Amazon's serpentine takeover of Seattle might scare most tech companies from moving in on their turf but when you're Google, you don't scare easy.
The tech giant and Vulcan, Inc. announced Thursday that they're going to build four six-story office buildings in South Lake Union, thereby completing the once-vacant neighborhood's transition into the technology hub of the Pacific Northwest.
In total the plan calls for 607,000 square feet of office space on Mercer Street between Terry Avenue and Fairview Avenue. The structures will include 14,000 square-feet of street-level retail, below-grade parking, courtyard plazas, and a pedestrian-friendly woonerf between Terry & Boren Avenues. Vulcan will also be building two residential towers containing 151 market-rate units total.
The buildings were all previously known as Block 25 and Block 31, both of which were already moving through the design review process. Block 37 remains an independant project by Vulcan.
Per Vulcan the plan is to construct the buildings in phases. Construction would begin in 2017 and be completed by 2019. The buildings will target LEED Gold certification and Salmon-Safe accreditation while Vulcan also plans to contribute $4.3M in incentive zoning fees for affordable housing and daycare.
Graphite Design Group is designing the project while Runberg Architecture Group is consulting on the residential portion. GLY Construction is the general contractor.
Google will be moving it's current operations in Fremont to the new space once completed. Combined with their Kirkland office, they'll get pretty close to one million square-feet of office space in the region. That's still a far cry from Amazon's eventual 9.4 million square-feet, but it's a clear sign that there's room for more than one tech giant in town.
· Google to move to new 4-building complex in Amazon’s backyard in Seattle, developed by Paul Allen’s Vulcan Inc. [GW]
· Early Look at Vulcan's Big South Lake Union Building Blocks [CS]