Google\u2019s vision for a transit village in San Jose is poised to rearrange the urban heart of the Bay Area\u2019s biggest city \u2014 and aims to alter how corporate campuses are crafted in a\u2026<\/b>
\nSAN JOSE \u2014 Google\u2019s plan to build a massive transit-centered village in downtown San Jose could provide a new model for the design of sprawling tech campuses by addressing one of the Bay Area\u2019s biggest headaches: commuters sitting in seemingly endless traffic jams.
The Mountain View search giant\u2019s development would reshape downtown San Jose in a dramatic fashion, similar to the major renewal of San Francisco\u2019s Mission Bay. It would take advantage of the groundwork San Jose and Silicon Valley leaders have done to bring more transit links into Diridon Station. And the project would elevate San Jose\u2019s position among tech\u2019s biggest host cities, bringing 15,000 to 20,000 Google employees into the city, which is already home to large tech employers such as Cisco Systems, Adobe Systems and eBay.
\u201cThis project really exemplifies the rethinking of the corporate campus, \u201d said Teresa Alvarado, director of the San Jose office of SPUR, a planning and urban research nonprofit group. \u201cWe are moving away from the sprawling, car-centric campus where people stay inside all day. Google would create a campus integrated with the community.\u201d
Google is already working to secure real estate near downtown San Jose\u2019s transit hub, Diridon Station. The plan it\u2019s discussing with San Jose city officials would redraw the map of some 240 acres, building 6 million to 8 million square feet of tech offices and research-and-development space, along with room for retailers.
On Tuesday, the San Jose City Council is scheduled to decide whether to open negotiations with Google to sell 16 city- and local agency-owned properties to the Mountain View search giant.
\u201cThis is critically important for downtown San Jose, \u201d Mayor Sam Liccardo said. \u201cBut far more than people realize, this is critically important for the future of Silicon Valley.\u201d
Echoes of Mission Bay
The potential renovation of downtown\u2019s Diridon Station area evokes parallels to San Francisco\u2019s Mission Bay, which until an official groundbreaking in 2000 was a 303-acre windswept shoreline dominated by old rail yards, ship piers, warehouses, industrial buildings, marshes and waterfowl.
\u201cNow it\u2019s an unbelievable metropolis, \u201d said Mark Ritchie, president of San Jose-based Ritchie Commercial, a realty firm. \u201cGoogle can become to downtown San Jose what UCSF has become to Mission Bay. This will be bigger than anything that has happened in downtown San Jose.\u201d
Some 17 years after construction began in Mission Bay, about 5,000 of a planned 6,400 residential units have been constructed. Mission Bay is home to a UC San Francisco medical center, Kaiser Permanente, Lyft, Cisco Systems and Nektar Therapeutics. On the horizon: Chase Center, whose highest-profile tenant will be the world champion Golden State Warriors. Plus, Uber Technologies will move its headquarters to the development.
The concept of a Google transit village in downtown San Jose comes at a time when tech companies continue to face fierce competition to attract and retain employees. They are under pressure to do more than dangle plump paychecks and stock options in front of recruits.
\u201cYoung, creative people who are driving innovation in our leading companies are choosing where they want to live before they decide whom they want to work for, \u201d Liccardo said. \u201cThey want to live in dynamic urban environments.\u201d
Pairing tech with transit
Google\u2019s development would be situated at the heart of San Jose\u2019s grand plan to make Diridon Station a central hub of stops for every major rail service in the region: BART, Amtrak, Caltrain, the ACE Train and planned high-speed rail.
\u201cThe fact that it is a transit hub is very important to Google, and the size of the potential development is attractive, \u201d a Google representative said.
The city has estimated that its plans to bring all those transit links to Diridon will increase transit trips to downtown San Jose eightfold.
\u201cThe only reason Google is coming into the downtown is that transit hub, \u201d said Carl Guardino, president of Silicon Valley Leadership Group. \u201cDiridon Station is absolutely going to be the Grand Central Station of the West. We will see 600 trains a day going through there.\u201d
Rod Diridon, a former Santa Clara County supervisor and longtime transit advocate for whom the station is named, has said in the past that he sees mixed-use development connected to train stations as essential to preventing Silicon Valley\u2019s traffic nightmares from growing even worse.
\u201cNo amount of freeway improvements will allow Silicon Valley to build its way out of the traffic congestion we will now have forever, \u201d Diridon said this month. \u201cWhat we are seeing is a microcosm of the evolution of the United States to new kinds of transportation systems.\u201d
Affiliates of Google and its development partner, Trammell Crow, have already bought properties near Diridon Station and the SAP Center sports and entertainment complex, home to the San Jose Sharks hockey team.
Wow factor
Google\u2019s vision for a downtown village could spur new interest in San Jose\u2019s somewhat overlooked central core. The city has said Google\u2019s tech-campus design would provide open spaces for public recreation, along with entertainment and retail options. That could make downtown San Jose a more memorable destination.
A March 2016 study suggested San Jose is a fairly forgettable city in the national consciousness, despite the presence of the NHL\u2019s Sharks. That\u2019s something San Jose\u2019s leaders certainly want to change.
\u201cFor a long time, San Jose has considered itself the capital of Silicon Valley, but this really roots us in a way that the center of gravity for Silicon Valley will shift southward, \u201d SPUR\u2019s Alvarado said.
Bringing Google into downtown could also help the city\u2019s downtown attract more investment.
\u201cWe will see more players that want to invest in real estate and redevelopment downtown, \u201d said Chad Leiker, a first vice president with commercial real estate firm Kidder Mathews.<\/p>\n

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