6 ms·

> Sidewalk Labs, a sister company to Google, had acquired disused land in Toronto, Canada for this bold urban experiment "Disused land" is a bit disingenuous.

by mabbo 7y ago

> Sidewalk Labs, a sister company to Google, had acquired disused land in Toronto, Canada for this bold urban experiment "Disused land" is a bit disingenuous. Toronto real estate prices are very high right now and this is waterfront property. It's former industrial land we're hoping to revitalize. As far as I can tell, Google isn't doing us a favor here. They're just another developer trying to make a bunch of money off of our huge need for additional housing. They choose to make this money via surveillance and advertising, and increasing demand by promising some neat tech benefits. But if they weren't here, that land would still be developed. Probably sooner. (And probably by a developer making money by cutting every corner in the build).

sonnyblarney 7y ago
" Google isn't doing us a favor here. They're just another developer trying to make a bunch of money off of our huge need for additional housing." Though I don't like the prospects of Google doing this, there are two issues with the comment: - Google is probably 'doing the city a favour'. Google has a gadgillion dollars we've handed to them, and their de-facto cost of capital (internally at least) is very cheap. The project probably won't make them a dime, it's borderline one of those 'moonshot' things, a speculative project that they can maybe learn from, get some PR, a giant branding exercise. They could easily lose a lot of money. They are definitely not doing this is a regular 'real estate play'. - Toronto 'desperately needs housing'? Then why is Toronto very aggressively bringing in 100K people per year into the city? That seems like a dumb thing to do with a 'lack of housing'? Housing prices are a function of market demand, interest rates, and distorted somewhat by small amounts of inelastic demand from elsewhere. But your original comment i.e. disusland is apt: the land is very valuable. The city should ideally zone it for whatever purpose we think is best, and then sell it. Then it will very actively 'used' for the purposes in which we have zoned it, and we don't need to worry at all about managing it. Surely there are some strategic things we could to, but again that has a lot to do with zoning: maybe we want a big park, maybe a huge shopping mall, maybe 10000 identical homes, maybe 10000 entirely unique homes, maybe giant factories, maybe tiny factories - we can mostly zone and regulate for what we want.
- dade_ 7y ago
  There are so many uninformed opinions here. The land is already being developed, it is well underway. There is substantial infrastructure, and decontamination projects ongoing for many years. Waterfront Toronto is a three level of government partnership (Federal, provincial and local) that plans the public spaces, roadways, transit and sells the land to developers to fund their activities (so yes, a lot of money). Sidewalk labs partnered with them to integrate smart city ideas, etc. The complexities of the situation are due to the fact that Sidewalk labs is really just the front end of many different companies that would provide the technology to make it happen.
  - sonnyblarney 7y ago
    Sorry, but for ostensibly 'so many uniformed opinions' - you have provided no facts at all to validate this position. ... and ironically your comment "Sidewalk labs partnered with them to integrate smart city ideas," is effectively not true, it's far beyond that. "There is substantial infrastructure, and decontamination projects ongoing for many years" comment I think is possibly misrepresentative as well, it implies 'the work has started' - when really it hasn't - moreover, I did not indicate that 'nothing has been done'. Again: 1) To the OP's point: this is a strategic, highly speculative project for Google, possibly not money making in the direct sense, and it's likely Toronto could come out ahead in some way (though I doubt it). Google is a massively cash flush entity, looking for ways to spend money. 2) Toronto doesn't have a desperate housing problem - it has a housing pricing problem. The Google project is not really relevant anyhow (it's small and will have less housing than zoning permits) 3) The city should zone and regulate the land for 'whatever purposes are suitable' and then that's mostly it, which is an opinion, but not exactly controversial as this is what most cities, including Toronto, do all of the time. To your points: A) Google is not gong to 'integrate smart city ideas' - they want to be considerably more than that, they want to effectively be a municipal of entity: they'll plan, subcontract, 'micro zone' etc.. Their plans go far beyond just tech, or just communications, just consultation - even into the realm of construction materials, architecture, sub-planning, even taxation! See the leaked data [1]. I actually would agree if Google were involved only to 'help with some IT/tech issues' or even 'advising' on developing some aspects of information etc. but this goes way beyond that. B) The 'Sidewalks Labs' relevant work has not been planned or started, of course some municipal infrastructural activities that have been going on for some time, but that's a general activity. 'Decontamination' is obviously something that would have to be done irrespective of whatever they built (i.e. shops, factories, parks etc.) Sidewalks Labs hasn't yet even proposed a detailed curriculum of what's going to happen, it's not fair to indicate that 'work has been ongoing for some time' even though some basic municipal activity has been. [1] https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/15/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-toronto-tax-revenue/ https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/15/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-t...
Fricken 7y ago
A study was done and they determined the main reason Nimbys are Nimbys is because they don't like the idea of developers making money by building things near them: https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/09/what-if-nimbys-hate-developers-more-than-housing/570169/ https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/09/what-if-nimbys-hate-d...
- mabbo 7y ago
  That's really fascinating. I'm not bothered by developers making money. They're a very important part of the housing system. But what does bother me is when you have buildings poorly constructed, made to be cheap to build but expensive to maintain. Most of the condos along the waterfront meet that criteria. Even my own building, which on the whole is pretty well built, has to undergo a huge renovation to each unit because the developer used plastic piping instead of copper and it's failing. The developer saved a few bucks, and I'm paying for it years later. I'm a YIMBY- so long as the developer isn't cutting corners.
  - metildaa 7y ago
    Copper pipe isn't a be all, end all, if anything it can be more damage prone than plastic pipe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD5lMITzx_Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD5lMITzx_Y
  - tedivm 7y ago
    PVC is extremely common for plumbing and should not, by it self, cause any issues. Copper pipes are very expensive and leak copper into the water, which can have some negative affects on health. The middle school I went to actually had to bring in bottled water because the copper quantity in the water was too high. Copper pipes are also much louder.
    - ip26 7y ago
      First of all PVC can't be used on the drinking side, only drain. Second of all, not all types of plastic used in plumbing have stood the test of time.
ajcodez 7y ago
> And probably by a developer making money by cutting every corner in the build. Well at least Concord didn’t get it. You can remove surveillance but it’s hard to undo a bunch of ugly condo towers.

by mabbo 7y ago

sonnyblarney 7y ago

" Google isn't doing us a favor here. They're just another developer trying to make a bunch of money off of our huge need for additional housing." Though I don't like the prospects of Google doing this, there are two issues with the comment: - Google is probably 'doing the city a favour'. Google has a gadgillion dollars we've handed to them, and their de-facto cost of capital (internally at least) is very cheap. The project probably won't make them a dime, it's borderline one of those 'moonshot' things, a speculative project that they can maybe learn from, get some PR, a giant branding exercise. They could easily lose a lot of money. They are definitely not doing this is a regular 'real estate play'. - Toronto 'desperately needs housing'? Then why is Toronto very aggressively bringing in 100K people per year into the city? That seems like a dumb thing to do with a 'lack of housing'? Housing prices are a function of market demand, interest rates, and distorted somewhat by small amounts of inelastic demand from elsewhere. But your original comment i.e. disusland is apt: the land is very valuable. The city should ideally zone it for whatever purpose we think is best, and then sell it. Then it will very actively 'used' for the purposes in which we have zoned it, and we don't need to worry at all about managing it. Surely there are some strategic things we could to, but again that has a lot to do with zoning: maybe we want a big park, maybe a huge shopping mall, maybe 10000 identical homes, maybe 10000 entirely unique homes, maybe giant factories, maybe tiny factories - we can mostly zone and regulate for what we want.

dade_ 7y ago
There are so many uninformed opinions here. The land is already being developed, it is well underway. There is substantial infrastructure, and decontamination projects ongoing for many years. Waterfront Toronto is a three level of government partnership (Federal, provincial and local) that plans the public spaces, roadways, transit and sells the land to developers to fund their activities (so yes, a lot of money). Sidewalk labs partnered with them to integrate smart city ideas, etc. The complexities of the situation are due to the fact that Sidewalk labs is really just the front end of many different companies that would provide the technology to make it happen.
- sonnyblarney 7y ago
  Sorry, but for ostensibly 'so many uniformed opinions' - you have provided no facts at all to validate this position. ... and ironically your comment "Sidewalk labs partnered with them to integrate smart city ideas," is effectively not true, it's far beyond that. "There is substantial infrastructure, and decontamination projects ongoing for many years" comment I think is possibly misrepresentative as well, it implies 'the work has started' - when really it hasn't - moreover, I did not indicate that 'nothing has been done'. Again: 1) To the OP's point: this is a strategic, highly speculative project for Google, possibly not money making in the direct sense, and it's likely Toronto could come out ahead in some way (though I doubt it). Google is a massively cash flush entity, looking for ways to spend money. 2) Toronto doesn't have a desperate housing problem - it has a housing pricing problem. The Google project is not really relevant anyhow (it's small and will have less housing than zoning permits) 3) The city should zone and regulate the land for 'whatever purposes are suitable' and then that's mostly it, which is an opinion, but not exactly controversial as this is what most cities, including Toronto, do all of the time. To your points: A) Google is not gong to 'integrate smart city ideas' - they want to be considerably more than that, they want to effectively be a municipal of entity: they'll plan, subcontract, 'micro zone' etc.. Their plans go far beyond just tech, or just communications, just consultation - even into the realm of construction materials, architecture, sub-planning, even taxation! See the leaked data [1]. I actually would agree if Google were involved only to 'help with some IT/tech issues' or even 'advising' on developing some aspects of information etc. but this goes way beyond that. B) The 'Sidewalks Labs' relevant work has not been planned or started, of course some municipal infrastructural activities that have been going on for some time, but that's a general activity. 'Decontamination' is obviously something that would have to be done irrespective of whatever they built (i.e. shops, factories, parks etc.) Sidewalks Labs hasn't yet even proposed a detailed curriculum of what's going to happen, it's not fair to indicate that 'work has been ongoing for some time' even though some basic municipal activity has been. [1] https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/15/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-toronto-tax-revenue/ https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/15/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-t...

Fricken 7y ago

A study was done and they determined the main reason Nimbys are Nimbys is because they don't like the idea of developers making money by building things near them: https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/09/what-if-nimbys-hate-developers-more-than-housing/570169/ https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/09/what-if-nimbys-hate-d...

mabbo 7y ago
That's really fascinating. I'm not bothered by developers making money. They're a very important part of the housing system. But what does bother me is when you have buildings poorly constructed, made to be cheap to build but expensive to maintain. Most of the condos along the waterfront meet that criteria. Even my own building, which on the whole is pretty well built, has to undergo a huge renovation to each unit because the developer used plastic piping instead of copper and it's failing. The developer saved a few bucks, and I'm paying for it years later. I'm a YIMBY- so long as the developer isn't cutting corners.
- metildaa 7y ago
  Copper pipe isn't a be all, end all, if anything it can be more damage prone than plastic pipe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD5lMITzx_Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD5lMITzx_Y
- tedivm 7y ago
  PVC is extremely common for plumbing and should not, by it self, cause any issues. Copper pipes are very expensive and leak copper into the water, which can have some negative affects on health. The middle school I went to actually had to bring in bottled water because the copper quantity in the water was too high. Copper pipes are also much louder.
  - ip26 7y ago
    First of all PVC can't be used on the drinking side, only drain. Second of all, not all types of plastic used in plumbing have stood the test of time.

ajcodez 7y ago

> And probably by a developer making money by cutting every corner in the build. Well at least Concord didn’t get it. You can remove surveillance but it’s hard to undo a bunch of ugly condo towers.