The Leader - May/June 2008 - (Page 17)

Gr een r eal e s tate : W Hat Yo u Really ne e D to kno W opposite a METRO subway station. The suburbs also have three “land banks” that companies can redevelop with new green workplaces: dead shopping centers, obsolete corporate campuses, and obsolete business parks. Many companies, of course, have workplaces in suburban and urban areas with limited or no public transportation. But they are far from helpless, or hopeless. What’s the solution? Companies can help cities spearhead the development of mass surface transit systems that integrate light rail and dedicated bus lanes. A surface system performs like a subway, but it can be constructed much faster, at much less cost, and serve more passengers. Over 80 cities around the world are constructing surface mass transit systems. In Seattle, property owners in the redeveloping South Lake Union district funded half the cost of a new $52 million streetcar line that is now connecting their neighborhood to the downtown retail core, upscale residential areas, university and medical centers, and to other light rail, monorail, and bus lines. The Seattle City Council had approved the project in 2005. The streetcar line opened in December 2007. In its first six weeks of operation, the line served more than 100,000 passengers, which was 59,000 more riders than originally projected. While the first three weeks of service were free, which generated greater ridership, the line is still outperforming expectations. It was supposed to serve an average of 950 riders a day. Currently, it is averaging 1,040 riders a day. In December 2007, Amazon, the Internet retailer, announced that it would move its 6,000 Seattle-area employees to a new corporate head- quarters campus of up to 1.6 million sq. ft. (148,645 sq. m.) in up to 11 buildings that are being constructed by two development companies, Vulcan and Schnitzer West, along two blocks of the South Lake Union streetcar line. The buildings are scheduled for completion in 2010 and 2011. If major companies in a city with inadequate transit options throw their weight behind surface mass transit, it will change forever that city’s development patterns, greenhouse gas emissions, and economy for the better. conventional Workplaces are rapiDlY BecoMinG oBsolete constructinG/renovatinG to Green BuilDinG stanDarDs In 2007, 5,528 buildings registered for or received LEED certification, more than in the seven previous years combined, and a 330 percent jump from the 1,672 buildings that registered for or received LEED certification in 2006. “Based on the current trajectory of growth, we should see a 50 percent increase every year in the number of new construction buildings that apply for LEED certification,” says S. Richard Fedrizzi, President and CEO of the USGBC. “By 2010, there will be 100,000 commercial buildings that are LEED Registered and Certified.” In the UK, over 95,000 buildings have already received certification from the BREEAM (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) program, and more than 670,000 buildings have been registered for a BREEAM rating. In Australia, “Every commercial tenant seeking 10,000+ square meters requires fiveor six-star Green Star space, the equivalent of LEED-Gold or LEED-Platinum,” says Ché Wall, Chair of the World Green Building Council. Companies can’t just throw a few green or energy-efficient features into their workplaces and hope to get by. They must meet rigorous green building standards, and document their accomplishments, to satisfy their shareholders, workers, public demand, and the growing number of municipal and state green building regulations. Boston and Washington, D.C. already mandate LEED green building construction and renovation criteria for private commercial and residential projects over a certain size. San Francisco is also about to enact a green building ordinance mandating LEED standards for private commercial and residential projects. As companies embrace the many benefits of green workplaces, existing conventional buildings are rapidly becoming obsolete and underperforming in the market in lease and occupancy rates and property values. Worse, whether a company owns or leases its workplaces, this looming obsolescence of conventional real estate will impact its competitiveness and bottom line, because it will have higher operating costs, weaker productivity rates, greater absenteeism, and less-than-stellar Corporate Social Responsibility reports compared to its peers. Companies with conventional workplaces are also less likely to attract and retain talented younger workers who care passionately about environmental issues like global climate change. A November 2007 MonsterTRAK.com poll found that 92 percent of students and entry-level hires are more inclined to work for companies that are environmentally friendly. “One of the questions that many potential employees ask us is about how green our workplaces are,” says Randy tHe le aDe r 17 MaY / j u n e 2008 http://MonsterTRAK.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of The Leader - May/June 2008

The Leader - May/June 2008 Leadership Contents Message from the CEO Real Estate in the News Green Real Estate Work Without Boundries Building Flexibility Into the Business Strategy Multi-Generational Work-Force Design Work Force Longevity Analysis Wells Fargo's David Nelson Pennsylvania's Michael Rossman Globalization 2.0 Site Selection Consultant Directory The New York Report: A Core of Traditional and State-of-the-Art Opportunities Discovery Forum Findings Industry Tracker Young Leader Career Development Effective Leadership Economic Development in the News A Look Ahead In Our Next Issue Calendar of Seminars Index of Advertisers Executive Development Spotlight

The Leader - May/June 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.