Demand for Office Space has Plummeted. What Does That Mean for San Francisco and the Bay Area?

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 16 March 2023

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

San Francisco’s once-redhot office market has waned since the pandemic. Less than half of the workers who used to fill downtown office towers are working in person most days. That has led to high office building vacancies, lower revenue from property and sales taxes, and fewer workers riding transit and supporting local businesses. Now that working from home continues to be the norm, city leaders, landlords and merchants are wondering what to do next. We’ll dig into what this massive shift in the office market means for our region’s urban centers, economy and workers. Guests: Ted Egan, chief economist, San Francisco Controller's Office Karen Chapple, professor of city and regional planning, University of California, Berkeley Kevin Truong, staff writer, The San Francisco Standard Colin Yasukochi, executive director, CBRE Tech Insights Center Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:00.0	Support for Forum comes from Rancho La Puerta, a wellness resort in Baja, California, just an hour from San Diego.
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0:23.8	Saver summer at Rancho LaPuerta, rancho LaPuerta.com.
0:28.3	Support for Forum comes from Broadway SF, presenting Parade, the musical revival based on a true story.
0:35.7	From three-time Tony-winning composer Jason Robert Brown comes the story of
0:40.0	Leo and Lucille Frank, a newlywed Jewish couple struggling to make a life in Georgia. When Leo is
0:46.9	accused of an unspeakable crime, it propels them into an unimaginable test of faith, humanity, justice,
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1:03.5	The riveting and gloriously hopeful parade plays the Orpheum Theater for three weeks only, May 20th through June 8th.
1:07.8	Tickets on sale now at Broadway, sF.com.
1:10.5	From KQED. From KQED. From KQED. I'm Alexei.
1:25.9	If you live in one of the outlying parts of the Bay Area,
1:28.8	or down in San Jose, it can be easy to be cynical about downtown San Francisco. Why does that
1:33.9	place get so much attention anyway? But almost any way that you cut it, a healthy Bay Area
1:39.1	requires a healthy downtown San Francisco. In the before times, downtown produced nearly three quarters of the economic output of San Francisco,
1:48.4	which itself is a substantial percentage of the region's economy.
1:52.0	By design, our infrastructure uses downtown as the hub of the system.
1:56.9	So what could an interesting revitalized downtown San Francisco look like?
2:00.7	And how can we get there?
2:02.0	That's coming up next after this news.
2:12.5	Welcome to Forum.
	...

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