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Google Bus and Spatial Justice
A Call for Greater Social Responsibility in Urban Governance
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Rosanne de Koning
MA dissertation rMA Cultural Analysis June 2014 University of Amsterdam Supervisor: Prof. dr. C. Lindner
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!Fig. 2. Map of San Francisco’s neighborhoods. sfvillage.org.
INTRODUCTION
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‘Viewed from above, every place on earth is blanketed with thick layers of macrospatial organization arising not just from administrative convenience but also from the imposition of political power, cultural domination, and social control over individuals, groups, and the places they inhabit” (Soja, Seeking spatial Justice, 32).
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A couple of years ago Google started running employee buses between downtown San Francisco and its campus in Mountain View, south of the city in Silicon Valley. These buses are changing the spatial and social structure of the city of San Francisco and the city’s relation to the region, it has sent real estate prices in the city skyrocketing. The buses improve the connection between the city of San Francisco and the tech offices in Silicon Valley, which makes the city a more attractive place to live for an affluent group of tech employees. Google Bus is a private bus service that Google has started to transport its employees that live in the city to Googleplex, its head office located in Mountain View, CA. The buses are luxury coach buses that feature on board WiFi, air conditioning, electrical outlets, and other amenities to make its riders comfortable, allowing them to continue their work during their commute while at the same time decreasing commuting time. In 2012, Google owned 73 of these $800,000 buses, and leased an additional 13 to transport some 4,500 employees, about one third of its employees that work at Googleplex (Dumaine). The Google Bus, is not only the biggest effort of its kind (now including ferries as well), but more importantly has managed to gain the most media attention to the point where the word Google Bus is now commonly used to refer to all buses of its kind. Google buses are also the buses to which most of the protests have been directed. For a combination of these reasons I have chosen Google Bus in particular as the focal point of my research, and for these same reasons my arguments will not only apply or be limited to Google Bus but will be extendable to all tech buses.
In this paper I will study Google Bus as a vehicle of gentrification. I will embed the processes of gentrification into larger political or ideological framework related to social and spatial justice, in particular issues related to public transport systems, gentrification and displacement, and the private public. I will argue that gentrification has a negative effect on public space as more and more public space is displaced by private space. In addition, gentrification makes the urban space less and less
livable especially for marginalized groups, pushing them out to the periphery. However, as diversity and encounter are the cornerstones of the urban space the marginalization of public space has a deteriorating effect on urban space and creates unjust geographies. As governments are failing to step in and regulate private parties pushing out public or social space, I would like to conclude this paper with a call for greater social responsibility on the part of private actors. Not only should they take responsibility for their own ‘urban projects’ such as Google Bus, they also have the power and funds to press government to adjust building regulations to provide apple housing for urbanites. This way both their employees will be able to find adequate housing as well as enjoy social diversity in their neighborhoods and a flourishing service industry (dry-cleaners, waiters, cleaners, but also law enforcement and teachers).
Up until now the debate about Google Bus has mainly focused on these negative consequences of the Google Bus. As it is now easier for Google employees to commute between the city and Googleplex, gentrification has skyrocketed and the residents of San Francisco are really starting to feel the implications. Rent prices have gone up radically and the real estate market has become cut-throat, as one pink house in Glen Park testifies; the fixer-upper was put up for sale for $895,000 and sold for sold for $1.425 million. This particular property was just a block away from a tech bus stop. Data from real-estate firm Redfin suggests that 60 to 80 percent of homes in San Francisco are selling for more than the list price (Bilton). If that was not enough, most homes are so expensive it already takes an average yearly salary of at least $100,000 to afford to buy or rent a house in San Francisco. These high prices are attractive for developers and through eviction laws such as the 1985 Ellis Act renters are forced out of their homes unable to afford new housing in the city, effectively pushing less affluent people out of the city. The bus also has big consequences for the public bus system in San Francisco, Muni, which has seen a decrease in its ridership over the last few years. Muni has financially been struggling for many years and more and more lines continue to be cut in efforts to save money (Henderson).
The debates, protests and media coverage of Google Bus so far have mostly been informed by emotions and understandably so as people worry about the affordability of their homes and even possible eviction. However, I would like to take an approach where Google Bus is not necessarily evil in order to investigate its potential for new forms of governance and public services. I will still express a heavy critique on the current form of the bus and the processes it sets in motion, but only to
expose the system to get to a place in which we can rethink the bus rather than get rid of it. To do so I will place Google Bus in the context of theory, and examine its place within theoretical, political, social, and spatial debates. Through politics of mobility I will examine the spatiality of ideology, in which I will rely heavily on the spatial turn in theory. Through Google Bus we can examine how ideological and political struggles influence space, and also how space plays a role in political, social and economic debates. Rather than consider space and ideology separately I will follow amongst others Henri Lefebvre and Edward Soja and consider them as a complex intertwined and interrelated whole.
Scholars involved in the spatial turn in theory, most notably Soja, argue academics have over-privileged social or historical perspectives and have ignored the spatiality of a wide range of processes (Soja, Writing the City Spatially). The spatial turn aims at correcting this overemphasis and introducing a spatial perspective as an additional lens added to existing research methods. Most studies of space assume space as a type of stage, but what they fail to take into account is that space, especially in cities, has an influence on the development of society and vice versa. The spatial turn is based on Henri Lefebvre’s idea of the social production of urban space in which he identifies three different ‘types’ of space; perceived space, conceived space, and lived space. “Perceived space refers to the relative objective, concrete space people encounter in their daily environment. Conceived space refers to mental constructions of space, creative ideas about and representations of space. Lived space is the complex combination of perceived and conceived space. It represents a person’s actual experience of space in everyday life” (Purcell 102). Without the inscription of social relations into space they do not become real and thus Soja argues “there is no unspatialized social reality” (Soja, Thirdspace 46). The relation between society and space is interwoven and when studying processes of gentrification space has to be included. Only then can we derive a more comprehensive understanding of the processes at play in processes of gentrification.
My theoretical point of departure for this paper is Henri Lefebvre’s The Right to the City. This name is deceiving. The right to the city is not meant as a right in the common notion of the word. Instead its meaning is more of a rethinking of society in which there is no longer the centrality of the city, and thus no more opposition between center and periphery, but only the global urban. Evident is the switch Lefebvre makes form the word city to the word urban, with which he denotes the social shift from the current social (and spatial) order of the city to that or the urban. He calls this shift urban
reform: “From questions of landed property to problems of segregation, each project of urban reform questions the structures, the immediate (individual) and daily relations of existing society, but also those that one purports to impose by the coercive and institutional means of what remains urban reality” (Lefebvre, Writings on Cities 154). The urban is global, and does not pertain to just the built form of what we now know as cities. The urban is a place of encounter, and although often facilitated by the density with which people live in cities it is only in the encounter that the urban in constituted (Lefebvre, Writings on Cities 158). Understanding the urban as encounter it becomes evident that phenomena such as the Google Bus which segregate inhabitants of the city have an influence on the construction of the socio-spatiality of the city or rather the urban.
This is where Edward Soja has picked up Lefebvre’s argument about the right to the city and has used it along with Lefebvre’s writings on space, to develop his theory of ‘spatial justice’ by taking a spatial approach to social justice. As Soja argues, the spatial has been under represented in social justice and needs to be added. Spatial justice is about seeking more democratic rights in the city “in a world of eroding civil liberties and degraded participatory democracy” (Soja, Seeking Spatial Justice 7). He argues that these spatial (in)justices are “situated and contextualizing three overlapping and interactive levels of geographical resolution”; “external creation of unjust geographies through boundary making and the political organization of space, [...] endogenously or internally from the distributional inequalities created through discriminatory decision making by individuals, firms, and institutions”, and “injustices associated with geographical uneven development and what is described as the globalization of injustice” (Soja, Seeking Spatial Justice 8-9). As these geographies are overlapping I will not treat them separately, rather it will become clear that they are always at play at the same time in each of the processes I will describe. I will treat Google Bus as a vehicle of gentrification through political and ideological expression.
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GOOGLE BUS AND POLITICS OF MOBILITY IN SF
It is not exactly clear when tech companies started running their bus services. Tech companies do not speak publicly on the topic. Some sources state 2007 (heart of the city) and others mark the beginning in 2004 when Google started running its first shuttle bus “that made two stops in San Francisco and carried 155 passengers a day” (Dai and Weinzimmer 4). Since it first started running shuttle busses between the city and its campus, Google has gradually expanded its fleet to its current size of approximately 100 buses and 80 stops across the Bay Area which facilitates about 10,000 one way trips each day (Dai and Weinzimmer 4). Although private commuter shuttles are not a new phenomenon, the current shuttle services such as Google Bus are distinctly different. Before these buses were mainly seen as a last mile solution, between suburban public transport hubs and suburban campuses. The ‘new’ shuttle services however, replace the public transport system altogether by ferrying the employees between their place of residence and their workplace. In addition, these services are now seen as “an employee benefit for recruitment, retention, and productivity purposes” (Dai and Weinzimmer 3). These benefit packages generally also include other shared programs such as “guaranteed rides home, onsite carsharing or bikesharing, intra-campus shuttles,
transit subsidies, and carpool programs” (Dai and Weinzimmer 3). Many of its users are very positive about the benefits of the private bus services on their quality of life and many consider it the most important employee benefit (Dai and Weinzimmer 5). One fortune editor, Brian Dumaine describes his experience on Google’s luxury bus as follows: “As the double-decker bus turns onto Charleston Road and starts winding through Google's Mountain View, Calif., campus, I stretch out in the business-class-size seat, admiring the smoothness of the black leather and the plush gray carpeting at my feet. A spacious table expands to hold a laptop, which can connect to the vehicle's Wi-Fi system” (Dumaine). But these buses are not meant for lounging, the amenities such as WiFi and electrical outlets ensure that employees can spend their time commuting efficiently and get work done. One Google intern, Matthew Melone, describes his bus ride as follows on Google+: “I live pretty far from the Mountain View campus, but I take the Google bus to work each morning. Today I finished a presentation, set up three meetings, and cleaned out my inbox before I even got to my desk. Not bad. #realinterns” (Melone).
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Fig. 4. Tech Bus Exterior. Steve Rhodes. http://
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If we compare images from Google Bus to images of the buses Muni uses the contrast is stark. The tech buses are white and look clean, they feature tinted windows to protect its riders from the outside world, the outer surface of the bus is completely smooth. On the inside Google Bus has leather cushioned seats and pullout tables to ensure passengers maximum comfort so they can get their work done. The floors are carpeted in black, there is overhead storage for bags and everything appears as if it is in its place. The bus oozes luxury, comfort, and privilege. The Muni busses on the other hand are grey and red, its outer surface is anything but smooth, the buses look raw and rugged, and give of a feeling that the ride will be rough, and so does its interior. The seats are made from hard plastic often in a drab looking beige, but sometimes the seats are colored. The floors have ridges and are made out of vinyl, easily ripped and hard to clean, giving the bus a dirty look. The brown and grey walls add to this impression and the loose cable to pull to signal the bus to stop appears unorganized and out of place. There is also enough space to stand, which is not necessary in the tech buses, because there are enough seats and frequent buses. Where tech buses aim for comfort, service and benefits, Muni buses aim for profit maximization, which is clearly visible from the aesthetics of the buses.
Google Bus has gained public attention mostly because it uses public Muni (San Francisco’s public bus) bus stops to load and unload passengers often blocking Muni buses from entering the stop. For years they have been able to do so even though officially there is a $271 fine for illegal parking at a public bus stop. However, as of January 1st 2014, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) has implemented a fee of $1 per bus per stop. Although this is expected to bring in
Fig. 6. Google Bus Exterior. David Olivier. Google+. 2011.
Fig. 7. Muni Bus Exterior. Michael Strauch. www.streetcarmike.com. 2006.
about $1.5 million a year this will only cover the costs of implementing these new fees. So while using public infrastructure tech companies do not contribute anything to maintenance or even development of these infrastructures. In addition, survey data indicates that about 20% of people who commute using shuttle buses would take public transport if these services were discontinued. With current ridership this translates to 1,400 riders daily (Dai and Weinzimmer 11). With 1.6 million riders the 28 transit agencies in the region service on a daily basis, these 1,400 commuters would account for a 1% increase in ridership. However, when taking into account the lacking regional transport system, and 48% of respondents indicating they would drive solo if shuttle services were discontinued (Dai and Weinzimmer 12), there is a much larger group who would potentially use public transport if it was adequate. To testify to the state of regional transport Dai and Weinzimmer summarize as follows:
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“The need for these shuttles is in part a reflection of the region’s fragmented transit services. The Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) operates in four counties but does not currently serve Silicon Valley (San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District 2009). From San Francisco, Caltrain offers rail service to 32 stations between San Francisco and southern Santa Clara County, but many users require a lengthy access trip to reach Caltrain (Caltrain n.d.). The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which operates Muni, the public transit system for San Francisco, does not offer services outside of the city. SamTrans offers an express bus between Palo Alto and San Francisco, but the route serves only the Financial District in San Francisco and runs hourly (San Mateo County Transit District 2012). The region’s inability to better integrate its transit services has created gaps that the corporate shuttles are now filling.” (Dai and Weinzimmer 4)
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Figures 8, 9 and 10 show the service areas of regional public transport in San Francisco. As can be seen on the map in figure 10 Caltrains only run from the east side of the city. Even for people that live on this side of town reaching a CalTrain stop alone can easily take 30 minutes. The fragmented state of the regional transport system causes commuting times to be 1.3 times as long on average using regular public transport and a last-mile shuttle service in comparison to the shuttle buses, which are
nothing more than luxury express buses and which also do not require transfers (Dai and Weinzimmer 10). Employees really do value the comfort of the shuttle buses, as one shuttle rider notes “It gives me a calm, clean, quiet place to work with WiFi... 75% of the time I work on the shuttle, but I often use that time to work to organize my day – personal and professional... Caltrain is a faster, more efficient option for me, but does not afford me the same environment to get things done” (Dai and Weinzimmer 13). Perhaps it is time for the public transport agencies to take note, the only way to retain ridership seem to be though added comfort. As two more shuttle riders remark: “I chose to live in San Francisco because of my employer-provided commuter shuttles. I would otherwise have lived in [the South Bay], because I don't have a car and who the hell wants to drive that much anyway.” Another shuttle rider who is looking to move says, “the convenience of the employee shuttles makes the commute tolerable enough that I don’t feel the need to move closer... within San Francisco I am restricting my apartment search to locations that are within walking distance of a shuttle stop” (Dai and Weinzimmer 14). But in a world of receding government support for public amenities and neoliberal individualism, the public transport system simply can never compete, not because people don’t depend on it, but because the people that depend on it most, those who can not afford a car, also can not afford to compete with ‘market forces’ in transport.
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Visualising Google Bus
Several initiatives have started to map and/or visualize the routes of tech buses. This is not easy, routes are usually kept ‘secret’. However, their presence in the city is highly visual for anyone spending time in the city. One such initiative to map the route of tech buses is The City from the Valley (2012) by Stamen Design, commissioned by San Jose based Zero1 as part of a larger exhibition called “Seeking Silicon Valley”. In this project the firm, which specializes in harnessing data to visualize flows, has mapped the flow of tech workers moving from the city to the different campuses. Employees live in the city, some even on tech bus routes, and see the buses pass by daily. To make their maps, the company stationed people around town and simply started counting. In addition, they hired bike messengers to follow the buses and used online sources such as foursquare to track activity (Stamen Design). They found that ‘Google alone runs about 150 trips daily, all over the city” (Stamen Design). Their efforts resulted in the map presented in fig. 11. which they describe as follows:
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“The subway map is the end result of that simplification; it's not a literal representation, but it's much more readable than the actual routes. We also wanted to show the relative volumes, so the map segments are scaled by how many trips pass through them; you get a sense for just how much traffic the highways get, and how
Fig. 9. Bay Area Rapid Transit Map. Wikimedia
the routes branch out from there to cover the city. We only mapped San Francisco shuttles, many of these companies operate additional routes in East Bay, the Peninsula, and around San Jose, including direct routes from Caltrain stations to corporate campuses.”
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This map also shows that the Google Bus is by far the largest effort of its kind. In response to this map Google has stated: “Google declined to comment on the map, but said it has over 100 buses that shuttle 4,500-plus people per day from more than 30 stops across seven Bay Area counties” (Fowler). Other tech companies either declined to comment or attested that the map is fairly accurate (some stops that were close together were aggregated so the locations of the stops approximate) (Fowler). This map also reveals that the area’s of the city that are most connected to Silicon Valley are The Marina, The Mission, The Western Addition, Heyes Valley, and Haight Ashbury. It also shows Van Ness is a huge artery for these buses. Interestingly enough these neighborhoods are exactly those that have historically been most contested in the light of the politics of mobility in San Francisco as Henderson describes in his book Street Fight: The politics of Mobility in San Francisco, which I will get into in the next section. Another visualization, fig 12, by one of Stamen Design employees, Eric Rodenbeck, shows the entire route of the tech buses. This map gives a better impression of the regional impact of the buses. These two depictions give some sense of the scale and location of the bus lines and are a primary illustration of the areas of San Francisco most affected by the tech buses.
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Politics of Mobility in San Francisco
To understand the rise of Google Bus, and many private buses alike, it is productive to have a closer look at the politics of mobility in the city of San Francisco and the ideologies behind these politics. Google Bus did not appear out of thin air but can be considered a result from a stalemate in infrastructural planning in SF and the Bay Area. The politics behind mobility are complex, especially in a city like San Francisco with a dense urban core much like European cities, but a (national) culture that is centered around the car. In his book Street Fight: The Politics of Mobility in San Francisco Jason Henderson does an excellent job describing the different political ideologies behind the politics of mobility in San Francisco in depth, but as these politics are central to my argument I will shortly recapture his argument. Often people in the United States are not aware that car usage is an
ideological issue; cars are so central to American culture, many people take it for granted and subconsciously consider driving a right. Henderson excavates the ideologies behind driving and breaks these down into three major ideological (political groups), progressives, neoliberals and conservatives (18). Each group has their own idea about who is responsible to provide infrastructure that relates back to how they consider responsibility in general. Progressives believe that individual responsibility includes responsibility for the larger group, and government should provide infrastructure that is optimized for, and leads to, greater equality for all. Neoliberals on the other hand believe that not government but market forces should determine the development of infrastructure, because they believe that everyone is responsible for themselves and should strive only after their own personal interest and if people do, market forces will provide necessary infrastructure. Conservatives ask for greater government involvement to provide the infrastructure so that everyone can take responsibility for their own interests. For public transport this means that progressives seek to maximize utility for everyone and advocate accessible public transport as well as infrastructure for other modes of transport such as bike lanes and sidewalks, which ensures that people have access to all options and can choose freely. However, conservatives do privilege car usage and advocate greater throughput as well as adequate parking spaces be provided. Neoliberals take up a position in between and advocate proximity to public transport, bike lanes, and sidewalks under headers such a walkability or livability, but mostly because they increase marketability and thus property value for developers, and only there where there is enough return on investment. These three groups have been so active in seeking after their ideals that the constant clashes between them have left infrastructural development in San Francisco lagging. This has left demands for adequate public transport to Silicon valley unanswered and opened up space for private bus charter services to step in.
Especially the influence that neoliberal politics have had on the drastic decrease of Muni bus service has opened up space for private coach services. In part due to the stalemate, a lack of investment has caused significant decreases in frequency and eliminated some bus stops and lines altogether. Initiatives such as Google Bus are in fact how neoliberals would ideally see public transport, developed and maintained by private companies responding to market needs, in effect favoring those with greater purchasing power. But neoliberalism has also had a huge impact on the development of cities through increasing free market real estate development. This kind of development is mostly concerned with maximizing the value of a piece of urban land, and building
houses aimed at the middle and higher classes often bring in more money than a housing development directed at lower income families. However, to charge a premium for a certain space certain amenities need to be available. Accessibility has become an important selling point for these kinds of properties, the more connected the space is to other locations (especially ones work) the more valuable the space is (Lees et al. 51). In this way especially the neoliberal market approach to real estate has been a major catalyst for gentrification. I will return to this argument after taking a closer look at the demographics of contemporary gentrification.
Creative Class
Richard Florida has based his theory of the creative class largely on San Francisco and Silicon Valley, in particular on the tech workers. The testimonies by shuttle riders I mentioned earlier in this paper attest that the things tech workers’ values are still consistent with Florida’s theory. Supplementing the demographics of the bus riders and their statements with knowledge about the creative class I would like to have a closer look at the demographics of the Google Bus riders. With this and circumstantial evidence from San Francisco I will then form a critique on some of the underlying assumption Forida makes, which are not consistent with the behavior and ideology of the group he is talking about. The creative class is a highly educated group of people who value urban living, walkability, ‘diversity’, and buzz in a neighborhood (Florida). These are the same reasons why many bus riders state they choose to live in the city. Research about the demographics of Google Bus riders has shown that they are:
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“Most[ly] male (69%). Only 24% lived with a spouse, and only 3% had children. The average age of the shuttle riders was 31.6 years old and the median age was about 30. About 60% had at most a bachelor’s degree, 24% a master’s or professional degree, and 6% a doctorate. Only 2% earned less than $50,000 and only 13% earned less than $75,000, while 67% reported an income of $100,000 or more. The majority (85%) rent their home.” (Dai and Weinzimmer 13)
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So just like the creative class, shuttle riders are highly educated, young, single, childless, and affluent. They care about the place they live, but they are not bound in place because they tend to be renters.
Bus riders choose to live in the city for an urban style of living which is described by attributes such as diversity and high density. One rider comments about his need for diversity: “I lived in Sunnyvale my first year at my current job and hated it so much. I don't think I would ever live in the South Bay again. I felt very isolated there as a single, gay man” (Dai and Weinzeimmer 14). When asked for their choice of residential location respondents taking the tech buses indicated that the most important reason for them to choose a neighborhood is its walkability. “Shuttle riders also placed a high value on proximity to entertainment, culture, and amenities, proximity to transit, and living in an urban neighborhood” (Dai and Weinzimmer 13). Florida's theory of the creative class has been subject of raging critiques about its exclusionary or elitist nature, and rightly so. Wilson and Keil (2008) “conclude that the creative class concept is not really about discerning and nurturing the truest creative class in Western cities today, false consciousness and deliberate ambiguity intercede. Rather, this thesis is about something else: finding another rationale to privilege in public policy the desires and aspirations of capital and the affluent” (846). Similarly, Peck argues “Creative-city strategies are predicated on, and designed for, this neoliberalized terrain. Repackaging urban cultural artifacts as competitive assets, they value them (literally) not for their own sake, but in terms of their (supposed) economic utility” (764). And while tolerance is one of the 3T’s Florida’s theory is built on, evidence suggests that polarization only increases as the creative class takes over the city (Florida in Peck 758), underlining the idea that the creativity trend is nothing but a repackaging of existing neoliberalism to reaffirm the hegemony of the dominant classes. In addition, it seems that under the guise of economic development cities are increasingly adopting revanchist policies, cracking down on marginal groups who are not seems as economically profitable. Lees, Slater, and Wyly tallied how cities with though revanchist policies rank in comparison to Florida’s ‘creativity index’. They “[n]ote in particular how San Francisco and Seattle, two of the cities with the 'meanest' policies towards the homeless and marginal populations, come second and third, respectively on Richard Florida's creativity index” (226). Thus it can be concluded that San Francisco is the domain of exactly those policies that are most worrisome for the marginal classes. While Google Bus is not a cause of these policies, it is playing right into this narrative reinforcing these trends even more. Lees et al. et al. also note that “[t]his raises the crucial issue of the disturbing ordinances deployed to make way for the influx of his 'creative class'" (226). The rationale of a creative city in San Francisco allows that “public resources continue to be deployed to favor a supposed (but elusively) propulsive ‘creative’ elite. Disregard for
the needs of socially disadvantaged citizens (particularly the racialized and gendered poor), who lose all connection to the economy’s successful parts, is unmistakable.” (Wilson and Keil 845). Although Google Bus is not directly taking public funds as their own, the impact it has on the public transport system as well as the space the buses claim at the public bus stops makes it obvious that Google Bus too is a story in which a public service is being both gobbled up and/or pushed out by private alternatives.
Many critics have pointed out that in Florida’s theory of the creative class there is no provision for public amenities. Florida addresses this critique in the prologue of his book by saying he expects the creative class to take responsibility and contribute to the commons. However this is a major contradiction in his thinking which goes all the way back to the core of his argument and in effect paralyzes its potential. As I have illustrated before in the section on the politics of mobility, the core of neoliberal and progressive ideologies are so far apart that it has caused a complete deadlock in planning. Florida’s assumption that the creative class will take responsibility in a neoliberal laissez-faire individualistic socio-political climate is thus severely naive. In addition, the creative class is a hyper-mobile global group that is not fixed in place. As we have seen they are not likely to be homeowners, instead they are renters, and more loosely tied into local comMunity. They have very busy schedules and one of the reasons Google Bus as well as urban living is so popular is the work/ life balance it offers. The creative class is not interested in building the comMunity they want to live in or the local attributes on which they choose their residential location, instead Florida speaks of plug-and-play communities, which suggests that the community and amenities should already be in place, so they can enjoy its benefits. As these people are not interested in developing the infrastructure needed for this lifestyle, but only seek its benefits, someone else must take on the task either government, non-profits, or private organizations like Google.
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GENTRIFICATION
Much of the public discourse surrounding the Google Bus has focused on the possible gentrification of the inner city and the consequences this will have for the current residents. The latest generation of tech workers does not want to live in suburban Silicon Valley but prefers to live in denser urban areas. Before Google (and other tech companies) started running bus services, poor public transport between the city and Silicon Valley was the only barrier that kept many tech workers in the suburbs. With that
barrier eliminated many are now moving into the city and driving up market prices for houses. Now that it is easier to get to work from the city 22% of Bay Area residents have actually moved further away from their offices and only 10% have moved closer. In addition, data shows that “more than half (57%) of respondents live less than a 10-minute walk from their shuttle stop, and 76% are within a 15- minute walk. The majority (80%) walk to their stop” (Dai and Weinzimmer 12). This forces less affluent San Franciscans to move out of their homes. To add to the burden many tech companies are also buying up a lot of property in the city to convert to offices to get closer to this new urbanophile generation of tech workers. Google has recently bought up office spaces in the mission district, a traditionally low-income area that is now starting to feel the burden of gentrification.
Gentrification is a term coined by Ruth Glass in 1964 to describe instances of the upper middle class replacing the working class in certain neighborhoods. Since then the term has been rather mobile and its precise interpretation has been bended, adjusted, and changed, as ways in which gentrification happened and our understanding of gentrification changed (Lees et al. 8). However, at the rudimentary level gentrification always pertains to the process of a more affluent group of people replacing/displacing a less affluent group in a particular geographical location. Gentrification often comes with a discourse of improvement of a neighborhood. Somehow it seems from this narrative, a poorer neighborhood cannot be perceived as nice unless a new group, often wealthier people, move in. Behind this rationale is the idea that there would be some sort of trickle-down effect, which has been a very powerful ideology behind many different kinds of gentrification processes (Lees et al. 84); whether it is tearing down a complete neighborhood or if it is starting small scale projects to ‘improve’ a neighborhood, which often entails attracting new and more affluent people to the neighborhood. Gentrification can thus also be seen as a spatial articulation of class struggle/inequality (Lees et al. 80).
Gentrification is also tied up with the mobility of people, more specifically with the mobility of groups of people. It is a dynamic that has played out over many years and has been a topic of contestation in San Francisco since the mid-20th century; in North Beach where Bohemians replaces working-class Italians, hippies replaced the working class in Haight-Ashbury, Gays replaced the Irish in the Castro district. But it seems this most recent wave of gentrification led by tech workers is the most aggressive San Francisco has ever seen; according to Richard Walker “only a handful of cities in the world that have such an extreme problem of gentrification” (Corbyn). While statistically it seems
the city is doing great “the unemployment rate is just 4.8%, compared to 8.3% for California as a whole” and “[i]n 2013 job growth in San Francisco County led all others in the nation” (Corbyn). This job growth, however, is also driving up rent prices across the city as the amount of jobs added is not matched by the amount of houses built. “Median rents rose 10.6 percent from February 2012 to February 2013, placing the median rent for the city at $3,200, the most expensive in the country. Other sources show that from 2011 to 2012, rents increased by as much as 135 percent in some neighborhoods like the Bayview, with increases of 53 percent in the Western Addition, 29 percent in the Mission and 61 percent in Noe Valley” (Goldman 15).
In theory different strains of gentrification are discussed separately, however, I do not believe these strains exist in isolation. Instead these differences between certain understandings of gentrification are superficial and a more balanced thorough understanding of gentrification arises when each these different strains are accepted, combined and used to complicate each other. Because processes of gentrification are ideologically or politically informed each approach makes up a different critique of the political ideology or rationale behind processes of gentrification. Lees et al. identifies two major streams in gentrification; on the one hand gentrification as a positive emancipatory process, and on the other gentrification as revanchism. In positive emancipatory gentrification it is assumed that for some groups of the middle-class it is liberating to live in diverse neighborhoods to escape the patriarchy of suburban communities, especially women and gays benefit from this emancipation. The theory of the creative class as I have discussed earlier is an example of a positive interpretation of gentrification. These positive perspectives assume some sort of trickle-down effect from the gentrification, in which the lower classes can pull themselves up through social mixing and dilution of poverty, and the lower classes will enjoy certain services brought into the neighborhood by the gentry. What is problematic about social mixing is that lower-classes often do not have the means to enjoy the services the middle-class brings in, nor do they need them and often these middle-class amenities replace those essential to the lower class. In addition, Blomley questions that if social mixing is beneficial for everyone then why isn't social mixing practiced in high class neighborhoods as well by adding lower cost units. These initiatives are often met with not-in-my-backyard objections of the higher classes. Such counter arguments expose most positive gentrification processes as a way to make more space for affluent desired groups and less space for non-desired groups. On the other hand, some arguments against the positive effects of gentrification through social
mixing also do not prove very inclusive, some argue people should be left to 'their own' and that gentrification and social mixing only generates more class struggle. However, it seems many forget that it is not the process of richer people moving in that creates these tensions, but it is the way in which people in society relate to each other. Rather than understanding the larger cultural or societal issues that cause such tensions (and possibly overcome them), proponents of a ‘separate’ theory seem all too happy to settle for the easy way out of keeping groups separated and forgoing a through cultural critique and challenge of existing class relations.
Narratives of gentrification, whether perceived as positive or negative, depend upon which group one belongs to, studies, or even favors. For the middle-class finding cheap, central, or hip places to live, where they can express their diversity and emancipate themselves can be a liberating positive experience, but on the flipside, the emancipation of the gentry often comes out as a loss for the working-class. Betancur argues that "gentrification is not about social mix, emancipation, creativity, and tolerance; it is about arson, abandonment, displacement, "speculation and abuse', ethnic minority tenant hardships, and class conflict, all of which are woven into a mournful account of struggle, loss, and, above all, 'the bitterness of the process and the open hostility/racism of gentrifiers and their organizations" (Lees et al. 215). For these lower classes gentrification is a lot more like colonization Atkinson and Bridge argue: "At the neighborhood level itself poor and vulnerable residents often experience gentrification as a process of colonization by the more privileged classes. Stories of personal housing dislocation and loss, distended social networks, "improved" local services out of sync with local needs and displacement have always been the underbelly of a process, which, for city boosters, has represented something of a savior for post-industrial cities" (in Lees et al. 221).
And gentrification in San Francisco is still going strong. “In June 2011, the median price for a one bedroom was $2,195. Two years later, the price of a one bedroom has increased 27% to $2,795. During the same time period, the price of a two bedroom apartment rose 33%. That's almost 10 times the rate of inflation during those two years” (Priceonomics). And these numbers are citywide, some neighborhoods, not surprisingly the more affordable ones on the routes of the tech busses are experiencing rent increases even higher than that. In Civic Center, transpierced by Van Ness, bordering Market Street, and adjacent to SoMa where a lot of tech companies now have office space, rent prices rose by 47% between 2011 and 2013. In Bernal Heights rents increased by 42%, followed by The Mission District where rents rose with 41% and Nob Hill and Western Addition
where they rose with 39%. All these neighborhoods are located around Van Ness avenue and are thus on either side of the tech bus route. As fig 13 shows, the top ten of highest increases in rent also includes Haight Ashbury (37%), Glen Park (34%), Noe Valley (34%), and Cole Valley(33%) which are all centered around the same area. An interesting statistic to note, however, is that the tenderloin, although wedged between all these neighborhoods, still does not seem as popular with a rent increase of only 25%. The Tenderloin is generally known as the worst, most dilapidated neighborhood in San Francisco and apparently it cannot seem to shake this identity.
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Google Bus and Gentrification
Google Bus is a vehicle of gentrification and as riders’ testimonies about working in peace (or at least in perceived peace) have shown before, a lot of the narrative hinges on the removal of the unwanted or unruly. This occurs in both the places where the tech workers choose to reside as well as in the collective ways they travel to work. Continuing the logic of class struggle, privatization has long been a way to divide and rule:
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“Baron Haussmann once tore into central Paris, into its old neighborhoods and poor populations, dispatching the latter to the periphery while speculating on the center; the built urban form simultaneously became a property machine and a means to divide and rule; to say, neo-Haussmannization, in a similar process that integrates financial corporate and state interests, tears into the globe, sequesters land through forcible slum clearance and imminent domain valorizing it while banishing former residents to the global hinterlands of post-industrial malaise.” (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 915)
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Although Merrifield is speaking of gentrification of the built environment, gentrification of other types of spaces, such as that of transportation, has similar effects in that it reasserts the boundaries between center and periphery. Only when people encounter each other public space is created (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 919), which means that the encounter has a counter establishment potential. The urban then, as space of the encounter, provides the potential for a liberation from class struggle, and it is no surprise that existing social structures enable segregation of space because it is the only way in which the privileged can retain their position of power. However these power structures are not apparent or clear. Rather the segregational structures often seem logical because they are implicitly and passively created through culture and space sub-textually dictated by the dominating classes. The spatial and social are not separated, they are intrinsically connected and should not be studied in isolation; “Space is not a scientific object removed from ideology and politics; it has always been political and strategic. [...] Space has been shaped and molded from historical and natural elements, but this has been a political process. Space is political and ideological. It is a product literally filled with ideologies” (Lefebvre in Soja, Socio-Spatial Dialectic 210). To Soja this means that “[s]pace itself may be primordially given, but the organization, use, and meaning of space is a product of social translation, transformation and experience” (Socio-Spatial Dialectic 210). However it is not just the social that shapes space, space also has an effect on social relations; “[...] the geographies in which we live can intensify and sustain our exploitation as workers, support oppressive forms of cultural and political domination based on race, gender, and nationality, and aggravate all forms of discrimination and injustice” (Soja, Seeking Spatial Justice 19). Space and people are not separated either: “In encountering one another, people produce space, urban space; they
become urban people” (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 916). Displacement of space and of people is connected, their processes may to an extent be individually described but do not exist in isolation and should be studied and described together.
The private buses allow small privatized bubbles in the shared space of the city. “Those in circuits of inclusion move through an archipelago of safe spaces which are secured for the ‘community’ against the ‘anti-social’. The anti-social, on the other hand, are banished to peripheral spaces, or have their movements restricted through the imposition of ‘good behavior contracts’ and incarceration” (Iveson 150). Google Bus functions as one of those safe archipelagos tech workers use to move through the city, from their residential neighborhood to Googleplex, segregating them from other inhabitants. The buses, privately owned by Google can only be boarded by Google employees, so that these employees won't be disturbed during their commute by ‘Other’ people considered nuisances. The buses, equipped with WiFi, allow Google employees to work during their commute, transforming commute time from idle to productive (although most people work on their commute mobile data networks are not as reliable and fast as on board WiFi). All that is a possible disturbance of this productivity is eliminated in this new highly controlled shared space. This privatized reinterpretation of a public service (shared transport) places a great burden on the public transport system. If these tech workers no longer take public transport it decreases public transport ridership, with less riders profitability of lines decreases and services may be suspended, leaving those dependent upon public transport behind. Here private space slowly displaces public space, which can be seen embodied in one of the main issues raised by the public against Google Bus. The buses use Muni bus stops for boarding but often park at a stop for prolonged periods of time, during which Muni buses do not have access to the stop. The private space of the Google Bus thus displaces the public space of the Muni bus. Although it may often feel like public services are being privatized (fig 14), it is important to point out that in fact Google Bus is not a form of privatization. Instead, it is a private alternative that through competition or through draining public funds or resources threatens the economic viability of the (already underfunded) public bus system.
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As these buses are not freely accessible to everyone, they disturb and distort public urban space. “People’s subject positions are mediated by their habitual activities in moving about the city. The common practice of walking, bicycling, bus-riding, or driving constitutes distinctive forms of urban life, each with characteristic rhythms, concerns, and social interactions (Patton in Jensen 145-146). Google Bus takes these interactions away from the people of San Francisco, parts of their population are separated and do not interact as intensively as they would have had sharing the same bus. This has consequences for the way urban spaces ‘operate’, Lefebvre conceives of urban space as constructed in the encounter, constructed through “centrality in space, assembly in space, encounters in space, a dense and differential social space” (Lefebvre in Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 915). In this Lefebvre does not differ much from Jane Jacobs, whom in her book The Life and Death of Great American Cities also describe how ‘good’ urban spaces are constructed through the encounter of people (Jacobs). Separation and segregation then are ‘the enemy of assemblies and encounters’ (Lefebvre in Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 915).
Politics of mobility in San Francisco with its three different political views -conservative,
Fig. 14. Google bus blocked at 24th & Valencia Muni stop. Steve Rhodes. http:// flickr.com/ari. April 1, 2014.
Fig. 15. Google bus blocked at 24th & Valencia Muni stop. Steve Rhodes. http:// flickr.com/ari. April 1, 2014.
neoliberal, and progressive- is thus closely related to politics of the encounter. “The philosophical underpinning of a mobility politics of multiplicity must be one that acknowledges the ‘Other’ without necessarily reaching consensus” (Jensen 148). Without the Other there is no encounter. Paradoxically, while Google Bus promotes a move to the urban core, it is at the same time a movement in the opposite direction, a movement of decentralization. Politics of the encounter are based on centrality (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 918), but centrality is not an absolute concept, not a geographical middle, it is a more mobile concept. Centrality is movable, it comes about through the encounter, and as centrality unfolds it draws more people in and produces more encounters. While these places tend to be urban centers, it is not their geographical central location but the relative density of people (and thus large amount on encounters) that is often found in urban centers that constitutes its centrality. But these centers also tend to move, and at times decenter themselves (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 918). Gentrification is one example of both; not only does it testify of the movement of centers, it also decentralizes ‘Other’ centers in its path. Gentrification through creative communities in New York is a great example; throughout the years the creative core has moved around through the city. Starting in Greenwich Village in the pre WWII era, the creative center moved to SOHO in the 1960s and 1970s, to the East Village in the in 1970s and 1980s, in the 1990s it made its way to Williamsburg, and most recently the creative core has moved to Bushwick along the L subway line (Zukin and Braslow 134). In its travels the creative center of NYC has both replaced and been replaced by other urban centers, before the creatives moved into a neighborhood these neighborhoods were oftentimes already centers for different groups of people. For example, Williamsburg is traditionally a conservative Jewish neighborhood and the influx of new people has created tensions between the orthodox Jewish population and the hipsters most notably focusing on the lack of clothing on the part of the hipsters and their bike usage. But the creative center does not always spring up in places that are already functioning as a center to some group. The creative center is mobile because it chases affordable housing, which brings the creatives to places conceived as downtrodden where there were few people out in the streets, as happened in SOHO to stick with NYC as example. The creative community also finds itself replaced in their own centers, which are capitalized upon by property speculators. As the the creative core creates a buzz, brings people to the streets, drives up encounters centers are made, the desirability of the neighborhood goes up and so does the price of housing, in what David Harvey calls ‘accumulation by dispossession’ (Merrifield, Planetary Urbanization 914).
But what is happening with the gentrification of San Francisco by tech workers is slightly different. In the case of New York the creatives work and live in their studios or have their home and studio in the same neighborhood, centering all activity within the center. The tech workers however work in Silicon Valley which means they abandon the neighborhood for at least part of the day, significantly decreasing the amount of encounter that would take place, especially if these workers commute to work in their private company buses. Therefore, at the same time as it gentrifies and creates a new center, the move of techworkers also decenters the urban core of San Francisco, and blurs the boundaries between center and periphery, and may even have a deurbanizing influence on San Francisco as signs of assembly are the signs of the urban. This then leads back to Lefebvre's notion of planetary urbanization and its “‘specific dialectic’, a paradox in which ‘centers and peripheries oppose one another’. Yet the fault lines between these two worlds aren't defined by any simple urban-rural divide, nor by anything North-South; instead centers and peripheries are immanent within the accumulation of capital itself, immanent within its ‘secondary circuit of capital’.” (Merrifield, The Right to the City 474). This suggests that the Google Bus may not have a deurbanizing influence on San Francisco, but rather changes the relation between center and periphery as it moves center and periphery around. On the one hand, it diminished the distance (and thus the boundary) between the geographical urban core in San Francisco which economically serves as the periphery of the economic center in Silicon Valley. At the same time the urban core becomes a center for these tech workers and blurs the lines between the city as periphery of the economic core, it creates a new periphery in the location(s) where the former residents of the urban core are pushed out towards. This creates a dynamic of periphery and core that is always moving, and never clear. However, while their borders may become blurred, the segregational potential remains.
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COMMODIFICATION OF SPACE
The relation of center periphery is at the core of David Harvey’s understanding of ‘accumulation by dispossession’, his understanding of spatio-temporal fixes for over-accumulation. Over-accumulation occurs when there is a surplus of either capital or labor “that can not be disposed of without a loss” (Harvey, The New Imperialism 64). Harvey identifies two ways in which capitalism deals with over-accumulation; one is to reinvest within the territory (country), the other is to invest elsewhere (imperialism). Reinvesting in a country is usually done through social or industrial investments.
Social investments include investments in the education system and other public amenities. However many neoliberal/bourgeoisie would rather keep the money for their own class rather than making investments that will reduce class differences (Harvey, The New Imperialism 68). Imperialism, and thus the geographical distribution of capital becomes the only viable option. Although Harvey explains these concepts on a national level, and imperialism in the traditional sense, the mechanisms at play also hold for gentrification. Especially considering the decreasing role of the nation-state in the current globalized world, where national borders matter less and less and social borders matter more and more (however, it is easy for elites to move across national borders but it is hard to do the same for the working-class). This vision of regionalism beyond national borders returns me to Lefebvre and serves as an indication of what planetary urbanization would look like under neoliberalism. Rather than the egalitarian vision Lefebvre had in mind, planetary urbanization may also turn into a global elite centered society. Gentrification also opens up discussion of the relevance of state power in a world where companies have become more and more influential. It opens up the space where we can begin to understand how Google is actively shaping social and spatial relations in San Francisco. As Harvey writes:
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“A process of displacement and what I call “accumulation by dispossession” also lies at the core of the urban process under capitalism. It is the mirror image of capital absorption through urban redevelopment and is giving rise to all manner of conflicts over the capture of high value land from low income populations that may have lived there for many years” (The New Imperialism 10-11).
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A recent eviction illustrated accumulation by dispossession at work in the gentrifying Fillmore District Adjacent to Van Ness Avenue, a major artery for the tech busses. Although this eviction was legal because the renters had failed to pay rent for a few months, the story surrounding the eviction paints the picture of the housing boom and flipping properties causing displacement especially well. Fillmore is the only historically black neighborhood in San Francisco and recently the oldest independent black bookstore in the US, Marcus Books, located in the Fillmore district has been forced out of its building to make way for ‘redevelopment’. The owners of the property in which the bookstore has been housed since 1981, the Sweis family, decided to put the property up for sale for an
asking price of $3.6 million. As a testimony to how the San Franciscan real-estate market is skyrocketing, the Sweis family had bought the property less than a year ago for $1.6 million in a foreclosure sale and hoped to double their investment in just a few months. Although under pressure from the community and city officials they lowered their price to $2.6 million to give the owners of the bookstore a chance to buy the property. However the owners of Marcus Books only managed to raise $1.8 million in the 90 days they were given by the Sweis family to raise the money. Even though they were the only bidders their offer was rejected and the Sweis family filed for eviction after Marcus Books had missed a few rent payments. The owners of the building were able to evict the bookstore, which has a landmark status granted to it by the city of San Francisco, increasing their chances of a more profitable sale now that the proper no longer comes with the responsibility of housing the bookstore. This incident also attests to the fact that groups with a relatively low socioeconomic position are being marginalized even further by gentrification. In 1970 the city of San Francisco had a black population of 13.4 percent, in 2010 this was just 3.9 percent. But it also attest to the smoothing out of culture in more symbolic ways than diminishing ethnic diversity. The bookstore was an institution “[t]hey were always open to community gatherings… I would just spend time in there, it was like going to the library full of books about my heritage and history that no one else did” said Hugh Gregory (Cherney). Along with the bookstore the ‘other’ voice disappears at the books and gathering disappear from the city of San Francisco. This case shows how the capital surpluses from the second tech boom are being absorbed in San Francisco. “Urbanization we may conclude has played a crucial role in the absorption of capital surpluses and has done so at every increasing geographical scales but at the price of burgeoning processes of creative destruction that entail the dispossession of the urban masses of any right to the city whatsoever” (Harvey, The New Imperialism 12). I would like to take this argument one step further. Not only are the urban masses denied their right to the city by displacement, the consequence of this displacement is that the affluent too are denied their right to the city, as the city or the urban in constituted through the encounter with others. Because the marginal groups are being pushed out diversity decreases, and encounter with the other will become more and more rare, destroying the urban, destroying their own right to the city.
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Social constructs also play an important role in gentrification, in which language proves a powerful tool. Words as redevelopment, rehabilitation, improvement, but also words like productivity,
efficiency, livability create an idea that places subject to gentrification are none of these, and will this become these things after redevelopment. However, the only way in which these neighborhoods are not productive is in that they do not produce as much wealth for the higher classes as a redeveloped gentrified neighborhood would do. As gentrification, by definition, is nothing more than the replacement of working class by middle class, and these redevelopments are aimed at nothing more than attracting a more affluent group to a certain neighborhood. It is thus not the space itself that is not productive, it is not the people in it that are not productive, but it is the metrics that we rely on that are not productive, and it is about what we consider to be productive in society or what is productive to the monetary beneficiaries of the space. Lees, Slater, and Wyly point out that the value of land is also a social construct; not only is the value of a piece of land the outcome of the resources put into it, “the total labor invested given a society’s prevailing technologies and wage rate, and so on” (51) but it is also “the relative attractiveness of the land where the structure is situated” (51). “This means that the value of urban land is primarily a social creation: if a tiny piece of land located at the heart of a large, vibrant, growing city commands a premium on the market, it is because (1) centrality and accessibility are valued in the society and (2) collective social investment over time produced a large, vibrant city” (Lees et al. 51). This small piece of land commands a premium because it is in high demand. In (western) society today it is assumed that market-forces which create such high premiums for a piece of land are fair, either one decides to spend more money for a smaller space in the center, or one gets more space on the periphery. And this rationale extends even to government policy one may choose to live in a municipality with high taxes because a lot of it goes to a good education system because one has kids, or one may choose to live in another municipality where taxes are much lower because they do not have kids anyway. In this market approach for social amenities municipalities are set to compete with each other and if voters are unhappy they will leave and municipalities will have to change their policies (Hayward and Swanstrom 17). This however “defines the differential ability to pay for public services [..] as a difference in people's preferences alone” (Hayward and Swanstrom 17), and assumes that all people are equally free to move around unbound by financial restraints. However, as I have explained before, as more capital comes into a neighborhood, the less affluent are priced out of the markets and lose their freedom to move around in a certain area, their choice of residence is restricted to what they can actually spend, not by what they choose to spend. What is more, this thinking is also highly individualistic, if one has children one
would want to spend more taxes in return for a better educational system, if one doesn't have children one does not want to spend the extra tax money. This may seem logical but there is a deep flaw in this type of thinking; even though one may not have children one will benefit from the larger societal and economic advantages of an educated workforce. Social investments may not have an effect that is directly identifiable, they do often have positive effects for everyone in society and it is the role of government or other governing institutions to make sure these investments are made. “The politics of social investment thus means something quite different from reliance on market efficiency to meet our needs” (Stone 127). The same goes for public transport; although for Google it may seem it is only important that their own employees can get to Mountain View, they seem to forget that these employees rely on a much greater network of services. And, although many are provided at Googleplex (Jakobsson and Stiernstedt 122) this in itself is part of the same problem. Google fosters innovation, they let their employees spend 20% of their time on their own projects, but innovation does not just come out of time spend working on it, it requires ideas (Jakobsson and Stiernstedt 121). Especially in knowledge dense places such as Silicon Valley, talking to peers outside of the company may spark that innovative idea. A local bar or coffee place is one of the places this would actually happen. But the employees staffing these places need to get to, or get around, Mountain View too. Although Google may not directly benefit from getting these people around, the mere fact that they are there, making a place where strangers can meet and interact casually, may be of benefit to them in the long run. This rationale extends to the journey on the busses as well. Keeping employees locked in a privatopia keeps these chance encounters to a minimum, in addition, for a company as Google that produces public and social products it is important their employees remain in touch with the world outside Googletopia. Especially considering the social projects undertaken by Google’s sub-division Google.org to improve the bay area.
But there is also another problem with market-forces and free choice of municipality. Each municipality can set their own zoning ordinances and create high entry boundaries. Some municipalities for example require a minimum plot size for housing (Rae 110), if this size is set extra high less affluent people cannot afford to buy a house in the municipality, so they cannot choose to pay higher taxes in return for the social benefits the area provides. These mechanisms have proved effective in keeping poor people out, and given the socio-economic situation combined with persistent racism in the United States it has even kept non-whites out of certain areas. Silicon Valley has quite
