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Two tech centers, Bellevue and Austin.
Which one do you think will come out on top by the end of the decade? Now of course Austin has more history and culture, but Bellevue is a very quick bus (and soon to be train) ride over the lake to Seattle. I think as Bellevue and the Eastside continue to grow, they could maybe make a case by the end of the decade that rivals Austin. I'm not sure which one is more dominated by tech, but both are continuing to grow exponentially in that sector and in population/ construction. Also Austin's skyline is better right now imo but Bellevue has so much in the pipeline that I think it's going to be close very soon.
Whatcha think?
If we are talking about Bellevue alone, not including Seattle…
I like them both but they are altogether two different entities aside from them both being tech centered. Bellevue is much better designed than Downtown Austin. Austin will eventually have a $7Bil rail which includes a subway downtown. I don’t know a great deal about the rail project in Bellevue but if it’s Heavy Rail then it’s pretty close but I think the subway overall will be alittle closer to what is seen at Transit Tunnel. Not a spitting image by any means but they have some pretty impressive plans. For connectivity though, Seattle is light years ahead of Austin, the $7 Bil project will not change that.
In terms of tech, both downtowns are dominated by the tech scene and I think it is close but I think Austin is slightly ahead here. There are also countless projects going up in Downtown as well.
Austin at least has a structurally dense core around downtown that has potential, no amount of construction will change how suburban Bellevue's layout is.
One is a whole city and another is small part of a city. Bellevue and its partners Kirkland, Redmond, and Issaquah (the core of the Eastside) are collectively 8% of the Seattle area population.
That said, all four have substantial office construction underway. Bellevue has the Amazon HQ1b firehose in its downtown, possibly the biggest of Meta's Seattle area nodes at the Spring District including buildings underway, plus the newly upgraded T-Mobile HQ. Redmond has the $3b Microsoft core campus redo underway plus inroads by Google and a number of Meta buildings including work underway. Kirkland has a couple growing Google campuses. Issaquah doesn't have as much tech, but the Costco HQ is adding a building. Combined, this area has more office construction than some large metros. (Issaquah's motto: Our name is so hard to spell and pronounce that Costco chose Kirkland as its brand name.)
I wouldn't call the Eastside urban, but it's getting a lot of urban nodes. Downtown Bellevue is the big one of course. Austin's skyline and core urbanity are higher.
Bellevue outdoes Austin in commute shares. Bellevue was 13.3% transit commutes (its residents) vs. 3.3% for Austin in 2019. Walking 7.8% to 2.6%. Biking 1.6% to 1.1%. Drove alone 56.0% to 70.3%. Bellevue is basically Portland in its commute stats.
Bellevue has a "boring" name in Seattle, but it's actually more international than the core city.
Let me add to that. Bellevue will never get big chip plants or corporate relocations (nor will the Seattle area overall). First, land is both scarce and expensive. Second, related to #1, most people don't move here unless they make six figures, don't have kids, or know somebody. And third, we don't play the incentive game. Bellevue and other municipalities don't try to actively punish corporations like Seattle can, but it's still a challenge.
Instead we grow companies gradually, whether they're home-grown or the engineering offices every other tech company (apparently) has established. And we're pretty good at gradually turning small operations into huge ones.
I’d lean towards Austin on account of Texas being more business friendly than Washington. If it were up to me though, I’d take Bellevue without thinking twice.
Two tech centers, Bellevue and Austin.
Which one do you think will come out on top by the end of the decade? Now of course Austin has more history and culture, but Bellevue is a very quick bus (and soon to be train) ride over the lake to Seattle. I think as Bellevue and the Eastside continue to grow, they could maybe make a case by the end of the decade that rivals Austin. I'm not sure which one is more dominated by tech, but both are continuing to grow exponentially in that sector and in population/ construction. Also Austin's skyline is better right now imo but Bellevue has so much in the pipeline that I think it's going to be close very soon.
Whatcha think?
How would this work exactly? Austin is growing much faster than Bellevue. And on the skyline, are you serious? Austin will have six 600' buildings under construction in 2022, one of those being over 1000'. Bellevue's current tallest is 450'.
Last edited by whereiend; 02-22-2022 at 10:07 AM..
Lived in both. Would prefer Bellevue easily. But, you're comparing a very small suburb to a giant city economically.
That's what's confused me about this, why are we comparing Austin specifically to Bellevue and not the Seattle area as a whole? May as well compare them completely.
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