Why Did Silicon Valley Elites Buy Up A Ton Of Land In Solano County?
When I first heard that $800 million dollars of land was purchased completely encircling Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield, I can’t lie, the first thing I thought was, “oh China or Russia is trolling us.” But the reality is much worse: Silicon Valley is going dumpster diving… IN MY DUMPSTER!
I’m kidding, I have a lot of love for Solano County, it’s the Bay Area’s most affordable county and that is precisely why I’m dismayed at Silicon Valley investors taking interest in it.
Solano County sits on the northern end of the Bay and stretches into the Sacramento Valley, Wine Country and the California Delta. Solano is a county of crossroads and it’s relatively untouched by tech.
Vallejo, the city where Bay Area Memes was created, and the biggest in city in Solano County, was so ungentrified that even Vice did a somewhat cool, albeit exploitative article showcasing the working class’ final stronghold in the San Francisco Bay Area.
I actually met the photographer behind the article, Carolyn Drake, and spoke to her about Vallejo. She was nice enough, but we ultimately lost touch.
I was nervous that Vice’s coverage would take the only place I could afford to live at the time away from me, so I wasn’t exactly ecstatic about a national spotlight on Vallejo or Solano County. But then they started focusing on crime and police brutality so hopefully that had brought down the rent a little.
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Something tells me it’s not for the grocery store clerks, warehouse workers, or truck drivers that have historically called Solano County home. I think this “new Bay Area city” is being built for hybrid tech workers. I find it funny that they’re saying they’re building a new city because they bought a shit ton of farmland. That farmland is in the city of Fairfield, which already very much exists. The land is surrounding Travis Air Force Base is in Fairfield. Fairfield is about 45 miles Northeast of San Francisco and is technically commutable to both San Francisco and Sacramento. So, if you’re working remotely for a company in either city, and you only have to commute there two or three times a week, living in a faux-urban walkable environment for the price of a far-flung suburb I can see being pretty attractive to a hybrid worker.
The demand and displacement would likely seep out of this new city into other parts of Solano County like Vallejo, which is only 30 miles from San Francisco and share a border with the Napa Valley.
I would love it if half of the developments were affordable and this new city or more realistically, this new neighborhood in Fairfield could essentially end the Bay Area housing crisis. There is a lot of potential, but I’m pessimistic because, let’s be honest, you don’t spend nearly a billion dollars without expecting to make it back.
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Howdy! My name is Katy Atchison and I'm an Associate Editor for Broke-Ass Stuart.
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