diff --git a/addon/ng2/blueprints/ng2/files/public/.gitignore b/addon/ng2/blueprints/ng2/files/public/.gitignore
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..e69de29bb2d1
diff --git a/lib/broccoli/angular2-app.js b/lib/broccoli/angular2-app.js
index 1e3fc27c639a..725b62d6b167 100644
--- a/lib/broccoli/angular2-app.js
+++ b/lib/broccoli/angular2-app.js
@@ -87,10 +87,15 @@ Angular2App.prototype.toTree = function () {
     destDir: 'vendor'
   });
 
+  var publicDirTree = new Funnel('public', {
+    allowEmpty: true
+  });
+
   var merged = mergeTrees([
     assetTree,
     tsTree,
     jsTree,
+    publicDirTree,
     this.index(),
     vendorNpmTree
   ], { overwrite: true });
diff --git a/tests/e2e/e2e_workflow.spec.js b/tests/e2e/e2e_workflow.spec.js
index 21d7c36d5c8c..bd980e5fee7f 100644
--- a/tests/e2e/e2e_workflow.spec.js
+++ b/tests/e2e/e2e_workflow.spec.js
@@ -176,6 +176,22 @@ describe('Basic end-to-end Workflow', function () {
     });
   });
 
+  it('moves all files that live inside `public` into `dist`', function () {
+    this.timeout(420000);
+
+    const tmpFile = path.join(process.cwd(), 'public', 'test.abc');
+    const tmpFileLocation = path.join(process.cwd(), 'dist', 'test.abc');
+    fs.writeFileSync(tmpFile, 'hello world');
+
+    return ng(['build', '--silent'])
+      .then(function () {
+        expect(existsSync(tmpFileLocation));
+      })
+      .catch(err => {
+        throw new Error(err)
+      });
+  });
+
   it('Turn on `noImplicitAny` in tsconfig.json and rebuild', function (done) {
     this.timeout(420000);