

Ask HN: How horrible is the SF to Silicon Valley commute? - sayrer

I just moved to SF from NYC for a bit. I commute to Mountain View each day. I'm not willing to live in the Valley, and it seems lots of other people living in SF feel the same way.<p>Does the commute influence your decisions on where to work? Why don't companies have offices in SF? I can't believe they think it's a good idea for employees to lose 2-3 hours every day in this way.
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dmfdmf
SF is notoriously anti-business and the center-of-mass of Silicon Valley is
probably somewhere between Palo Alto and San Jose (depending on the sector)
which is why businesses have offices on the pennisula and not SF. Also, costs
are much cheaper outside of SF. Its not your company's fault if you choose to
live in SF and commute.

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dasht
The commute is horrible, whether by car or Caltrans.

Many firms locate down in the heart of the valley for many reasons including
that office space is considerably less expensive, infrastructure is
theoretically somewhat more robust, traditionally the biggest money firms are
down there, many of the firms down there are related by chains of nepotism,
there are fewer "distractions" for workers in those boring areas, executives
can afford more posh places down there, ....

The valley proper, back when I worked there, had all the elements of an old-
school company town: easy for workers to move into, hard to move out;
collusive hiring practices across firms; not much to do beside eat, work,
sleep, and pay rent; even its own set of camp-follower brothels. It's an ugly,
horrible environment and you're darn right it influences the decisions of some
to simply not work there.

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thinkcomp
Just to present an alternate viewpoint: I live in Palo Alto and actually like
it! At least for me it's hard to think of a place where I am free to set my
own schedule, choose my own office, leave whenever I want, enjoy gorgeous
weather, and visit friends at Stanford in the same way that you'd think of a
19th-century company town.

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rms
Palo Alto doesn't quite count; it was a town first and then Silicon Valley
grew around it. Palo Alto is the best part of Silicon Valley and has the most
expensive rents to go along with that.

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derfclausen
Your question is a little bit weird -- you're asking how horrible your own
commute is? Or are you asking why more companies don't have SF offices?

For the latter, it seems obvious that real estate and infrastructure are
cheaper in the Valley.

For the former, it really depends on where you live in SF.

If you are driving a car to the Valley, how far are you from the 280 or 101?
Does your employer allow you to work your schedule around the rush hours? Are
you working for a startup where you are expected to put in long hours and
possibly even spend a lot of time with coworkers outside of the office?

If you are taking CalTrain, how far are you from the nearest station? I lived
in the Sunset for several years and commuted to Palo Alto; it was a bit
maddening, mostly due to the long time it took to ride MUNI to CalTrain. Door-
to-door was around 100 minutes, but it was 100x less stressful than driving.
Plus, I could catch up on news/email on the train. On the rare days that I'd
drive in, I'd arrive at work already feeling beaten down.

While it's true that there's plenty of cool stuff going on in the Redwood
City-Sunnyvale corridor, I still prefer life in SF. I'll speculate that you'll
hear a lot of startup-centric people here bagging on it, but to each his own.

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ithayer
I commuted to Google for 4 years. Even with the bus it was tough. I was the
same though, living in the valley is not really an option, and I'm glad I
didn't.

Some advice:

\- live as close as possible to the highway or caltrain. this means soma,
potrero, the mission, or noe valley.

\- negotiate at least 1 work from home day. friday is the best. (although
wednesdays are usually easiest to ask for first)

\- work off peak.

It's possible to get your average commute to about 45 minutes, which isn't so
bad (still gets old though).

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keville
At least two companies in the South Bay (Google, Yahoo) hire daily shuttles
for employees living in San Francisco, and most offer some form of
compensation for those who take public transportation. Are you really _losing_
2-3 hours when you could be processing email on your smartphone, or reading
the news and social updates that you would otherwise dick around with during
the workday?

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anamax
> Why don't companies have offices in SF?

Some do. Perhaps you should ask your company why it doesn't. Or maybe you
should work for one that does. Or even work for an SF-based company.

> I can't believe they think it's a good idea for employees to lose 2-3 hours
> every day in this way.

What fraction of your co-workers commute from SF?

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starkfist
If you live near Soma or Potrero Hill the commute to Mountain View is often
faster than the commute to the other side of San Francisco.

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pasbesoin
Out of curiosity, what's it like on/from the east side of the Bay? I have a
standing invitation to be a roommate in the Concord area. BART to downtown I'm
familiar with, but I don't know what to expect if I have to head south.

