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Newest coworking space costs just $2.25 an hour, because it is a parking spot
- amelius 7y agoI've seen someone being literally bumped out of a parking spot by a car, because the driver wanted to park there.
- lprubin 7y ago$2.25/hr for 8 hours is $18. I don't know about the SF prices but in Manhattan you can get a "hot desk" for $30/day at some fairly nice places. I'd guess in Brooklyn you can probably find/negotiate something comparable to $18/hr.
- candu 7y agoI was just going to say the same - and $18 / day * 21-ish working days per month is...$400 / month. Hey, that's roughly what a coworking office space costs! Except sitting in a parking spot, you don't get free wifi, coffee / tea, bathrooms, networking events, shelter from the elements, facilities security / maintenance... So: I'm not sure how coworking fits into the larger point they're trying to make. Yes, residential rent is insane in San Francisco - no argument there. Yes, parking spaces that sit unused throughout most of the day are an unfortunate legacy of car-centric urban design. Both of these are solid and reasonable points to make. But $400 / month for an office space that comes with a slew of amenities? That seems entirely reasonable to me, and definitely in keeping with permanent desk costs in other, less extravagantly priced cities.
- snarf21 7y agoThe best part of co-working spaces is that the cost scales completely linearly without signing multi-year leases and deposits and all the other logistics of having an office.
- RandallBrown 7y agoYou can get a hot desk for $30/person/day. This parking spot is only $2.25 for as many people as you can fit in it.
- zrobotics 7y agoWhat confusese is that anytime the open-office concept is mentioned it seems that nearly nobody is in favor of it, yet that is the model employed by most coworking spaces. I can't imagine trying to actually be productive in most of those environments.
- JohnFen 7y ago> I can't imagine trying to actually be productive in most of those environments. I know from experience that I can't, and that's one reason why things like WeWork would not be something that I'd consider. I wouldn't even take a position with a company that uses an open office plan. But there are apparently a large enough number of people who find that sort of thing tolerable that a business catering to them appears viable.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago$18 for a workday is bargain pricing for parking in the Boston area.
- Tomte 7y agoTwenty people working in a space about the size of a parking spot? I call bullshit.
- jotm 7y agoThis is getting ridiculous.
- phalangion 7y agoThat appears to be the point.
- humanbeinc 7y agoWhat a time we live in...
- jontaydev 7y agoHas anybody tried to create something like AirBnB for co-working/office spaces? There must be people willing to rent out a spare bedroom they never use, etc. All you really need to provide is a desk and internet.
- jeswin 7y agoThis is an excellent idea! Letting out the entire apartment or most of it could make for a better experience, since part of the appeal (for many) is the community and a break from solo working environments. One could make an app where users could see coworker profiles etc - might appeal to people looking for inspiration or motivation.
- s3r3nity 7y agoA lot of states have laws against office and living spaces being in the same building, if I recall. Maybe someone else has more expertise and correct me. This would obviously make it difficult for someone to rent out their living room to $Startup, for example.
- Scoundreller 7y agoDid Uber let local laws strangle its business? NO! Did Airbnb let local laws strangle its business? NO! Did PayPal let money transmitter licenses and rampant fraud strangle its business? NO! Did YouTube let rampant piracy strangle its business? NO! Now go start your residential hot-desking business!!’
- cjsawyer 7y agoI guess the moral is that if you make enough money fast enough, you can hire lawyers to keep you out of jail.
- localhostdotdev 7y agoexactly what I was thinking, e.g. "need a working space anywhere? just use the app and rent a one of our free spaces or share one" I could definitely see VC money going into this, maybe even an existing company doing it. the parking spots could have temporary structures to make it more like an office, have plugs, internet, etc. then it could expand globally and it's no issue if it's outlawed in one city/country, just go to the next city/country.
- larrydag 7y agoI hope they have the added cost of theft, vandalism, and medical. That looks really risky.
- gumby 7y agoWas the reporter too credulous or were they in on the joke?
- s3r3nity 7y agoWelcome to Silicon Valley: where everyone has somehow bamboozled themselves into believing that working in a cramped parking space is more valuable than buying office real estate in LITERALLY any other state... Remember kids: you don’t HAVE to live in California.
- dcosson 7y agoCan’t tell if you’re serious but this was a joke/stunt. The point being to show how poor of a use of space it is to have street parking lining every street in an expensive and crowded city.
- chrisan 7y agoHe may have taken it too literally... but he does have a point. Everyone doesn't _need_ to live in SF. > proving two points: one about the high cost of coworking spaces in an already unaffordable city, and another about how the space currently dedicated to on-street parking in cramped cities like San Francisco could be put to better and more human-centric use. You can reduce your cost of living/co-working by moving out of the city. I can't imaging wanting to deal with fumes, electricity, weather, traffic dangers just to stay in the city by converting parking spots to more "human-centric" areas.
- dcosson 7y agoAgain...it was a stunt. These were pro-housing folks but no one is suggesting directly turning parking into makeshift long term office space or housing. Human centric uses might include — protected bike lanes, trees so that the sidewalks feel further removed from cars, food trucks, outdoor cafe seating, etc. Also, sure, not everyone needs to live in SF. But that’s a completely unrelated point. There are still people who do choose to live here and want to make the city a nicer place to live.
- zrobotics 7y agoIronically, the pictures of one of the #wepark offices in the article was literally directly in front of empty commercial real estate for lease. What does this stunt prove, aside from being slightly silly? Should all the buildings be expanded by ~6',and the sidewalk moved directly adjacent to the road? Because even if personal automobiles are entirely eliminated, roads will still be necessary for access. As a tounge-in-cheek protest against high prices it works, but I think the grandparent is making a more salient point than the wepark group. If your job can be done from a temporary office environment (and many of the people interviewed already worked from their homes) then a far better solution to expensive real estate is to move, especially if you are already working remotely. How much space can actually be reclaimed from on-street parking in a feasible manner? Likely not enough to make a significant difference in the price of real-estate.
- keeganjw 7y agoGood on them for bringing attention to how much space is wasted for parking in cities! A clever way to raise awareness.
- Luc 7y agoApparently a bit too clever for a lot of people, going by many of the comments here.
- cowpewter 7y agoThat makes me wonder what else you could repurpose as an office in places where offices are disproportionally expensive. What about a climate-controlled storage unit? A quick Googling tells me you can get a small (but large enough for a desk) climate controlled storage unit in San Fran for about $100-150/month. That's vastly cheaper than a co-working space. I know you can get storage units with power, they're pretty popular as practice spaces for bands around where I live. You'd need a mobile hotspot for internet, and no windows might be a bit depressing, but for the price...
- Invictus0 7y agoMet a guy in DC that actually lived inside a warehouse storage unit. He had installed lights, walls for multiple bedrooms, a kitchen/bar, and a lot of cool art. I'm awful at estimating distances but I'd guess the main room was about 800sqft and the bedrooms/bathrooms were divided from another 400sqft. With a little love, any place can become a home.
- fyfy18 7y agoI haven't ever seem a storage unit with plumbing before...
- cowpewter 7y agoWater tanks filled from outside and a composting toilet maybe?
- dsfyu404ed 7y agoI think he meant rented warehouse space, not an actual storage unit. Storage units rarely have more than a single electrical outlet and many lower end ones don't even have that.
- zrobotics 7y agoMost of the plumbing technology developed for RV 'boondocking' would be perfectly adequate. Bit of a PITA, but I've done that for 2.5 week stretches in the mountains on ~1 gallon/day of H2O. My real concern would be no windows, definitely not great for anyone who suffers from seasonal affective disorder.
- slashcom 7y agoThat is the actual plot of the SheWork episode in Broad City.
- nickthegreek 7y agoClip of the SheWork concept. https://youtu.be/Sk-WvSvQbKk?t=93 https://youtu.be/Sk-WvSvQbKk?t=93
- Abishek_Muthian 7y agoThey should invest in getting those large collapsable umbrellas for shade, working in 'on-road parking' during summer doesn't sound practical.
- Cthulhu_ 7y agoOr an RV or van converted to an office space.
- JohnFen 7y agoI did this (in an RV) for a few years in my younger days, when starting my first business. It worked very, very well for me and came with the added benefit that I could move my office any time I wanted to be in a place that was more convenient or enjoyable.
- Abishek_Muthian 7y agoI think the motive of this group is to organise people to the streets with bare minimum costs, sounds more like an agenda to show that it's possible than to be a practical working space.
- localhostdotdev 7y agothe website: https://www.wepark.us https://www.wepark.us the original twitter thread (first test drive): https://twitter.com/VictorPontis/status/1121521771633500160 https://twitter.com/VictorPontis/status/1121521771633500160
- Scoundreller 7y agoIt’s $2.75/hr. Talk about inflation!
- pseudolus 7y agoIn a similar vein I'm working on an idea to monetize cemetery plots and crypts in and around San Francisco. They're quiet workplaces with scenic views (lots of flowers and greenery), often centrally located and many are close to coffee shops. With a little cabling/wiring and some temporary structures they would make ideal workplaces.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- stronglikedan 7y ago> they would make ideal workplaces I'm not sure ideal is the right word, but I get your drift.
- derp_dee_derp 7y agoI think you are missing the whole point of cemeteries and crypts: to honor the dead. They are not parks. They are not nature preserves. They are not just quiet places with scenic views. They are memorials to those who have gone before. Turning a place of honor into an office space kinda defeats the whole point and is super disrespectful.
- viklove 7y agoI'm pretty sure the comment you're replying to was sarcastic.
- xtracto 7y agoYou might be half kidding. But one thing I loved in the UK was that people went to cemetery to jog. That is a great multifunctional use of a plot of land. I live pretty close to a cemetery, however due to cultural customs, I would never think of going there to jog. Unfortunately, there is no other place nearby my house were I could go jogging.
- WD-42 7y agoThis is a fantastic demonstration of how poorly we manage our streets. There is no doubt in my mind that in the future we will look back at how we currently treat parking and wonder "What took so long?" I wonder if anyone has ever calculated the amount of actual acreage taken up by street parking in San Francisco. Undoubtedly it's a huge amount that you would consider extremely valuable in a place like San Francisco. Yet we're letting people dump their single passenger vehicles in public and it's no big deal.
- zck 7y agoThe group Improv Everywhere did a similar thing, playing it more for laughs: https://improveverywhere.com/2018/11/13/phone-booth-coworking/ https://improveverywhere.com/2018/11/13/phone-booth-coworkin...