Interesting. Wonder where in ‘Raleigh’ this would be. It’s probably using “Raleigh” loosely, meaning somewhere in the triangle region.
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I’m thinking it would require a good bit of land. Maybe RTP? Or maybe they go out on a limb and jumpstart some more development for East Wake
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I bet the need for lots of flat land takes them east. The advantage there is better access to 95 with out sacrificing too much on the 40/85 connection.
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I know a neighborhood (cough, Wendell falls) who is looking for a huge campus like tenant to take a gamble on the east side. Direct I-87 access and only 25 miles from I-95 but still only 15 miles from Raleigh
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Maybe they’ll choose one of the Megasites. I believe Moncure would be the closest? Already has rail running to it and a few other manufacturers.
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Edgecombe County, Franklin, Lee & Chatham all have “megasites” I believe……from what i have heard however is this facility may not require such a massive space as say, they actual Tesla body manufacturing site (or any car manufacturer) requires
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East Wake, or even Franklin County makes sense to me. I can even imagine Johnston County.
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I did see a guy in Smithfield was trying to sell 1200 acres right beside 95!
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I agree the Moncure site would be favorable, as it would connect by rail to the lithium mining in Western Gaston County. A Western site would have the advantage, if rail can connect to the mining site.
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Clarification: just because I can see a rail connection on a map doesn’t necessarily mean the rail company would agree.
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Don’t forget @ that very large CSX site in Rocky Mount
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A contrarian perspective for non-tech work.
I work in an office managing construction projects. The struggle we (the development/construction industry) are facing getting material from manufacturers, to the lumber yards, to the job site…the struggle to get qualifies laborers to do the work. It’s a truly amazing and scary time in the economy. There are major manufacturers, like James Hardie, that have completely shuttered product lines to focus on their most basic product. I was told yesterday JH is producing 14m sq ft of product a week and receiving orders for 17m…I have a chip on my shoulder regarding work from home, because the workers I rely on have to physically show up to keep the world turning. Installing and maintaining sewer lines, stormwater pipes, electrical lines, tree maintenance, concrete pouring, street cleaning, manufacturing, logistics… These are essential workers. And in my inbox this morning was a pertinent blog post from Strong Towns: After the Innovation Revolusion, Who will Clean the Streets?
I mean no disrespect to folks who WFH. I think it’s great that it’s an option, and it certainly has benefits to society in general. I just hope it doesn’t give rise to a generation that strives to achieve WFH, because that will lead to the “slow disasters” the article mentions.
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Amen!! I work in env consulting and our folks have to be present. As a PM, I can WFH, but honestly, it makes it difficult to interact and maintain relationships with my "hands on " folks in the field. We have just hired a bunch of new folks, and relationships and skills need to be developed before we can cut them lose into the world on their own. I hated to transition to WFH, but with 3 kids in remote school for a year, it was the only option I had besides spending a fortune on someone to stay with them. Once the kidos go back to school in August, I’ll be back in the office 4-5 days per week.
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Relationships. Bingo.
I think the most interesting part of that article is the notion that we can’t neglect maintenance work or workers, or try to hide them from society. It’s creating a “maintenance caste”.
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I have WFH for 20 years now, and the entire issue is one of nuance. Clearly essential workers whose jobs can’t be done remotely are not viable candidates for WFH. That said, removing the WFH cars from the highways reduces our demand on resources, frees up lanes for people who need to use them, reduces emissions into the environment, and allows companies to be more nimble.
This is not an all or nothing conversation, but things will not go back to the way they were in Feb. 2020.
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Agreed absolutely on those benefits to society, especially the reduced demand of resources, like heating and cooling a home when it’s unoccupied during business hours. I think the problem we are beginning to run into that potentially will worsen is a complete lack of interest for hands-on work. I come from a bloodline of masons, but even as a millennial growing up I had no interest in learning any trades. I’ve enjoyed getting into it as an adult. Wok be interesting to see how younger generations view work and labor.
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No disrespect but I don’t see how the desire of knowledge workers to WFH more would affect the decision of young people to not pursue a hands-on trade or work. I think that’s a reach.
We have already heard here on the board from many people that say they can’t wait to go back to their offices. This is about our knowledge workforce having more choice and control over their work lives with more respect to their personal lives. Even before the pandemic began, there were many full time remote (WFH) people like me, and many more (if not the majority of) knowledge workers who extended their days at home in the mornings, evenings, and weekends to manage commutes, and all of their lives’ obligations within the context of business that never sleeps and the colleagues that they engage across time zones.
IMO what will compel the next generation to pursue hands-on work is more about the work itself, its value to society, its ability to connect to them on an emotional and/or intellectual level, its contribution to self worth, and compensation.
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Who will get the last word on this tangent I started!?!? Haha
To summarize my thoughts, I think the rise in WFH due to the pandemic is just another notch on the belt of the innovation revolution, slowly eroding away incentive for someone to choose a physical skilled or unskilled job occupation. Money or fulfillment aside, young adults follow the culture and what their contemporaries are pursuing for occupation. I can see a possible future where highly educated people will be forced to learn and maintain mechanical/physical systems or face a 3rd world reality, because there is no one on the other end of the phone (or bot chat) that is going to show up and do it for pay.
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Hopefully Bandwidth’s campus will foster greater relationships and camradarie within their team and prove to be a worthwhile investment.
I think this tangent/debate is stuck because you and @evan.j.bost are both right and wrong at the same time.
I don't think WFH is "good" or "bad", but the fact we're having this debate at all suggests there's something darker going on (click to see what I mean).
I think that’s true for higher-earning workers (and I certainly vibe with that, as someone in the biotech industry). But then I saw:
This sounded like it came from the same place as where Evan said:
I agree with John’s premise in that I also don’t see a cause-and-effect relationship between WFH desires and interest in trade-based work (or, to take it a step further, jobs that don’t need degrees). Still, you can have correlation without causation. That just implies there’s something in common between the things we see.
Moving the line in the sand from WFH to job types, then, I think what Evan pointed out takes on another meaning:
I think you could extend John and @Nickster’s arguments on why in-person jobs won’t be entirely replaced to say that skilled trade also won’t go away (even if it takes on different forms, such as replacing mechanists with mechanical engineers). In that sense, I don’t think that 3-way conflict of skilled-nonphysical vs skilled-physical vs unskilled labor is an issue of one choice beating out others.
If it’s not a choice between paths for self-fulfillment, then, what’s causing people to say “no” to careers without degree requirements or involving skilled labor (which can show up as a rise in WFH)? Maslow’s hierarchy says you need to fulfill “basic” needs before you can achieve what you want. In that case, could the rise in WFH actually come from deeper problems in people’s livelihoods?
I’m sure everyone’s noticed the increases in number of “servers wanted” signs in restaurants, but that labor shortage really extends from HVAC design to airline cabin attendants and GoTriangle. The jobs that are having this problem are non-WFH jobs, sure, but they also have other things in common like employers who are rarely known to offer competitive pay. That’s something that Forbes, some economists, and business writers have started to take seriously. If that relationship is real, I think it means the dip in non-WFH jobs hints at disapproval over how people in those industries feel and work; it’s not just a personal preference or market trend.
That doesn’t mean the converse is true (i.e. I don’t think the rise of WFH jobs suggests a support for how WFH-friendly workspaces are). But I wonder if it’s more helpful to think about WFH as a part of a complex system? After all, that has huge downstream effects for how corporate HQs may plan on moving to the Triangle in the future.
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