Boulder was like this when I was in college there, well before Google existed. They always capped growth at a ridiculously low percentage because of all the NIMBY behavior.<p>Housing in the surrounding suburbs of Denver would easily be less than 1/4 the price. Most people who worked in Boulder commuted from a nearby suburb even back then. Thankfully it was the only the city in the area to pick up on NIMBYism, unlike the Bay Area.
Brad Feld wrote a pretty scathing response to this piece, and as someone who lived in the Denver / Boulder area growing up, I have to agree with him.<p><a href="http://www.feld.com/archives/2014/12/endless-struggle-boulder.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.feld.com/archives/2014/12/endless-struggle-boulde...</a>
Why do they always locate in places that have these screwed-up housing markets. There are many, many urban centres in North America with ample university grads pouring out of local institutions, a plethora of amenities, and cheap housing. Any former-industrial city fits the template just fine and would be ecstatic to have a gentrification "problem".
Boulder has always been quite expensive because of the abundance of nature that it basks in. This might add to high real estate prices, but certainly would not be the root cause of it.<p>It's actually traditionally been quite an educated and engineering-focused city, so it's really nothing other than NIMBYism for current residents to oppose this. Does it really matter if some of the new residents are software rather than petroleum engineers?
What a luxury these people have to complain and be worried about high income jobs coming to their town. The town I live in would fall all over itself to have Google build a campus here.
Brad Feld commented on this article here: <a href="http://www.feld.com/archives/2014/12/endless-struggle-boulder.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.feld.com/archives/2014/12/endless-struggle-boulde...</a>
Anyone who describes Boulder as undergoing gentrification has clearly never been here. Upper class whites have been pushing out middle class whites for 15 years now. Comparing this to the situation in SF seems irrelevant.<p>Edit: I've split time between Boulder and SF for the past few years and have experienced both.
While cost in certainly an interesting -and perhaps dire- discussion, I'm equally curious about what this will do to the work environment in Boulder.<p>A have a good deal of my friends in tech here in Boulder, many of who work for big names such at Twitter and Google. However, nearly all of them agree- they wouldn't work at those places if they had to work Silicon Valley Hours.<p>Boulder has long had a culture of not working 80 hours weeks like the Valley. But if Google massively increases their presence in Boulder, I wonder if that will change the normal work habits here? Or perhaps they will lose the workers that refuse to prioritize work over lifestyle?<p>I really don't know which way that will go, although I personally hope the latter.
Interesting; I'm considering moving to that area. Sad to see this kind of thing, especially considering that Boulder has plenty of room both vertically, and to the east, in which to add housing stock so as to lower prices.
I'm surprised nobody just puts together a new little tech town on the front range where there isn't anything, say just south of Pueblo or north of Ft. Collins. Plenty of foothills to go around.
Change the tax code to a "Colonizer's Locked In Rate" so that people who originally started or live in a town pay the same property tax as long as they stay in that town / city / zip code / within _ mile radius of their original home.<p>● That way original residents are not forced out.<p>● Low income residents can afford to stay without further special subsidies. Tax payers don't have to pay for low income housing.<p>● Residents will have the incentive to improve their communities without fear of it raising their taxes.
Real estate has always cost more in Boulder than neighboring towns. There's a height restriction on building, and the local government (I've forgotten if it was the county or city) bought a lot of open space from private landowners.<p>Supply and demand...people want to live in Boulder because it's nice because there is open space. Google builds in places where people want to live.