The appeal of Crystal City and other finalists for Amazon HQ2

• Amazon is reportedly in final discussions with Northern Virginia, Dallas, and New York City.  
• Amazon will choose two new headquarters, according to The Wall Street Journal, with 25,000 employees each.  
• We examine why Crystal City, in Arlington, Virginia, makes a lot of sense for Amazon.  

Amazon’s search for a new headquarters has felt, from here in Seattle, a bit like the hunt for a sister-wife.  

Amazon started taking up more room; Seattle blamed Amazon for its problems; then Amazon threw up its arms and denounced monogamy.  

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos explained that choosing this new city would require some gut instinct: “You collect as much data as you can,” he said, “you immerse yourself in that data, but then you make that decision with your heart.” 

We learned this weekend from the Wall Street Journal that Amazon may end up with TWO more headquarters. Seattle would remain the company’s head of headquarters, with roughly 45,000 employees, and the other two new headquarters would have about 25,000 each. (Are you a headquarters when you are half the original headquarters? Discuss.)

A contender, an anonymous source told The Washington Post, is Crystal City, a suburban D.C. neighborhood in Arlington, Virginia. The neighborhood is within walking distance of Reagan National Airport and is primed for development.  

Crystal City is a relentless strip of bland, mid-century mid-rises, but it has potential. There is a beautiful bike trail along the Potomac nearby, and it is three stops from the charming Old Town Alexandria. It is two stops from the Pentagon, three stops from the National Mall, and a 12-minute drive to the White House.  

This could be perfect for Amazon, given the company’s reliance on cloud services for its bottom line. Amazon recently secured contracts with the U.S. military, and this location is just two subway stops from the Pentagon.  

For talent, too, Crystal City is well positioned: This neighborhood is full of people who know how to secure government contracts.  

Teresa Carlson, an Amazon vice president, confirmed the company’s goal to grow GovCloud. “Our goal at (Amazon Web Services) is to provide every government customer the ability to utilize (Amazon Web Services) at every level of classification,” Carlson said, according to the Federal Times. 

Crystal City could give Amazon access to people who could work on a cloud for government services — this Amazon video states that GovCloud, as it's called, "is solely managed by Amazon Web Services personnel who are U.S. citizens located on U.S. soil.”  

This appears to amplify Amazon’s need for highly skilled workers who are more likely to be based here in the U.S. than recruited from overseas.  

And D.C. has that heart factor. Bezos clearly likes Washington, D.C.: He bought the venerable Washington Post in 2013 and three years later bought a house in the city’s wealthy Kalorama neighborhood. House might be an understatement, however; we are told it is the city’s largest private residence, and that it cost Bezos $23 million.  

Amazon did not deny the Post’s report that Crystal City was a contender and even seemed to confirm it. After the news broke, an Amazon executive lashed out at the leaker on Twitter:  

In a 2016 interview, Bezos answered a question from the audience about making decisions.  

“Contrarians are usually wrong,” he said. “Conventional wisdom is usually right.”  

Given that, Crystal City for the win.  

But Bezos continued: “Amazon’s most important bets have been very counterintuitive." He cited the company’s gamble with cloud services as an example. 

“I’m not against being a contrarian,” he said, “but you have to remember, when you’re being a contrarian, you’re probably going to be wrong.”  

Which brings us to Dallas.   

Dallas is more affordable than Seattle, it is vast, and it is Texas. It does not have an income tax, like Washington state, and it is a heart place for Bezos, who lived in Houston as a child, and who speaks fondly of his grandfather’s ranch in the southern part of the state. Texas is also home to Whole Foods, based in Austin, which Amazon bought last year.  

Amazon is also considering Long Island City, in Queens, New York, which is being rebuilt with high-rises. New York is also a heart place for Bezos — it’s where he and his wife MacKenzie Bezos met.  

Andrew Cuomo, New York’s governor, said the conversation between Amazon and New York have been “very positive,” according to the Journal.    

"I’ll change my name to Amazon Cuomo,” the governor said, “if that’s what it takes, because it would be a great economic boost.” 

Having two, rather than one, headquarters could prevent the unpleasant relations that have emerged in Seattle after a decade of exhausting growth.  

Seattleites have blamed Amazon for the rising cost of real estate, for the box houses, for the homelessness crisis and for the 40 bus being too packed to pick up more passengers.  

A homeless teenager named Millionaire Lavish recently blamed Amazon for being on the streets: “Amazon, you know, these companies are causing more homelessness. Since they’ve been here, our rent went from $850 to $1,550.”