I'm so glad to see that the City Council has decided to listen to the people of Mountain View once again! For years they have been demanding more expensive housing, more traffic, and more OFFICES! This agreement guarantees that they will get all 3 for years to come! As a bonus, maybe you've finally found a way to kill the few remaining small businesses in the area. Well done!



Jim Neal
Modesto, Ca
(Formerly Old Mountain View)

If you don’t want pro growth, pro business, you made the right choice by moving out, Jim ... don’t take offense at me saying that. tt’s just the direction Mountain View has taken. I wish it had more limits to construction and tall buildings like Palo Alto but that ship sailed years ago.You can’t put the genie back in the bottle especially by posting on the internet...

On the subject of a subsidy for restaurants, that I’m adamantly opposed to as a resident and tax payer / as that’s just a handout to restaurant owners who complain the loudest. It might come from Facebook in lieu of some other concession but it’s not broadly benefiting the tax payers and residents of this town of ours.

So let me get this straight, Facebook leased the building on the condition that they couldn't run a private cafeteria for employees, and then the city turns around and re-negotiates the deal so Facebook gets to open a private cafeteria half of the time? Why not hold Facebook to the original terms? What did the City of Mountain View get in return for modifying the terms?

Any new project should be measured by the benefit it will confer upon the current residents. Right now, we sit through three cycles of lights to get off Central Expressway (roughly perpendicular to San Antonio). How will this project alleviate that waste of our time? City planners should answer that simple question. And do it before any approvals are issued.

I am pro growth and pro business. I just never saw any reason why so much of it has to be shoehorned into a landlocked city the size of Mountain View when it's obviously having such a negative impact on the residents. I know I should care more about businesses than people, but somehow I could just never bring myself to think that way.


Jim Neal
Modesto, Ca
(Formerly Old Mountain View)

And there goes any chance for a vibrant commercial or retail center that evokes a second downtown. After all, I am the only one that has noticed dozens of still vacant retail spaces more than three years now all around the phase one and two of the project prior to the offices towers being completed? The article described it best when it says we are about to get another "walled-off tech compound with private food service." In the meantime, our mountain views have been obliterated. Another epic fail by our beloved city council.

As a local resident who has been here 20+ years, I'm a little worried what prices are going to do once the place is filled with Facebook employees running around with company paid debit cards. Two parties seem to have won here, Facebook and the nearby restaurants. I do hope this spurs a lot more restaurants to open in the mostly-empty shopping center, but I also hope locals aren't priced out.

I frequently have meetings in the San Antonio area and wish to grab a quick lunch or indeed a more leisurely lunch in one of the eating establishments in the San Antonio area. They are often very busy with lines, particularly the more popular ones.

As a result I want to know if we will still have enough space for the rest of us to get lunch and secondly how will they find workers for these eating establishments? Robots and other AI gadgetry are invading our lives everywhere in Silicon Valley. Finding a person at a checkout in WalMart or Target involves waiting extra time. Will the same occur at our favorite lunch providers?

This was destined to end favorably for Facebook. The idea that the company would not have a cafeteria was a way to appease the community into more easily accepting Facebook. Facebook was always going to get their cafeteria, and they'll need it. Any successful tech company with with lots of employees who are expected to be on the job 24/7 needs food on site.

Google: we want Mayfield and we’ll provide enough parking, not practice Waymo through Monta Loma, drive shuttles through your neighborhood, work at 4am, etc etc
MV: ok!
Google- does the opposite
MV- silent, reaping in the money

Facebook: we won’t have a cafeteria, we’ll support local businesses
-moves in-
Facebook: we want a cafeteria
MV: ok! Reaping in the money in taxes.
Rest of us... what just happened again?