Oakland, California, has long been in a tumultuous growth period that has increased housing prices and pushed low-income residents out of the city. Although growth has forced a small percentage of small businesses to shut down, new and local businesses have begun to thrive in downtown Oakland over the last four years. Some local residents would say that economic change has provided new options, more places to work and has made the city better. The adjustment period is far from over, however, with new technology companies moving into town.

The latest Oakland expansion comes in the form of on-demand transportation service Uber, which closed a deal with developer Lane Partners Wednesday morning and announced the purchase of the 330,000-square-foot, seven-story Uptown Station―the historic Sears building―for an undisclosed amount. The building has been vacant for several years.

Uber joins the ranks of other tech companies that have offices in Oakland–Live Work Oakland cites more than 300 Web-based startups in the city. A tech company the size of Uber, with a $50 billion valuation, has never landed in the East Bay; it may be a prelude to a wave of tech giants migrating from across the bay in San Francisco, where commercial office space is twice the cost.

The tech giants’ arrival in downtown Oakland will likely fuel new city developments, infrastructure improvements, more restaurants and retail in the area by adding more workers and increasing foot traffic.

Uber has been criticized in recent months for misclassifying its drivers as independent contractors, with the California Labor Commissioner Office ruling in favor of one driver. Despite setbacks, Los Angeles has finally taken steps to allow the ride-sharing company to pick up passengers flying into Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), the third-busiest airport in the country―a move that still has to be approved by the city attorney. Other cities are taking similar steps.

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said in a statement that she looks forward to “helping Uber make other meaningful contributions to Oakland that will make this a more equitable, vibrant city where everyone can thrive.”

Uber plans to move to Oakland by 2017.

A federal government shutdown would cost the U.S. travel sector at least $185 million per day in economic output due to lost activity and affect 530,000 travel-related jobs due to temporary layoffs, reduced wages and fewer hours worked, according to predictions by U.S. Travel Association economists. Congress is facing a Sept. 30 deadline  to pass a spending plan.

The U.S. Travel projection encompasses the closure of national parks and historic sites—upon which many regional economies greatly depend—and also the cancellation of both government travel and private business travel related to government projects.

“Political leaders need to understand that there are real-world consequences to these arguments that go on in the halls of power,” says Roger Dow, U.S. Travel Association president and CEO. “I realize that each side feels passionately about their respective position, but frankly there’s just no excuse for letting the fiscal year expire without a budget when we know that people’s very livelihood, their ability to feed their families, is at stake.”

U.S. Travel’s measurement of the impact of a government shutdown on the travel sector does not account for any potential effect on other travel-related agencies, such as Customs and Border Protection, the Transportation Security Administration, or the visa-issuing organs of the State Department.

“Though officials assured us at the time that the 2013 shutdown would not affect the work of those agencies, anecdotal evidence on that score was mixed,” Dow says. “If we detect that a new shutdown is hurting those travel-related functions as well, we’ll certainly stand ready to spotlight the fallout for policymakers and the public.”

The 408 national park sites are spread across every U.S. state and territory in both rural and urban areas. Many regional economies are almost entirely dependent upon visitors to nearby national parks to support restaurants, lodging establishments and other businesses, and the jobs they provide.

U.S. Travel Lost $43 Million a Day in 2013

The shuttering of national parks due to the 16-day budget stalemate of October 2013 directly reduced travel spending by $680 million or nearly $43 million per day. During that shutdown, countries such as Germany, the U.K. and China—which together account for more than eight million visitors to the U.S. annually—issued warnings to their citizens about possible shutdown-related problems and delays when traveling to and within the U.S. Even once resolved, such episodes can inflict lasting damage upon the U.S.’s brand in the competitive international travel marketplace, according to Dow.