Slippery slope

Henry Jones

Ever since March, when Google’s Spear Street offices expanded, employees have been burdened with a most un-Googlelike indignity: having to walk down stairs. Walk? As if this were the Ask.com building. To fix the appalling situation, Google brass are scrambling to assemble a slide (think McDonald’s playpen–style) between the third and second floors, adjacent to the building’s grand staircase. But while the idea is consistent with Google’s patented—and slightly odd—flair for juvenile tomfoolery, the project so far has proven to be an adult-size headache. Tentatively aiming for early-summer completion (after a year of planning), Google still has a few challenges ahead.

Public Relations
They’ve got to get their story straight. During a tour of the facility, construction managers and local Google heads touted it as the only slide in a Google office outside of Zurich (above, photo courtesy of picasaweb.google.com/zurich.office.images). But lo! Employees at Google Detroit have been quietly slipping down one for months.

Basic Physics
The biggest hurdle has been figuring out how to deal with the slide’s L shape. The initial plan was to leave the slide uncovered, but the contractors soon realized that riders were sure to be thrown from it (known in the biz as “lateral discharge”) when they hit that nasty 90-degree turn. Even enclosed, the slide could result in more cracked heads than Google is likely to tolerate. The challenge is formidable enough to have turned the project into the Panama Canal of tube slides. Before the job fell to Novato-based California Sports & Recreation in March, no fewer than three playground manufacturers had already given up—or chickened out.

Safety Concerns
A potential worry for Google will be personal-injury litigation, so insurance and/or safety waivers may be in its future. As for state and federal laws regulating playground standards, scholars of playground safety will note that these laws apply only to equipment intended for children…not grown-ups acting like children.

Aesthetics
After its initial vision of alternating the slide’s segments by color proved unrealistic, the company now plans to keep it simple. “I wouldn’t drive a yellow car, so hopefully it won’t be Google Yellow,” one construction manager mused. He can rest easy. After much hullabaloo, the slide will be red—a distinguishing color option, as Google Detroit’s slide is known as Big Blue.