One interesting thing about Cornell Tech is that the faculty all work in an open office space, and I think that's to embrace start up culture. Faculty have "huddle" rooms for meetings. At my home institution, I spend 20 hours per week in meetings. Faculty do have dedicated huddle rooms, though.
That's really just your opinion, not a fact. I for one love open plans, I find they make working a more social activity, which suits me.
I realize this is a polarizing topic, but personally I've always preferred working in open-plan spaces to having a private office for precisely that reason.
Graduate students & postdocs—who make up the majority of research labor—come and go, on the order of months-to-years, making open plans actually somewhat reasonable.
Faculty additionally have huddles where they can take meetings.
Are the common activities of faculty compatible with rows of desks, no privacy and constant interruptions? I'm thinking about administrivia and deep, contemplative thought.
The only (perhaps) valid use-case I've seen for open office is highly collaborative tactical execution. The minute you need individual thought-space or strategic focus it's a massive hinderance.
From my experience in college (anecdotal observations), there's professors who seem to spend a lot of time working with others. They were solving problems with grad-students or at meetings-- though there's some I always found alone in their offices too. I'm sure this varies by person and by field, but I'd be interested in knowing if the open office is working for the faculty here.
I don't use it except for holding office hours and 1:1 meetings that require confidentiality. I spend most of my time near the entry of an open plan area where I bump into people at a much higher rate. I love it.
I do sometimes hide in my office or home for some things, but much less than you'd probably guess. I also spend a lot of time walking around - I find that things like reviewing papers is best done away from all distraction, including electronic , so I'll walk over to a nearby park while reading. I often do the same for editing my student's papers.