Time moves slowly when you're waiting for a big announcement, and it feels like Amazon took forever with its year-plus long hunt for HQ2. Even after all these leaks about which city or cities might land the huge corporate development, the company stayed mostly quiet.
Until now: Amazon Picks Northern Virginia’s Crystal City and New York City For HQ2 — HQ3.
It's been more than a year since the ecommerce behemoth said it would select a city for its second North American headquarters. By now, you probably know the high points by. It's a projected $5 billion investment in a campus and up to 50,000 high-paying jobs over the next decade or two. It's a game-changer for any city in terms of jobs, housing affordability and the city's character -- and Austin was still one of the finalists.
But sources close to the deal have told The New York Times that Jeff Bezos and company are actually planning to split HQ2 between two cities. In other words, it's HQ2 and HQ3 -- and half the benefit for whichever cities land it. The Times has reported that Long Island City area of Queens New York and in the Crystal City area of Arlington, Va. That became official on Nov. 13.
But the company -- or one of its employees, at least -- did show a little frustration in the form of a tweet from Amazon's director of economic development policy, Mike Grella, who wrote: "Memo to the genius leaking info about Crystal City, VA as #HQ2 selection. You're not doing Crystal City, VA any favors. And stop treating the NDA you signed like a used napkin."
In the early days, long shot cities made elaborate pitches to win the hearts and minds of Amazon executives. Kansas City's mayor wrote 1,000 5-star Amazon reviews. Tucson, Ariz. sent a truck with a giant saguaro cactus. Stonecrest, Ga., said it would rename itself Amazon.
But Amazon proved to be more pragmatic, using a so-far unknown metric that the company says includes measures of tech talent, housing affordability and, of course, incentives offered by cities, counties, states and business organizations.
Austin is out of the running. But, through all the speculation, Austin has landed some high marks.
Austin was ranked third most likely to win HQ2 in a survey by Geekwire.com. It was ranked second, behind Atlanta, in a breakdown of housing affordability by Attom Data Solutions. But when the Wall Street Journal conducted its analysis based on what was known about Amazon's search, Austin ranked in the second-to-last tier of cities. In that analysis, Dallas and the Washington D.C. area topped the charts.
Now, here's a look at some of our other Amazon HQ2 coverage.
