Perhaps you've heard: Amazon has culled its pool of applicants for its second headquarters from 238 to a list of 20 finalists.
The Rhode Island Commerce Corporation had submitted an application in October with seven potential addresses for "HQ2," such as Providence, Pawtucket-Central Falls, East Providence, Warwick, Richmond, North Kingstown and Woonsocket.
Gov. Gina Raimondo had not published the application, as some other applicants had, saying she wanted the state to “be in the best possible position to negotiate,” an AP report states.
However, Rhode Island did not make the recent cut.
“Though it was a long shot, we're glad we gave it a shot," Matt Sheaff, Director of Communications and Stakeholder Outreach for the Executive Office of Commerce, said in an email to Rhode Island Inno. "Rhode Island put in a serious bid for Amazon’s HQ2 and we're told it was well received. We are in ongoing discussions with the company about other opportunities in Rhode Island.”
Making the list of finalists were cities like Boston, Austin, Atlanta and Chicago, among others.
Some analysts said the results weren't all-together unexpected, while others, such as Baird's Colin Sebastian, expressed surprise that Columbus and Nashville made the cut, as Amazon expressed a need for robust airport hubs, and that cities like Minneapolis, Detroit and Houston failed to rank on the final list.
"Their proposals may have simply fallen short," he added.
Others are chiming in that not moving forward for HQ2 is a potential blessing in disguise.
"Seattle journalist Knute Berger tells Business Insider that Amazon’s original headquarters has displaced minority communities there, driven up housing costs, and swelled the city’s population of homeless people," wrote Beth Skwarecki in a piece on HQ2 for Lifehacker. "Seattle is also in the nation’s top 10 cities with the worst traffic, and doesn’t have a public transit system good enough to alleviate traffic pressure. I’m thinking of my city, Pittsburgh, as I read about Seattle’s troubles. Our housing costs are blessedly cheap to begin with, phew. But I can’t imagine any part of the city handling 50,000 employees worth of traffic."
Amazon said it would make its final decision sometime in 2018.
