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A comment on Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F. Parent comment

Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by diebeforei485 on Sunday October 25, 2020 @05:53PM (#24890247)
Many of them can't because they don't have sufficient plumbing everywhere (apartments would have far more bathrooms and kitchens) and most buildings can't be retrofitted.

Plus, land-use laws would have to change, which is also extremely difficult.

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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by swiley on Sunday October 25, 2020 @06:21PM (#24890528)
SF: shared bathrooms aren't ok, we'd rather have people use the sidewalk.
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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by Aeolun on Sunday October 25, 2020 @06:17PM (#24890489)
> extremely difficult

Right up until 50% of the city center is empty. You’ll see those laws changing real soon.

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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by 908B64B197 on Sunday October 25, 2020 @06:07PM (#24890391)
I guess they could make bigger apartments if they are bottlenecked on plumbing.

But I wonder what people could do with commercial office space so cheap? For startups that can't really go 100% remote (mostly hardware) that's a dream come true!

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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by VectorLock on Sunday October 25, 2020 @06:21PM (#24890523)
I wonder what it would be like to live in a 10k SF open-plan office with a single bathroom.
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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by TeMPOraL on Sunday October 25, 2020 @07:15PM (#24890992)
I wonder how it would be like to work there, because that already sounds like a sweatshop from my worst nightmares.

(There are only 96 five-minutes bathroom breaks available during 8-hour work day, to share between all employees.)

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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by sjg007 on Sunday October 25, 2020 @06:33PM (#24890661)
You can reconfigure the more modern ones.
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Re:Nearly 12M Square Feet of Vacant Office Space in S.F by diebeforei485 on Sunday October 25, 2020 @07:42PM (#24891227)
True, but the new buildings are also less likely to stay vacant because it's easier for them to attract tenants.
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