March 3, 2023, 1:12pm
In big news for The Shop Around the Corner, Amazon.com Inc. was reported today to be pausing construction on its second headquarters in Virginia, per Bloomberg. Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, let the cranes dangle idly alongside the half-constructed steel middle finger to independent booksellers.
Matt Day noted in his report that the decision coincides with “the company’s deepest ever job cuts and a reassessment of office needs to account for remote work.” Pardon us while we add some tinsel to the window of our tiny, quirky enterprise.
The project impacted encompasses three 22-story office towers and “The Helix,” a dystopian “corporate conference center” and excellent place to die. So far, developers have only gotten as far as digging a parking garage.
If you live in the D.C. area, why don’t you take a leaf from our book, and pull in, pop the roof, and read yourself some Thomas Piketty in the sun.
[via Bloomberg]