[MikefromCT]

Originally Posted by Lincolnian

Jay,

Unfortunately we are now the 3rd summer in since Covid hit and downtown is far from normal. Many restaurants are gone or have significantly reduced hours. Other than when an event is taking place at the XL Center or Yard Goats few people come downtown. The after work crowd is nonexistent. There are a few restaurants with business but it's largely due to the fact that they are the last ones standing.

Converting former office space to residential is not going to do it. Many of the people I know who lived downtown lived there because it was close to work. Many actually purchased/rented units downtown specifically for work and lived elsewhere. Many in this situation have now either sold or rented owned units or not renewed their residential leases.

This problem is not exclusive to downtown Hartford. However, downtown badly needs a draw. UConn helps. A mission which links UConn, Trinity, University of Hartford and other area colleges/universities with a downtown high tech/science/medicine research and development center could create the kind of driver needed to differentiate Hartford from other mid-sized cities in the northeast.

Unfortunately, I agree with this. In Hartford, as with so many cities, the downtown area was the central business district where people commuted to work from 9 to 5, with a handful of restaurants and bars benefiting from foot traffic, and then they would return home outside the confines of downtown, sometimes within city limits, sometimes in the 'burbs. Very few cities, large and small, have downtowns that don't clear out when workers leave the office at the end of the day, and most of them have neighborhoods outside of downtown within city limits that have trendy nightlife. Hartford, on the other hand, seems to be lacking this, and it's the inner suburbs that have these characteristics: lower-rise buildings with densely populated residential areas that have built up their Main Street areas. It's not just West Hartford that's done this (though that seems to be the most popular). Every suburb that borders Hartford is reinvesting in downtown, so the city has these areas to contend with. In Hartford, there are points of interest beyond downtown that are growing popular (Parkville Market, Real Art Ways, Thomas Hooker Brewery at Colt and their adjoining performance venue) but this growth seems like it's happening at snail's pace, and the pandemic IMO is at least partially to blame.

[JayCT]

The Hartford is consolidating the last of its suburban offices to its Asylum Hill campus in Hartford. This means that just under 500 workers that now report to its Windsor office when they report, will now be in Hartford instead. Just goes to show how reliant insurers have become on Work-From-Home and how that has reduced the need for office space. Jay

https://www.courant.com/news/connect...kra-story.html

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by JayCT

The Hartford is consolidating the last of its suburban offices to its Asylum Hill campus in Hartford. This means that just under 500 workers that now report to its Windsor office when they report, will now be in Hartford instead. Just goes to show how reliant insurers have become on Work-From-Home and how that has reduced the need for office space. Jay

https://www.courant.com/news/connect...kra-story.html

I was just texting about this with my friend who works at Aetna. Unfortunately, WFH for The Hartford meant 10% of the employees left Connecticut.

https://www.ctinsider.com/hartford/a...t-17142925.php

[Johnho771]

Originally Posted by kidyankee764

I was just texting about this with my friend who works at Aetna. Unfortunately, WFH for The Hartford meant 10% of the employees left Connecticut.

https://www.ctinsider.com/hartford/a...t-17142925.php

Just one company. I'm sure a lot of people who work fir ither companies have moved to the Hartford area and CT at result of being able to work remotely.

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by Johnho771

Just one company. I'm sure a lot of people who work fir ither companies have moved to the Hartford area and CT at result of being able to work remotely.

Funny you should say that because my friend at Aetna said the opposite - he said a lot of employees have become what they call “WFHers” and relocated to cheaper areas of the country on their Hartford salary.

[mdovell]

This is a discussion that comes up at work every now and then. Last year when I was hired I was told it would be a hybrid. By the time we hit late December omnicron happened and we were fully remote for a few months and we came back. The original agreement was we were to be remote until the end of June and then that got moved to the end of summer and now supposedly it's mid-September. Last year we are fully staffed now we're down about 15%. Long-time employees with a decade or more have been leaving some of which are going to places just because it's fully remote. We've had discussions about if we should go in additional days eventually and what days those will be but I don't think there's any easy questions here..

Much of this I think also stems from the agreement that might be with the time of hiring. If you hired somebody for remote work and you're calling everybody back to the office Does it include those that were never in the office to begin with? The average National Rent is now $2,000. So I highly doubt you're going to get people to move like they did before the interest rates went up so much and fuel on top of that.

We've been debating back to the office now for probably a year or so. At this point I don't think it's that many people still concerned about covid-19 out more about the inflation. If calling people all back to the office for 40 hours a week means more traffic and higher gas prices I don't know if it's going to work.

[JayCT]

Originally Posted by kidyankee764

I was just texting about this with my friend who works at Aetna. Unfortunately, WFH for The Hartford meant 10% of the employees left Connecticut.

https://www.ctinsider.com/hartford/a...t-17142925.php

As the linked article notes, these workers report to the office a couple days a week so it’s unlikely they can or will be able to move far from Hartford. Jay

[mdovell]

Originally Posted by JayCT

As the linked article notes, these workers report to the office a couple days a week so it’s unlikely they can or will be able to move far from Hartford. Jay

Depends. I've heard of UMass Amherst students looking for housing in Hartford. The market is that tight, even for rentals. I'd argue nearly have of the state is within an hour of Hartford (size, not population)

[Lincolnian]

In Hartford some companies have reduced their physical space by 2/3. They have a minority of people working full time in the office. The balance need to schedule appointments to use the limited number of pop in stations. The result is that only about 20% of the workers are full-time in the office. Another 20% are half-time and the balance come in on rare occasion or not at all. Many have moved out of state. My wife is one of these employees. She could work whenever she wants. She formerly had been a full-time in the office person and now has been reassigned as full-time remote. The job and responsibilities didn't change. It works flawlessly (for the company) and her company, like many others, are finding that they are getting more productivity out of the existing employees. They also require the worker to carry the costs of the internet, use their own cell phone (not subsidized) and related costs associated with their home office.

It's not all roses however. It saves the company a ton of money but the extra costs are not tax deductible for the employee. For some they need more room in the house to dedicate to a real office. In my wife's case the day is longer because there no longer appears to be a defined work day. Her boss expects answers whenever he is working and often schedules meetings to start at 8 am and 5 pm whereas in the past the company's hours were pretty much defined as 8:00 to 4:30. The result is that the commuting time she saved has been absorbed by additional work time and instead of an 8.5 hour day it is now more like 10. I expect some adjustments will occur but I don't think it will go back to the way it was. The leased space is gone and the equipment and office furniture has been disposed of. There is little reason to have many of these professional people return to an office just to be seen calling others business associates and clients who are located all over the country.

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by JayCT

As the linked article notes, these workers report to the office a couple days a week so it’s unlikely they can or will be able to move far from Hartford. Jay

Do you mean my linked article, or yours? If mine, I don’t see that anywhere in the article. If yours, I can’t read it since it’s behind a paywall.