We sort of thought that Google was well on their way to owning the world, but it seems that isn’t really the case, especially in Mountain View, California, where plans for a sprawling green headquarters campus have been dashed by a few newly-appointed city council members. In a vote earlier this week, the council considered construction requests from Google and LinkedIn (among others) and—in news of the “whoah”—LinkedIn won.
Google already has rights to about 700,000 square feet of land in the area in question, located just north of Highway 101, and had requested an additional 2.5 million square feet of land across four sites. Interestingly, Google’s initial ask was more than the city had to divvy up in the first place. The council members had only 2.2 million square feet of land to dole out, so it was clear at the outset that someone wouldn’t get their way.
Related: BIG and Heatherwick Studio to design Google’s new Mountain View HQ
The Tuesday evening vote awarded LinkedIn with 1.45 million square feet of the requested 1.6 million, while poor Google was granted only 515,000 square feet—a mere crumb compared to their lofty plans. With this news, the hot shot design team Heatherwick Studios and Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) will have to make serious cuts to their original design, which included an enormous greenhouse and an indoor cycling track, among other sprawling luxuries. Unless someone can convince the folks at LinkedIn to turn tail, it looks like Google may have to get used to not being the biggest dog in the fight.
Learn more about the original plan for Google’s sprawling campus here, and stay tuned for details as the plans are updated to reflect the much smaller footprint.
Via Forbes
Images via Google
