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> a similar "doom loop" of crime, undevelopment, decaying historic buildings, etc. That's not the doom loop in the OP, which results from office space demand d
by wolverine876 2y ago
> a similar "doom loop" of crime, undevelopment, decaying historic buildings, etc.
That's not the doom loop in the OP, which results from office space demand decreasing due to so many working remotely:
Urban theorists describe a phenomenon called the “doom loop”: once workers stop filling up downtown offices, the stores and restaurants that serve them close, which in turn makes the area even emptier. And who wants to work somewhere with no services?
> every block has similar projects of 100+ year old buildings of nontrivial sizes that are now super unique apartments
Per the OP (and I've read elsewhere), older buildings are easier to convert because their floors are smaller, which makes it much easier to give a windows to every apartment (a law in many/most/all places).
- jvanderbot 2y agoIt's easy to imagine that the two doom loops are in fact connected. A vacant downtown is essentially what GP described, and the crime seemed to follow and exacerbate the problem
- wernercd 2y agoThe problem is the differences... IE: Soft on crime policies in large cities. I seriously doubt a lot of these larger cities that are in the "doom loop" will have the same results with the current differences between 20-30 years ago and today with simply turning buildings into apartments. Just look at New York where businesses are closing all over because of rampant theft. They aren't closing because people aren't there. They care closing because they can't afford to have half their wares walk out the door because New York is refusing to charge criminals because of "justice". The world we live in is vastly different than it was and the doom loops aren't just because of remote workers.
- causality0 2y agoI would be interested in an analysis of how refusals to prosecute are or are not affecting statistics. If you stop prosecuting a certain crime, does it appear like that crime is happening less on paper?
- pstrateman 2y agoYes because the police stop arresting people for it. If you don't prosecute, it effectively stops being illegal.
- bombcar 2y agoMost of the time. Certain crimes (eg public intoxication) often have an arrest followed by letting the person go when they’ve sobered up, so no official prosecution but not no arrest.
- pstrateman 2y agoPublic intoxication would seem to be the only example of that though. Can you think of any other?
- selimthegrim 2y agoLittering, poaching
- wolverine876 2y agoProtestors (whatever those charges are). Disobeying a police officer. Lots of things. The DA's resources are limited (unless all the Republican critics want to pay more taxes!). Arrest is enough of a deterrent for minor crimes.
- watwut 2y agoYeah, but protestors are frequently arrested and charged with completely made up charges. It is just a tactic how to discouraged protests. The cops doing arrests know about it, prosecutors know about it, defense layers knows about it and protesters know about it. It has nothing to do with deterring crimes or crime rates, it is just politics.
- outop 2y agoLoitering, prostitution, vagrancy.
- malfist 2y agoAh yes, New York, home of "stop and frisk" and it's other soft on crime policies.
- gottorf 2y agoNYPD hasn't been stopping and frisking in a while.
- wernercd 2y ago"stop and frisk" 1990 called and wants its talking point back. S&F has been "unconstitutional" for over a decade - and that's not counting Defund The Police shenannery, open border policies and stuff like "bail reform". IE: Illegal immigrants attacking police and getting released without bail.
- hughesjj 2y agoCitation needed on all of that. It's not just retail closing up in NYC -- the rent is ludicrous, and no one wants to start renting at a lowe rate lest their appraisal goes down and their mortgage lender/city coffers start putting the pressure on the landlord
- sifttio 2y agoCorporate real estate is a different beast. Residential real estate and corporate real estate do not mirror each other in the market. One can be in high demand while the other has excess supply. Residential landlords are also much different than dealing with corp real estate owners. The terms, length of lease, laws and many other factors are completely different.
- bombcar 2y agoPerhaps we need to encourage (via taxes?) convertible buildings that can either be corporate or residential with relative ease, similar to how in smaller towns you often have dentists and lawyers operating out of obviously converted houses.
- choilive 2y agoThis is primarily a building code issue for residential vs commercial construction. Office generally try to maximize square footage, this tends to result in floor plans that are very awkward to adopt into residential use, primarily because the building code virtually everywhere has some sort of "natural light"/window requirement. This means that purpose built residential high rises tend to be "skinnier" to have more windows per sq. ft of floor space. Not to mention the very expensive changes (hvac, plumbing, etc.) required to support residential use. If the building code was changed so that the requirements for office and residential use buildings were closer then it would make future buildings more easily convertible between those use cases. It does not solve the problem of the existing buildings however..
- hughesjj 2y agoI don't get how any of that is relevant when my claim is that the corporate rental rates is also too high and the financing for rentals shares the same concerns w.r.t rentable price regardless if it's residential or corporate landlords
- wolverine876 2y agoCrime is historically low in many cities, including NYC. Visit and you'll see what I mean.
- wernercd 2y agoCrime is historically low... as crimes like theft are decriminalized. It's easy to say there's less crime when you make stuff not a crime. For reference: all the stores closing because of all of the theft not being prosecuted or that's no longer enforced. IE: California where theft of under $1000 is no longer enforced.
- wolverine876 2y agoI'm talking about objective facts. You can make up reasons, but so can anyone about anything - they don't mean anything without a factual basis. Where in NY are these stores closing?
- chiefalchemist 2y agoA Walgreens or CVS closed near my GF's flat in NYC. She's within 10 blocks of Central Park. The chain said it was due to too much shrinkage. It's been discussed on WNYC as well, tho those experts claimed most shrinkage is employee related. I live closer to PHL and hear similar claims / rumours. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/it-s-started-shoplifting-in-nyc-is-up-60-stores-are-shutting-down-and-permanently-leaving/ss-BB1jGu11 https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/it-s-started-shoplif...
- gremlinunderway 2y agoSelf-reporting on these reasons from the business itself is basically useless. No one's fact checking their claims nor do they provide evidence when making these kinds of social-narrative driven claims like "taxes are too high!" or "too much theft!". Businesses, including chains, fail all the time and the owners/managers have an inherent incentive to try and deflect any blame on environmental factors so they are looked at more favourably by corporate.
- entangledqubit 2y agoI believe that some retailer special interest group put out some numbers that did not support any real increase in shoplifting/shrinkage. Initially they made a claim otherwise but they ended up backpedaling. Oddly, the numbers around shrinkage from self-checkout seems to be persistent though.
- wolverine876 2y ago> the crime seemed to follow and exacerbate the problem Did it? Not in NYC. Crime is very low; it's arguably one of the safest places to be in the country.
- jvanderbot 2y ago> seemed to In GP comment - sorry too late to edit.
- whythre 2y agoAccurate crime statistics are… let’s say, ‘discouraged,’ by the NYPD and the Mayor’s Office.
- zdragnar 2y agoCombine that the culture of not snitching, and you get wildly bad crime data, fueling all sorts of silly internet arguments, bad politics and bad social science.
- wolverine876 2y agoSo how do you know the truth? Maybe crime is even lower. I'm not sure how the no-snitch culture lowers the crime rate; it would seem to lower the conviction rate.
- zdragnar 2y agoIt's hard to convict if the crying never gets reported in the first place.
- warcher 2y agoIn the end the murder rate cannot be fudged, and it is quite favorable. https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-city-rankings/cities-with-most-murders https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-city-rankings/cities-wi...
- tylerFowler 2y agoTrue - not specifically related to fleeing workers, as I understand it (wasn't there at the time) the office usage was more or less static downtown through all of that. Though, nonetheless, most of the buildings I cited (and many more) remained vacant so over the grand scale of the 150 year history or so of that city, one could say office space was largely unused. Interesting point on older buildings being easier. I would have thought quite the opposite. Commerce Tower was one of the "newest" buildings converted and it was built in 1965. Although, I suspect older buildings are still an untapped resource in many cities depending on what we mean by "older".
- masom 2y ago"older" and "newer" is the construction type. Think of an old brick building with several stories and a window per floor vs a new steel + concrete building with windows spanning multiple floors. The "older" builder like the converted one in the parent post has small windows, allowing easy subdivisions. Newer buildings have windows spanning multiple floors and need to be retrofitted and on a skyscraper that comes at a huge cost. The bigger ticket item is the plumbing and ventilation, and to some extent the electrical. Ventilation is needed around the cooking area and washrooms, adding that to a building not purposed for this is challenging (where does the "contaminated" air go out?). It's often cheaper to bomb down the building and start over than doing a conversion on a new highrise. You'll see this often where they gut the entire structure and floors, keep a few walls/supporting structure, and build new.
- bobthepanda 2y agoi think the best way to describe it is to consider what an office in these types of buildings looks like. consider a detective office in a movie from like the '50s. the office is small, primary illumination is from large, openable windows, maybe there's a front section for a secretary. that happens to be pretty more or less around the ideal size for an apartment as well, though for more bedrooms you probably need to merge adjacent offices. now consider the office block from Office Space. it's extremely large and dark in the middle. it is so large that there is no way you could possibly get natural light into the middle easily. in Office Space that's kind of the point, the darkness and required artificial lighting makes it super depressing and a dystopian commentary on the modern economy. who would want to live in an interior like that?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- underlipton 2y agoNot easier, maybe slightly more economical. One could easily turn the less-desirable inner spaces into common areas or something else economically-sustainable, like public storage, co-working spaces, etc.
- rvba 2y ago> who wants to work somewhere with no services Nobody wants to work there, yet lots of people work there since they need money. And it's the employer who chooses the location. Of course top talent does not need to work in a crappy company, but that's the theory. Also empty space = less trafic. And you can get food delivered. If you can afford it. People are foreced to work in crappy open plan offices all the time.