[tristanj]

Most of the other comments are off base for Mountain View/Sunnyvale shoreline area. Google and Linkedin can't build tall buildings here because their campuses are next to Moffett federal airfield and the surrounding area is subject to building height restrictions.

There's a map for this, I'll edit my comment when I find it.

Edit: I found the map (http://i.imgur.com/B48yRGK.jpg), the maximum building height for this area is 182 feet above sea level. The Google campus sits around 15 feet above sea level and LinkedIn around 50. That works out to a max height of around 10 stories for the Google area, 7 stories for LinkedIn. So actually, it's higher than I thought.

There are quite a few tallish (7-10 story) buildings along 237 and Central expressway that seem to skirt this restriction.

[1024core]

This has got to be wrong. Have you seen the "Moffett Towers" buildings that are actually bordering Moffett Field? Google's buildings are 2 floor max; Moffett Towers has 6-8 floor buildings.

[mtviewdave]

Google's current buildings were built years (or decades) ago, long before the current space crunch, and say nothing about current City policy. The maximum height in the current North Bayshore Precise Plan is 140 feet above ground (155 feet above sea level), which takes it pretty close to the federally imposed limit.

http://www.mountainview.gov/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?...

[largote]

Except that Google has tried several times to replace those old building with denser development only to be blocked by the city.

[cowsandmilk]

Which confirms the fact that current zoning code is more restrictive than the federal guidelines for the airfield, in direct contradiction to the claim that Moffett was restricting the heights rather than the city.

[mtviewdave]

There was a skyscraper in downtown San Jose that was proposed a few years ago that was designed to the maximum height allowed by San Jose airport. After the designs were finalized, the FAA decided that the maximum height was too high, and lowered it a few feet, leading the developer to almost abandon the project, before redesigning it at some expense.

Lesson: it's a mistake to design to the limit.

I suppose in some idealized, maximally YIMBY world, the difference between 8 stories and 10 represents some horrible market interference by "NIMBY asshats". But in the real world, Google would be foolish to build above 8 stories no matter what the Mountain View city council says. The Precise Plan just reflects the practical limits of building in that area.

[minwcnt5]

That's not true. There are at least seven four storey buildings (Alza, Crittenden) on the main campus, and there's also a new 5 storey building on Pear Ave. But almost none of their buildings were built new, most were already built and acquired. Their proposals for new buildings have mostly been around 6-8 storeys, but they've had problems getting the city to approve their plans. I believe the LinkedIn land they acquired also already has approval for taller buildings.

[TulliusCicero]

They're not exactly wrong, it's just that they're subject to those rules and ALSO subject to city-level zoning regulations.

[tristanj]

You're right, the other comments aren't incorrect (I wrote that word earlier), it's just in this spot there's federal restrictions on building height that prevent certain developments.

I edited my comment to remove that part.

[karma_vaccum123]

Likewise, San Jose downtown has height limitations due to the proximity of SJC.