The promotors of SubTropolis call it the The World’s Largest Underground Business Complex.
The industrial and warehouse complex is in an old limestone room-and-pillar underground mine near Kansas City in Missouri, USA.
They’re so confident that the mine-into-business-park concept will take off that they’ve gone so far as to trademark™ the name. They also have a mascot called GUS – Great Underground Space.
The company has nearly 5,000,000 square feet of industrial space for lease in SubTropolis which is adjacent to Ford’s Claycomo vehicle plant.
According to a Bloomberg piece tenants have reported saving as much as 70% on their energy bills while rents of $2.25 per square foot is about half the going rate above ground. Some 1,000 people already work in SubTropolis.
Images below are from a company that’s in the process of moving into the complex (and the firm’s neighbors: The US National Archives and Records Administration). Click here to see many more of these. Click here for more on SubTropolis.
3 Comments
Khai
what about increased ventilation costs and safety problems?
Mark Harder
Khai, enough already! I get your point ;-). If the developers thought this true, I’m sure they have reason to believe initial costs and energy savings more than make up for some of the unusual costs.
That said, I worked for a few years in the bottom floor NY state’s Albany office complex. There were no windows. One day I went to work on a crisp shiny winter day. When I emerged from the depths, it was wet, gray & slushy. The snow was falling. I had to pause and convince myself I hadn’t missed a day somehow. I guess mine workers deal with it somehow. I just wasn’t used to it.
Ex-geology Major
In the presence of moisture, automobile exhausts creates acidic air that eats at limestone.