I've lived and worked in Colorado my whole life, joined Google Boulder about 8 months ago. Spent a ton of time in Boulder before that; my wife is from Boulder proper. Honestly? Google is barely a speck in the whirlwind of changes that Boulder is undergoing. Tech is a huge part of it, but you can't throw that entirely at Google's feet. There's been Silicon Valley expats and tons of other folks moving to Boulder for years.

Back on Google for a moment:

Lets talk neighborhood. The older Google buildings are renovated, small buildings. One of them was a Circuit City that closed. That should already give you a good idea of the area. It isn't trendy downtown, just primarily commercial space.

The new Google building is larger, about 3 blocks away, and located in what was a basically condemned. There's empty, undeveloped lots across from it on one side, and a huge sprawling Whole Foods with a massive parking lot on the other side. Google's new building is flanked by a large Target. Overall, the building is not actually that large. It's 4 floors and built as two halves joined in the center with a bridge.

It isn't the trendy part of town. It's developed a nice building in an otherwise lower-traffic area. I know there's follow-on effects from employing new folks in the area (housing, traffic, etc.), but I don't see how that's overall different from the general influx of folks into Boulder.

Perhaps it's myopic of me, but I don't see "us" (as if us vs. them is a productive use of time) being a negative force. Google Boulder employs lots of folks, and the vast majority of them have lived in Colorado for more than the last few years.

I'd like to know what we're doing to destroy communities and how we can prevent that.