Google hopes to build a new, town-like campus near its Silicon Valley headquarters.
The company this month unveiled its proposal for Middlefield Park, a revamped 40-acre site in the city of Mountain View, California, where Google's main headquarters is currently based. The plan includes a parks network, retail space, office space, and even a public pool and sports field.
The tech giant also plans to add as many as 1,850 residential units, and the company says 20% of those units will be affordable housing. The housing commitment follows a $1 billion pledge Google made last year to housing in the Bay Area, which included repurposing some its land holdings to create 15,000 new homes at varying income levels, including homes intended for lower- and middle-income families.
Google's new campus plans come at a time when the future of offices is uncertain. None of the major tech companies has sent employees back to work in the US amid the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, and Google's itself isn't requiring companies to return to work until July 2021.
But Google isn't alone in reaffirming its commitment to physical offices. Last month, Amazon announced that it plans to expand its physical office space in six "tech hubs" across the US, investing $1.4 billion to build out the offices and adding 3,500 jobs.
And Facebook in August signed a deal for a massive new office in the Farley Building in New York City. The office space spans 730,000 square feet and Facebook said at the time it will be used to expand the company's engineering operations in New York.
While Google's plans are still in the very early stages, we got our first look at how the company is imagining its new campus. Take a look: