urbanSTL

^ RW, ATT seemed to have tightened up on the home work rule/telecommuting but not sure how well they enforce it. My wife's boss mentions something every once in a while about the office but things are so busy that it is not pushed too hard on her. At same time, I'm out the door happy for my own office space even if it comes with a the lousy view of a parking lot and lousy commutes now and then. My gut feeling, you got more people like me who rather have that office space and face to face connections.

I also wonder if ATT sees some advantage of a Midwest workforce, the cost of business and realization that outsourcing everything maybe wasn't as great as executives where hoping it to be.

roger wyoming II wrote:This is not gospel, but I did have a chat with an AT&T worker outside One Center today and it seems like we may not be losing as many workers as once thought. A couple things he said,,,

-- there's still a fair amount of workers in One Center for the time being. He said originally they thought the lease was up this year but actually it goes until '17 so their not rushing things.

-- workers who are moving are getting sent to the historic building across the street. and that should be full once completed. He said the Manchester location really isn't an option.

-- in reference to what dredger mentioned about telecommuting, I'm not sure if I understood exactly what he was saying but it seems that they may have tightened up work-from-home arrangements or were finding as many aren't doing it as they thought there might be.

Anyway, it all sounded better than worst fears coming to pass. In an ideal world AT&T would have sold the historic building for a mixed-use project and moved everyone into One Center but it is what it is. And with the significant lead time, perhaps the owners will be able to come land something exciting.... miracles happen!

I would not be surprised if AT&T would want to consolidate everything in the region in one bell center but I really think they would now keep about 50% of bell center.

Any discussion of Direct TV moving their operations to the large tower?

I heard a rumor from an employee they were moving their operations to ATT tower after being purchased. I don't think it's true though.

Currently located in southern cal.

Downtown, I'm assume that your are referring to Direct TV moving its or part of its ops. I can see the business model for such a move as it doesn't make a lot of sense to spend a premium in the California business climate for the day to day DirectTV ops on the back office end, billings, customer service and so forth. Who knows, maybe most of the back end is somewhere else.

Would be interesting to note that St. Louis would become another mini hub, this time for tv service providers with Charter's large and expanding cable role and ATT expanding role with DirectTV if ATT so chooses to shake things ups by moving some workload to St. Louis.

Yes their operations currently in Marina Del Rey and Long Beach.

roger wyoming II wrote:This is not gospel, but I did have a chat with an AT&T worker outside One Center today and it seems like we may not be losing as many workers as once thought. A couple things he said,,,

-- there's still a fair amount of workers in One Center for the time being. He said originally they thought the lease was up this year but actually it goes until '17 so their not rushing things.

-- workers who are moving are getting sent to the historic building across the street. and that should be full once completed. He said the Manchester location really isn't an option.

-- in reference to what dredger mentioned about telecommuting, I'm not sure if I understood exactly what he was saying but it seems that they may have tightened up work-from-home arrangements or were finding as many aren't doing it as they thought there might be.

Anyway, it all sounded better than worst fears coming to pass. In an ideal world AT&T would have sold the historic building for a mixed-use project and moved everyone into One Center but it is what it is. And with the significant lead time, perhaps the owners will be able to come land something exciting.... miracles happen!

I am currently on a project that has me working in 1010 Pine. It is a ghost town. Entire floors have no - zero! - people working on them. Often I am the only one on an entire floor. There are a few people manning the central office. AT&T is also trialing a new IT service center (for laptop/hardware issues) that built out a small space on one of the floors. There are a few people staffing that.

If they've moved people to 1010 from One ATT, I sure haven't seen so much as a single one. On the other hand, I do know of maybe a half dozen that have moved out and are officially working from Des Peres (i.e. their address is there, though they may be working from home more often). So not sure why Des Peres "isn't an option" unless it was just for this individual.

Telecommuting is more nuanced than just being harder or easier to do. There were some Exec VP-levels that restricted it, or (in some cases) relocated employees' jobs from NJ to Dallas - many left instead. A new flex worker policy was implemented more or less company wide. I think the net result for the most part will be that (a) fewer people will become true teleworkers 4-5 days a week, (b) more people will work from home occasionally (1-3x a week), and (c) most in the group will no longer have dedicated office space. There is a 'drop in' area to get wifi and use of a phone, and that concept will spread.

If I had to sum my expectations up in one phrase, it would be that the number of people in the downtown complex on any given day - barring any DirecTV move, of which there is absolutely no talk - will remain roughly the same, but the amount of office space dedicated to housing said workers will decrease by ~30-50%. Just my guess.

Technology may ultimately render this unimportant, but I've been told in the past that the facility itself can't be sold because of the central office therein.

Bprop, thanks for the insight. My wife has the drop in office option @ ATT's San Ramon North California regional office after they sold back the office to the developer and downsized big time on leased square footage. She hates it because never know what is and what's not available, wifi not nearly as good as her DSL hard wire connection at home and the phone system a mess in the new configured space. So she sticks with telecommuting as much as she can.

dredger wrote:Bprop, thanks for the insight. My wife has the drop in office option @ ATT's San Ramon North California regional office after they sold back the office to the developer and downsized big time on leased square footage. She hates it because never know what is and what's not available, wifi not nearly as good as her DSL hard wire connection at home and the phone system a mess in the new configured space. So she sticks with telecommuting as much as she can.

Yea, it can be a mess. In theory they're going to move to online registration so there are no issues finding open space.

But to me the worst part is that most people by our nature are disgusting slobs. I don't like touching things and putting things by my mouth that other people put their mouths, hands, boogers, and other body parts on. If I'm going to have to bathe my workstation in Clorox before working there, I'd rather stay home.

It's still in use

Supposedly by 3Q2017 everyone will be moved out. I don't know how many are left. The official numbers say 2500 need to move to 1010 Pine. But 2500 couldn't fit in 1010 Pine to begin with. So we have to assume that most of those only nominally have offices in ATT Center and work remotely most of the time. It looks like they're preparing two floors of 1010 Pine with the high-density open office environment. Perhaps the other floors will house more people in a more traditional cubicle/office environment, but no word one way or the other.

Also, the two walkways connected to ATT Center are scheduled to come down after the moves are complete.

^ my wife who works for ATT avoids the high use, high density multi user office space in their downsized Northern California San Ramon office with a passion. But good question, wonder how many users they believe that space will utilize. like you noted, 2500 is a big number.

Wishful thinking but ATT relocating Direct TV from Southern California to St. Louis ATT One Center seems like a good business move. I can see Direct TV eating up the incentives, tax credits and likes that would be thrown at them for their back office and customer support out California. Think of Charter based out East but for the most part has its operations out of St. Louis.

bprop wrote:Also, the two walkways connected to ATT Center are scheduled to come down after the moves are complete.

Interesting, but not too surprising. It will definitely make it less convenient for people who need to go from 1010 Pine to the Data Center.

Greg

The building was built and owned by Southwestern Bell. They occupied the entire building. Then-CEO Zane Barnes was a big supporter of the visual arts. They had a huge collection of prints and originals by modern masters on the lower 40 floors, and the top two executive levels had very fine works by more traditional artists. Some of the pieces were extremely valuable.

I spent many, many hours in that building moving and installing artwork. I imagine most of good stuff was moved to Texas years ago.

The AT&T building in downtown Cleveland isn't nearly as big, but like One AT&T Center it was built in the 80's and originally owned (and fully occupied) by Ohio Bell before AT&T sold it and scaled back its square footage leasing over time. Anyway, kind of interesting to see what its latest, NY-based owner is trying to do to shore up an office building that has large blocks of space and in ways is similar to One Center and the downtown STL market...

http://realestate.cleveland.com/realest ... r_home_pop



"We really like investing in urban markets," said Ross, who plans to fix up the building and aggressively pitch space there to companies trying to court employees in their 20s and 30s...

The suburban office concept, which you see a lot of in the Midwest and you see a lot of in Cleveland, specifically ... that's going by the wayside. That's not going to be the pull or the attraction for that highly sought-after employee."

To liven up the property, Somera could overhaul the lobby, add a fitness center, create collaborative work areas, explore retail opportunities along East Ninth and add outdoor space...

One change he's not considering, though, is turning office space into apartments. Other residential makeovers have trimmed the supply of empty office space downtown. Meanwhile, a few developers are talking about constructing new office buildings, if tenants and lenders sign on. Ross is trying to position 45 Erieview somewhere in between - as long-term office space that's a lower-cost, lower-risk alternative to new construction."

And finally,

And though most office leasing here involves existing Northeast Ohio tenants hopping around, he's not ruling out the prospect of attracting new players.

"I think a lot of national companies, in Los Angeles, New York, D.C., Chicago, are saying the cost of living in those cities has gotten astronomical. ... Attrition problems continue to be an issue," he said. "Companies are looking toward the Midwest. I do think there will be growth in the Greater Cleveland area in terms of new tenancy."

The Business Journal has an article today titled "City officials meet to discuss future of AT&T tower".

Unfortunately it is behind their paywall for subscribers only.

City officials meet to discuss future of AT&T tower
“We met to address the issue and are taking a major run at helping the current owner get something to happen there,” Williams said. “This building is another huge challenge, just as the Railway Exchange and Jefferson Arms buildings were."

http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/news ... -at-t.html

moorlander wrote: ↑

Feb 17, 2017

City officials meet to discuss future of AT&T tower
“We met to address the issue and are taking a major run at helping the current owner get something to happen there,” Williams said. “This building is another huge challenge, just as the Railway Exchange and Jefferson Arms buildings were."

http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/news ... -at-t.html

What was brought up in the meeting? Any ideas on what they want to put there?