Core project

Apple’s massive $1 billion campus will take a bite out of Northwest Austin in 2022

The new campus will sprawl 133 acres.

Courtesy of Apple

Apple will mark the 30th anniversary of its first Austin office with the debut of its $1 billion office campus in Northwest Austin.

The tech giant confirmed April 26 that employees will start occupying the new campus, at West Parmer Lane and Dallas Drive, sometime in 2022. Apple first established an Austin presence in 1992.

“It’s been over 25 years since Apple opened its first office in Austin, and we are thrilled to be deepening our partnership with the city and people here,” Kristina Raspe, Apple’s vice president of worldwide real estate and facilities, says in a statement. “Our growing teams are deeply engrained in the community, and we are proud to contribute to Austin’s thriving culture and its economy.”

Apple announced the $1 billion campus in 2018 and started construction the following year. The office complex initially will house 5,000 employees and eventually may accommodate as many as 15,000. Apple’s nearby office campus, also along West Parmer Lane, employs close to 7,000 people.

The new 133-acre campus will contain about 2 million square feet of office space. Last May, CultureMap broke the news that Apple was adding a 192-room hotel to the campus.

Word of Apple’s move into the new Austin campus came as the Cupertino, California-based company revealed it will spend more than $1 billion to establish a corporate campus and engineering hub in North Carolina’s Research Triangle region. The North Carolina operation will employ at least 3,000 people working on technology like machine learning, artificial intelligence, and software.

In all, Apple says it is investing $430 billion and adding 20,000 jobs in the U.S. over the next five years.

“At this moment of recovery and rebuilding, Apple is doubling down on our commitment to U.S. innovation and manufacturing with a generational investment reaching communities across all 50 states,” Apple CEO Tim Cook says. “We’re creating jobs in cutting-edge fields — from 5G to silicon engineering to artificial intelligence — investing in the next generation of innovative new businesses, and in all our work, building toward a greener and more equitable future.”

technology

Self-driving Roller Coaster

More self-driving cars expected to roll out in Austin for 2025

Photo courtesy of Waymo via KVUE

Various brands offering self-driving cars are on-and-off in Austin.

Expect to see more self-driving rideshare vehicles, also known as robotaxis, on Austin roads next year.

Robotaxi company Waymo, which you may have already seen on Austin's roads, is partnering with Uber. At some point next year, customers will be able to use the Uber app to call a self-driving ride.

Austin-based company Avride is in the testing phase and plans to roll out its robotaxis next year.

Currently, Volkswagen ADMT and Amazon's Zoox are in the testing phase in Austin, while Hyundai's Motional is in the mapping phase.

Last year, robotaxi company Cruise paused operations in Austin after the California Department of Motor Vehicles revoked the company's permits to operate driverless vehicles in the state. And last week, General Motors said it would no longer fund the company because of the time and resources needed.

This way of getting around has come with its safety concerns and issues. The city is tracking those concerns. According to the Transportation Department, the problems span from blocking the roads and parking in front of people's homes for weeks with lights beaming through their windows, to actual wrecks.

Since July 2023, robotaxis have been involved in 75 incidents. Only 21 of those incidents happened in 2024. It's important to note that Cruise has not been operating in Austin this year.

Since July 2023, driverless rideshare vehicles have been involved in 22 near collisions, eight collisions and seven instances where driverless taxis ignored directions from the Austin Police Department (APD).

According to the data, at least four of those Austin police incidents happened in recent months. The issues varied from driving through police checkpoints, to malfunctioning and getting stuck at an APD road closure near pedestrians, causing safety concerns.

A Waymo spokesperson said their vehicles have gesture recognition capabilities, which they've been training APD officers on using.

As the report shows, sometimes it does not work and Waymo said it is working to improve that. The spokesperson said that as of just last week, Waymo's First Responder Program has been independently verified by TÜV SÜD, making Waymo the first autonomous vehicle (AV) company to receive third-party validation for our emergency response protocols. They also said the data to date indicates the Waymo Driver is already reducing traffic injuries and fatalities in the places where the company currently operates.

Read the full story and watch the video at KVUE.com.

traffic self-driving cars innovation