The project is maybe not the worst idea, the $1400 rent a month though…
Oh and this was not the first plan:
“We were thinking of turning it into a WeWork space, a concert hall, a beer garden. We had no shortage of ideas on what to do with the space,”
Your article says they had trees growing inside the building…
And that they worked with a parks department to maintain the original look.
So ironically, them trying to maintain the history is why you think they’re overcharging.
They wanted to make it a “we work” at first, its not the overcharging that is the issue. The issue (at least for me) is turning every thing into a business venture. This was once a public building for teaching kids and was bought on the cheap to turn into another trendy revenue source.
I wanted to disagree with you at first, because I love the idea of repurposing old structures instead of building yet another soulless, “modern” apartment building, but yeah, they’re clearly doing this with the intent of turning a profit when it could have been another example of non-market housing, where the cost of rent simply covers the cost of building maintenance and actually helps to stabilize rent costs in an area.
TL;DR: Once again, a cool thing is made less cool by the profit motive.
Maybe that is why I got a “dystopia” feel from this more then anything, its almost a cool thing. I would be I think much more willing to go along with this if it was not put up as a “feel good” story that to me has very little good. I get more “we work” style hipster scam then a long term usable housing solution.
Lol what a comment