Apple's impressive, futuristic-looking "spaceship campus" is lifting off later than planned.
The company's galactic headquarters, which will house 13,000 employees, was slated for completion in 2015, but that's been pushed back a year because Apple was late in delivering its second set of plans to the city. The company had hoped to break ground on the 176-acre campus by the end of the year, but that probably won't happen until 2014 because Apple didn't file the revised proposal until November. It was due in September.
Oops. But don't think that's got anyone at City Hall upset.
"Apple’s a great company, it’s nice to have them in Cupertino," mayor Mark Santoro told Wired. Santoro suggested the environmental review process may be to blame for the delay. "The city is not putting up any constraints or holding up anything."
The plans were expected in September but "for some reason they didn’t come in at that point," city spokesman Rick Kitson said. He doesn't expect the revised drawings to be noticeably different from what we've already seen, though they'll provide more detail.
"We don’t expect anything revolutionary," he said. "It's not suddenly going to be a square building or anything."
Some of the updates will include an additional utility equipment building, more parking spaces, and moving a 1,000-seat auditorium further from the road. The updated renderings will be available on the city of Cupertino website later today.
City Manager David Brandt told Bloomberg it's possible Apple could break ground as early as 2013, depending upon how quickly the city council approves the plans and whether local residents file any legal complaints.
"We could have this come back for a second round of public input in the spring," Kitson said.
Earlier this summer, Apple sent residents pamphlets showing floor plans and detailed renderings of the proposed campus. The massive circular building will have four-stories and a total of nearly 3,000,000 square feet. It also features green tech like a huge rooftop solar array.
"I think their schedule is pretty aggressive," the mayor said. "But frankly it's a huge, huge project, so naturally, it may take longer than people would like."
This campus will supplement Apple's current digs, which were built in 1993 and cover 32 acres in Cupertino. Apple has had a presence in the city since its founding in 1976.
Correction: The original version of this article incorrectly stated the number of square feet in the proposed building.
