Hey New York,
We get it, this is a little awkward. We’ve been with Amazon for how long now? A long time — we guess we’re Amazon’s first. Please don’t take that as bragging or undermining your relationship — we promise you, it’s water under the bridge. And we’ve been trying to manage our relationship with Amazon for some time now. So for very selfish reasons, we’re glad Amazon has found someone new. We get that we’re in an open relationship, but honestly, we’re hoping once Amazon has settled in with you, we’ll get dumped for good.
In the spirit of city sisterhood, we’d like to share a few things about what it’s like to live with Amazon. Please don’t take this as meddling, we swear, we just want you to be happy. We’re hoping that you can learn from our mistakes.
We’re guessing Amazon promised you thousands of jobs, right? Cool! Jobs are good! We love jobs! Thing is, those jobs tend to be of a type. They’re programmers and marketers and web designers. Nothing against those jobs, hell, we’re Seattle, we thrive on those kinds of jobs! But wow, it sure has led to the homogenization of our city. We used to feel scrappier, forgive us, grungier. And if Amazon has given us a bit more diversity (has it?), well, it’s made the types of people we meet when we go out at night a lot more similar. That’s weird. It’s weird to hear the same tech conversations in every damn bar in town. We’ve never been as cool as you are, New York, it’s why everybody loves you. We hope being with Amazon won’t, you know, water you down.
Did you guys talk about housing? We hope you talked about housing. Thousands of new workers need thousands of new housing units. That means two things — increasing demand and increasing prices. When Amazon started its latest project (we’ll get to Amazon’s projects in a sec), the funky neighborhoods around the edges of downtown changed a lot. We got tons of those box condos, you know the ones, three stories, narrow, all shoulder to shoulder, as many as zoning allows. Starter homes at 750k! Okay, you’re New York, maybe you’re used to that. We were still hanging out around 400k, below in some places, and that’s over. Rents went up too. We think you have rent control — is that right? — and that might help, but we don’t think it helps when your building goes condo and you have to buy in or move out of town to find something you can afford. Maybe you can afford a fair bit — if you work for Amazon. But if you can’t, sorry about how much longer your commute just got. More time to read your Kindle on the subway? Kindles are cool, and we love our library, but wow, if we could hook Overdrive to the New York Public Library… we digress.
We wanted to warn you about the projects. Amazon likes to do projects. Maybe you’ve heard about The Spheres. They’re these cool blobby round things and they’re full of plants, and you can go if you sign up for a tour, but don’t be thinking this is some open to the public garden, it’s not. Plus, it seems like they took forever to build, and the construction, wow. New York, you’re not big on driving, right? But walking has been an issue too, and biking, and you want to know something crazy? We get lost in our own hometown now. All that construction means you’re always being rerouted, and more than once we were late for a meeting or someone was late to meet us because they got lost downtown. Change is good but it seems like Amazon really wanted to focus on their projects and didn’t think so much about how they would affect our daily activities. It was weird, you’d think they’d want to make it easy for us to feel great about them, but it seems like they just wanted to have right of way. We don’t know, maybe you can talk to them about how you need to walk places, or ride your bike places, even while they’re tearing up your streets? Just, you know, get that conversation started now. Recommended!
Amazon isn’t great about looking beyond its own issues. Yeah, they’ve supported some important causes, you’d expect that from a Richie Rich like Amazon by default. But Amazon’s warehouse workers are continually fighting for better working conditions and a living wage. Hey, it’s Amazon’s money, after all, we don’t get to say how it’s spent, but our schools are underfunded and our homeless population is the third largest in the country. But Amazon fought long and hard with us over a head tax it could easily afford. We’re confused by how Amazon even needs incentives to hook up with another city like you, New York. You know better than we do, you’re New York, but we hear you have some transportation issues, for starters, so maybe they should be paying you a transit incentive? Heads up, when Amazon moves in with thousands of jobs and dozens of disruptive construction projects, traffic gets worse.
We really want to be friends, New York! We think you’re the best, and we can totally see why Amazon wants to be with you. I mean, there are days when we want to BE you. Our bagels are still not that good! But hey, you’re starting fresh with Amazon (see what we did there? We’re funny!) so maybe you can learn from our mistakes. We’re thinking things like, oh, maybe when you give Amazon building permits, Amazon funds transit improvements. Amazon worker influx means new housing, maybe you ask for low income housing as a percentage of every new project? You give Amazon incentives, Amazon gives you lots of support for education, including the arts? Maybe the weird robot stores are a no altogether, you gotta keep those bodegas hopping, right? We don’t know, we’re just spit-balling here with some things we wish we had talked about.
We hope you don’t think we’re out of line, New York. We just wanted you to know that we’re here for you if you have questions and we hope you’ll trust us enough to ask. We don’t want you to make the same mistakes we did.
Thanks, and good luck. We wish you success and happiness.
Your sister-wife,
Seattle
PS: Virginia, we know.