"Fordlandia" here we come. I mean sure, we could pray for an Owenite community, but they all fall apart too. Saltaire in scotland was a housing paradise for workers but only because the factory owner wanted to reduce drunk related work absenteeism.
They're the two extremes. You will notice that the impact google will have on local rent, non-google related trade and industry, service-sector jobs without transport burdens, the working poor.. not all the "effects" of google investing in somewhere will be positive. So.. the alternative model, is to go clean-build somewhere in the jungle, but that doesn't work either.
Basically, what I am trying to say is that the problem isn't google investing: the problem is the ICT sector being so completely out of whack with non-ICT sector norms. In order to make it work, they need to commit to employing people who already live locally, investing in schools locally, investing in infrastructure commitments which don't (and cannot) directly benefit google. We have a mechanism to do that btw. Its called tax.
google can totally afford to build a dream town, they have fingers in every pie they would need to be in to build infrastructure for apart from construction.
