choose to bring them into their international HQ or their USA HQ. If one denies the person, they still have another route they can use to bring the person over.

 

[kirblar]

Seattle should make a pitch to be Amazon’s 2nd headquarters (Matthew Yglesias, VOX)

Good look at some of the issues that are making Amazon look elsewhere.

Amazon’s announcement that it wants to essentially duplicate its massive home office presence by constructing a second corporate headquarters in North America set off an irresistible frenzy of speculation. And from the company’s point of view, the best part is that it will also set off an irresistible race to the bottom as cities compete to shower subsidies on the company in hopes of luring the proposed 50,000 jobs spread across 8 million square feet of offices at an average salary of $100,000 a piece.

But one city is weirdly missing from the speculation: Seattle.

Seattle checks all the boxes. It’s a large, amenity-rich city whose metro area population is well over 1 million. It’s also an unusually well-educated city, with plentiful college graduates and a local business culture rich with experience in both engineering and retail with companies like Microsoft, Starbucks, and (historically) Boeing headquartered there. Its airport, though modest in size, serves all the major international business destinations — places like London, Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai, Frankfurt, Seoul, Dubai, Taipei, Paris, Toronto, and Shenzhen.

Perhaps best of all, Seattle is where Amazon’s headquarters is already located. That will spare executives the need to fly to some satellite headquarters in another city, facilitate collaboration between rank-and-file colleagues across the company, and avoid the linguistic absurdity of a company claiming to have two different HQs.

The fundamental problem Seattle is facing is that the city, county, and state governments are trying to funnel demand for growth into a comparatively tiny patch of the city. Downtown and select other areas zoned for high rises are, in fact, seeing a huge boom in high rise construction.

But (depending on exactly how you count) somewhere between 57 and 65 percent of the city’s land area is zoned exclusively for single-family homes. The recent devastating flooding in the famously zoning-free city of Houston has sparked a mini-renaissance of enthusiasm for restrictive land use planning. But as Richard Kahlenberg wrote in August, the actual history of single-family zoning in the United States has nothing to do with flood control and everything to do with racial segregation. Houston itself, meanwhile, through parking requirements, largely manages to recreate many of the pathologies of single-family zoning.

 

[facetheslayer92]

I wonder if Detroit will get ruled out due to lack of good mass transit.

 

[kirblar]

I wonder if Detroit will get ruled out due to lack of good mass transit.

I think Detroit gets ruled out because the people who they'd be trying to attract to work there aren't going to want to live there.

 

[facetheslayer92]

I think Detroit gets ruled out because the people who they'd be trying to attract to work there aren't going to want to live there.

That's fair.

 

[teh_pwn]

So thinking about things logically. Amazon is going to primarily be looking at locations on the East Coast. I base this off of the fact that Amazon already has an extremely sizable west coast presence. They have HQ1 in Seattle, and they also have a sizable base in silicon valley. In addition, its also the typical expansion path for most companies when looking at regions. West-East-Center or East-West-Center. So with that in mind, I have a couple locations that I think might make it to the short list. In no particular order

- Toronto
- Ottawa
- Montreal
- DC
- NYC
- Houston
- Detroit

Putting aside the fact that I'm Canadian and am desperately hoping we get the HQ, I do think that we have some added benefits compared to the USA. Mainly, our Federal government is heavily pushing jobs in tech through massive subsidies, infrastructure investments, education (both employee and employer-wise).

Since everyone says it, I wont emphasise on this point as much, but we do have a highly educated population in Canada. Within the GTHA alone we have several world class universities that produces talent that Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Apple regularly hires from. On top of that you can get top talent extremely cheaply here. Wages in tech for top talent across canada are often tens of thousands of dollars cheaper per employee. Amazon says they are going to have plenty of people at this office earning more than $100,000, which tends to be the average in the USA but in Canada it's just over half.


These were the statistics for 2017. Now add onto this that Amazon can save dramatically on Employee benefits because they wont have to provide coverage for Healthcare or things like Maternity Leave. There is also significant pressure to get our systems to cover Pharmacare, Dental and Optical so that would be even less medical coverage they would need to provide going forward if it came to be.

Public transit in our major cities are fairly decent and are only getting better as all three levels of government are continuing to expand rail systems and increasing bus frequency. Millennials like not being able to own a vehicle and our systems have been at a point where its an actual reality for awhile now.

Amazon would be lessening their reliance on the USA. This is a major bonus for both Canada and Mexico because currently if Amazon wants to hire someone overseas and bring them over to the USA they are entirely reliant on the USA granting the Visas and proper permits. If they don't approve it, Amazon is effectively screwed in regards to that person. On the other hand, if Amazon expanded into Canada or Mexico, they now have a second route to attracting talent since they can choose to bring them into their international HQ or their USA HQ. If one denies the person, they still have another route they can use to bring the person over.

The problem with rust belt and cold cities is that yes, while on paper there's a good cost/quality ratio, in reality young 20-40 year old IT and software engineers don't want to move there. If you're trying to add 50k employees, you need a city that younger talent wants to move to.

The most plausible of the cost/labor sweet spots that's cold is Chicago. But taxes there are much higher than other candidates.

 

[Apath]

I hope you mean 245 post offices.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Chicago_Main_Post_Office

It is a very large piece of land.

 

[kirblar]

The big thing pointing to DC/NOVA: Bezos bought a $23M house in DC this January - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ous-buyer-of-the-biggest-house-in-washington/

 

[Vanillalite]

So thinking about things logically. Amazon is going to primarily be looking at locations on the East Coast. I base this off of the fact that Amazon already has an extremely sizable west coast presence. They have HQ1 in Seattle, and they also have a sizable base in silicon valley. In addition, its also the typical expansion path for most companies when looking at regions. West-East-Center or East-West-Center. So with that in mind, I have a couple locations that I think might make it to the short list. In no particular order

- Toronto
- Ottawa
- Montreal
- DC
- NYC
- Houston
- Detroit

Respectfully disagree. I'd be shocked if it's not in the US. Houston while a great city isn't East enough if they are gonna do an Eastern version. Pittsburgh is the up and coming city not Detroit if it's going in the Mid West. Also DC isn't really condusive to this type of thing.

Not counting it just staying on the West Coast I'd say for East Coastish

Tier 1

Boston
NYC
Atlanta

Tier 2

Charlotte
Miami
Orlando
Raleigh

Not East or West

Tier 1

Houston
Chicago

Tier 2

Dallas
Pittsburgh


Honestly a lot of West Coast places make more sense. Either another HQ in Seattle or else Nor or So Cal. Idk how they'd do it in NYC due to the land they probably want. Would be less of an issue in Boston, Atlanta, Chicago, or Houston.

I'll admit DC is a wild card though if it's in Maryland like Under Armour is that really even DC metro? Ditto for Virginia Beach.

 

[Goro Majima]

St Louis is pushing hard for it but that's a tough hill to climb.

It would probably spark a massive renaissance in a city that used to be far more important than it is now. Don't think there isn't anything they wouldn't throw at Amazon to get them to move here.

 

[ghostofsparta]

I think Detroit gets ruled out because the people who they'd be trying to attract to work there aren't going to want to live there.

what's a better way to develop a city than get 50k high paid workers? Bring the people and the coffee shops, Whole Checks, fancy restaurants and what not, will come

 

[Vanillalite]

what's a better way to develop a city than get 50k high paid workers? Bring the people and the coffee shops, Whole Checks, fancy restaurants and what not, will come

Pittsburgh already did this hence why of a mid tier city if it was gonna go to one in the mid west I think Pitt > Detroit.

 

[kirblar]

I'll admit DC is a wild card though if it's in Maryland like Under Armour is that really even DC metro?

MD doesn't work because transportation would be a serious issue -MD's very, very hilly and it makes their roads/metro/etc way more annoying to build and develop. It'd have to be in DC/NOVA logistically. (The Pentagon, for example, has 23K employees.)

what's a better way to develop a city than get 50k high paid workers? Bring the people and the coffee shops, Whole Checks, fancy restaurants and what not, will come

It's not just the culture aspects- good public schools is another, and moving to a state that keeps trying to give its citizens lead poisoning is a non-starter.

 

[facetheslayer92]

It looks like AOL has sold a lot of their old land near Dulles/Sterling. Lots of good development out on 267.

 

[mantis23]

I think Detroit gets ruled out because the people who they'd be trying to attract to work there aren't going to want to live there.

Spoken like someone who hasn't been to Detroit lately. The city center has undergone a huge comeback over the last few years partially thanks to an influx of tech companies and has become a very desirable living destination for young professionals. You literally can not turn around downtown without bumping into new construction of upscale luxury condos and studio apartments. If you venture slightly outside of the downtown core there are many neighborhoods that are on the verge of revitalization full of the DIY crowd that could benefit from something like this. At the very least, people could commute to the suburbs. There are any number of "cool cities" that pepper the borders of Detroit.

Amazon is in the process of opening two distribution centers in the area and already has an office downtown. Google and Microsoft have offices here. There are a number of startup incubators downtown. The tech industry is slowly migrating to a city that is ready and willing to diversify from a manufacturing town. Detroit may not be the first city on the list, it may not be the second city on the list. But its silly to write it off because "nobody wants to live there"

 

[Vanillalite]

MD doesn't work because transportation would be a serious issue -MD's very, very hilly and it makes their roads/metro/etc way more annoying to build and develop. It'd have to be in DC/NOVA logistically. (The Pentagon, for example, has 23K employees.)

I guess my thing is semantics. What's considered DC and what's NOVA? I got family that live up there and IDK where one starts and stops.

 

[AbortedWalrusFetus]

Pittsburgh already did this hence why of a mid tier city if it was gonna go to one in the mid west I think Pitt > Detroit.

There is almost literally no reason for Amazon to pick Pittsburgh over Philadelphia if they're coming to Pennsylvania. It's got better transit access, a larger educated population to draw from, a more well established business community, better airport access, and it's closer to all major NE cities, and it's closer to vastly more universities. Philadelphia can even draw from Pittsburghs talent pool.

 

[Steeped in a Sea of Games]

I don't think Minneapolis has the infrastructure to support a huge company like Amazon. The roads and traffic are awful enough as it is.

But isn't that Target HQ?

Minneapolis has Target HQ in the city and Best Buy HQ just barely south in Richfield. We also have a big Amazon sorting warehouse out on the fringes of Minneapolis in Shakopee. A lot of med tech companies as well and the cities have seen a ton of growth so you could tap into that talent. There's a good amount of educated people here and MN often ranks as the healthiest state in the country without a huge cost of living to go with it. There's also easy access to Duluth for boat shipping in and out of Canada. In general, MN is very centralized with the entire North American continent. MSP airport is one of the most connected and used airports in the country.

I dunno, if they built on the periphery of the city instead of in the city proper, it'd probably be a pretty good place to be.

 

[Hari Seldon]

It is going to go to whatever local government can promise the most free shit. We should be ranking cities by how corruptible the local governments are, not by any other category lol.

 

[Pagusas]

It is going to go to whatever local government can promise the most free shit. We should be ranking cities by how corruptible the local governments are, not by any other category lol.

... You dont have to be corrupt to use tax incentives to better the local economy.

 

[Futureman]

Spoken like someone who hasn't been to Detroit lately. The city center has undergone a huge comeback over the last few years partially thanks to an influx of tech companies and has become a very desirable living destination for young professionals. You literally can not turn around downtown without bumping into new construction of upscale luxury condos and studio apartments. If you venture slightly outside of the downtown core there are many neighborhoods that are on the verge of revitalization full of the DIY crowd that could benefit from something like this. At the very least, people could commute to the suburbs. There are any number of "cool cities" that pepper the borders of Detroit.

Living in Pittsburgh my perception is that Detroit has still been struggling so that's nice to hear. 8 years of Obama really did well for the country after the Bush administration.

 

[lawnchair]

seattle got very expensive.

 

[Futureman]

seattle got very expensive.

Thanks Amazon.

 

[biggersmaller]

I don't think Minneapolis has the infrastructure to support a huge company like Amazon. The roads and traffic are awful enough as it is.

As I stand in downtown Minneapolis as light rail train bells echo a block away, in the shadow of my Fortune 500 employer's HQ and across the street from another, and within eyesight of 3 others - not to mention the dozen Fortune 500 HQ in a 10 mile radius I can't see, I know you clearly don't know the area.

I mean shit, three of them are retail (Target, Best Buy, Super Value).

Plus a ton of large corporate offices that aren't head quartered here like Amazon would be.

 

[kirblar]

I guess my thing is semantics. What's considered DC and what's NOVA? I got family that live up there and IDK where one starts and stops.

MD - Maryland
DC - Literally DC
NOVA- Northern VA.

Amazon has a large warehouse and a cloud server farm out in the Dulles area, but it's not clear if there's enough transportation infrastructure out that way to make an HQ work.

 

[hawkshockey11]

+1 for Buffalo especially if it comes with software dev positions

 

[facetheslayer92]

I guess my thing is semantics. What's considered DC and what's NOVA? I got family that live up there and IDK where one starts and stops.

99.99% of D.C. is east of the Potomac River. It's attached to Maryland. Anything west of D.C. is NOVA while east/north is obviously Maryland.

 

[Hari Seldon]

... You dont have to be corrupt to use tax incentives to better the local economy.

I'm not saying it isn't the smart thing to do, but I'm saying that giving away free shit to a corporation is from a high level pretty shitty. At least 50,000 jobs is a way better deal than the snake oil sports stadium horseshit.

 

[Steeped in a Sea of Games]

I'm not saying it isn't the smart thing to do, but I'm saying that giving away free shit to a corporation is from a high level pretty shitty. At least 50,000 jobs is a way better deal than the snake oil sports stadium horseshit.

Yeah, but if the state sees a bigger return on taxes than they gave out, it tends to work out.

 

[n0razi]

Texas/Dallas is my guess... its a top 10 metropolitan city without any major disaster issues and has insanely low taxes for business and income. Its also a central hub for the entire country.

 

[Friggz]

MD - Maryland
DC - Literally DC
NOVA- Northern VA.

Amazon has a large warehouse and a cloud server farm out in the Dulles area, but it's not clear if there's enough transportation infrastructure out that way to make an HQ work.

they are in the middle of building a *gigantic* metro line and plan to be done by 2019. My guess a few pages back was northern virginia becuase of everything going in the area. High talent pool, public transportation, cheapish land, and the space to expand.

 

[DopeyFish]

Toronto is basically perfectly positioned from a logistics, talent acquisition cost and talent attraction point of view.

From the upper level it is by far the most logical choice. However, our governments might not give as much incentive.

 

[kirblar]

they are in the middle of building a *gigantic* metro line and plan to be done by 2019. My guess a few pages back was northern virginia becuase of everything going in the area. High talent pool, public transportation, cheapish land, and the space to expand.

Yeah, it's the auto traffic part I'm worried about, 28/66 is a traffic jam

 

[Brandson]

Toronto would make sense for this. There's a lot of young tech talent willing to work for cheap, no risk of deportations of foreign-born employees, healthcare, low corporate taxes, a market that quite likes Amazon already, and this downtown Toronto site that is in the redevelopment planning stages that would make for a suitable HQ for 50000 employees: http://urbantoronto.ca/database/projects/east-harbour

There are plans to build a subway line through there eventually. If Amazon were to come on board, those plans would probably get the green light immediately.

 

[killer rin]

The problem with rust belt and cold cities is that yes, while on paper there's a good cost/quality ratio, in reality young 20-40 year old IT and software engineers don't want to move there. If you're trying to add 50k employees, you need a city that younger talent wants to move to.

The most plausible of the cost/labor sweet spots that's cold is Chicago. But taxes there are much higher than other candidates.

I beg to differ. Take Toronto for example. Population of 2.8million alone. 6.4million when you include the GTA (Which is the default when talking about Toronto) and 7.2 when you include the GTHA. Its the financial capital of Canada, the city with the best public transit and one that youth and immigrants alike have been moving to en masse for the greater part of the past decade. At its current population growth rate which has only gone up it adds about 1-2 million people every couple years.

Location-wise It's dead smack in the center of Ontario. By car it takes 4 Hours to Ottawa/Montreal, 4 Hours to Detroit, 2 Hours to Kitchener/Waterloo, 2 Hours to New York State. Its also host to Pearson International Airport which every flight and their mothers have to pass through. Every major business in the USA and Canada has a branch office or a HQ within the GTA so there will never be a lack of clients. Being in the financial capital means that they have easy access to Canadian Investors should they ever need them. Every business man worth their salt knows Pearson and is comfortable enough to navigate it with their eyes closed.

Education wise, the GTHA is home to a majority of the colleges and universities within the province, several of which are known for their Robotics and Computer Science programs. Add in Waterloo which has an even better reputation. Its fact that if you go to UoW or UoT you will get snatched up by a firm in the USA before you even graduate.

Climate wise, it's within the Great Lakes region which means it gets mild winters and hot summers. Mild winters defined as between -15c to 10c, and usually more on the warmer side than the colder side.

 

[Deleted member 284]

dropping T-Dot facts

Yeah I didn't get why people are saying Toronto doesn't have a chance. In fact, with UK turning to shit for young foreigners, Toronto has a once in a lifetime opportunity to become a bigger deal in tech and finance. I just left Brooklyn for here and im wowed at how much the city has grown and can still grow. We just need to plan for that increase.

 

[killer rin]

Yeah I didn't get why people are saying Toronto doesn't have a chance. In fact, with UK turning to shit for young foreigners, Toronto has a once in a lifetime opportunity to become a bigger deal in tech and finance. I just left Brooklyn for here and im wowed at how much the city has grown and can still grow. We just need to plan for that increase.

That reminds me of another plus for Canada in general. We recently managed to get a historic Free Trade Agreement with the European Union. That means that if Amazon located in Canada they would have easier access to the EU market in addition to first level access to the Canadian markets.

But yeah, I think the main reason people are looking down on the Canadian proposals is because usually when a USA company looks to expand, they are only looking within the USA. Or even if they say North America, they really mean USA. Here, everything from the project proposal requirements to what Amazon is saying is that Canada and Mexico are in the running as well. They mention State/Province at every opportunity they get and they are even helping cities within Canada and Mexico form attractive proposals.

 

[Kicko]

+1 for Buffalo especially if it comes with software dev positions

The more I think about it, the more Buffalo makes sense for Amazon. I detailed some of the advantages the city has in luring the company earlier in this thread, but I think something that is somewhat overlooked, and even understated, is it's strategic location. Buffalo has geography going for it. The city itself became the gateway to the west because of it's logistic advantages and the creation of the Erie canal. Our airports (Buffalo-Niagara and Niagara International) aren't congested and you can reach just about anywhere on the map in a decent time due to the regions central location.

 

[SMattera]

Spoken like someone who hasn't been to Detroit lately. The city center has undergone a huge comeback over the last few years partially thanks to an influx of tech companies and has become a very desirable living destination for young professionals. You literally can not turn around downtown without bumping into new construction of upscale luxury condos and studio apartments. If you venture slightly outside of the downtown core there are many neighborhoods that are on the verge of revitalization full of the DIY crowd that could benefit from something like this. At the very least, people could commute to the suburbs. There are any number of "cool cities" that pepper the borders of Detroit.

Amazon is in the process of opening two distribution centers in the area and already has an office downtown. Google and Microsoft have offices here. There are a number of startup incubators downtown. The tech industry is slowly migrating to a city that is ready and willing to diversify from a manufacturing town. Detroit may not be the first city on the list, it may not be the second city on the list. But its silly to write it off because "nobody wants to live there"

Spoken like someone that drinks the Dan Gilbert coolaid.

Detroit has one tiny strip in the middle. The rest of the city remains largely burned out, zombie land. Google is in the suburbs (Novi and Ann Arbor, 30min+ freeway drive away). Microsoft just moved from Southfield to Detroit. There's no public transportation. The Qline is another people mover joke. Car insurance is insane.

Royal Oak/Novi/Ann Arbor/Ferndale/Birmingham/etc are fine cities, but for a company that specifically wants a vibrant urban campus, Amazon would be better off moving to Ann Arbor or Grand Rapids.