[yborg]

I wonder how many operating 5ESS are left now.

[Aloha]

a fairly large number - a bigger question is what happens to all the CO buildings once all the copper is turned down.

There is a huge opportunity about 5 years from now for edge datacenters. You have these buildings which have highly reliable power and connectivity, all thats needed is servers which can live in a NEBS environment.

[kayfox]

COs are already being used for edge datacenters, its just not been talked about much outside the industry.

[kjs3]

The CO closest to me was turned into condos. A friend was the general contractor. It was by all accounts a nightmare.

[bluedino]

Most of those CO's are in buildings that don't have all that much space in them, were built in the 40's and 50's, and likely aren't suitable for that kind of thing. Cooling would be a big deal.

[bediger4000]

Central offices are everywhere, too. You've driven or walked by any number of them, and the most you noticed was a Bell System logo. The downtown COs in big cities are on expensive real estate.

[peterbecich]

Relevant https://www.co-buildings.com/

[shrubble]

Across the USA? Very likely a few thousand.