
Why Silicon Valley should settle in Oakland - rajbala
http://gigaom.com/2014/02/17/some-day-silicon-valley-will-move-north-heres-why-it-should-settle-in-oakland/
======
kps
If only there were some way for programmers to collaborate without them being
in the same room.

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kleinsch
I just moved to the Bay Area last year and living in SF was never an option.
You can get the same housing (or better) for $1000/month less by living in the
East Bay and you'll be right next to the BART. If SF real estate prices
continue to climb like they have been, I think there's going to be an even
greater trend of folks moving to the East Bay where it's more affordable.

I also think the East Bay will be attractive for the same reason the Valley
was: once you get older, it's a great place to settle down and think about
having children. You can buy a single family house (with a yard!) in
Rockridge, Berkeley, or Orinda with great schools that's still accessible to
SF. I know plenty of folks getting into their mid-30s or 40s for whom this has
become a lot more attractive than a million dollar rowhouse in SF.

~~~
wavefunction
For how long? The situation sounds untenable. Better to spread the tech-
industry all over the country and world in my not at all humble opinion.

~~~
nostrademons
Somebody needs to solve the out-of-sight-out-of-mind problem then. The
technology already exists for easy videoconferencing (Hangouts/GVC), for easy
screen-sharing (VNC), for easy code collaboration (GitHub), and for easy code
reviews (Rietveld/Gerrit). The problem is that this isn't enough: many of the
great ideas that the big tech companies are built on came out of small
informal discussions in hallways, in cubes, or over dinner. Until you can hack
human nature so that people will randomly say whatever just popped into their
head to the avatar sitting next to them, there will still be a strong
incentive for creative companies to colocate their employees.

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rwallace
If there's one lesson to be drawn from the San Francisco mess, it's this: if a
community is going to choose a city to move into, it had better not be a city
where political corruption has rendered it illegal to build new housing. How
does Oakland fare in that regard?

~~~
kiba
Political corruption or utterly stupid democracies that can't think beyond one
dimension?

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tasty_freeze
I lived in the south bay area for 20 years, although I moved away ten years
ago. Unless there has been a seismic shift, why is it inevitable that the tech
industry must move north? There is an assumption in this article that the
ideal place to be is SF, except for the prices there, so the game is to get as
close as one can afford.

I utterly reject that idea. I loved visiting San Francisco when I was 20, and
when I was 30, and when I was 40 with kids, but through those different phases
of my life, I never wanted to live there, and not living there was never an
impediment to my career. None of the companies I worked for considered moving
there.

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JetSpiegel
Looks like someone invested in Oakland real-estate...

~~~
BugBrother
I always wondered if you couldn't finance a high speed train (Or Elon Musk's
"strange loop") in areas like California by buying cheap real estate and
selling it to future commuters.

Edit: It ought to be enough with 50-150 km distance to get low land prices
around that part of California? Assume a train at 250 km/hour, the commute
will be short and there won't be a need for "exotics" (maglev, Musk's tube,
etc).

~~~
the_watcher
I don't think anyone has every figured out a way to make trains profitable at
a price that consumers will pay. That's why governments are pretty much the
only people that build them now, since they are willing to take the losses to
facilitate any economic gains generated by public transit. Whether or not
those gains are real is a separate argument, but as far as I know, no American
public transit system is profitable on a revenue-expenditures basis.

~~~
protomyth
There are two profitable high-speed rail lines: Japan (Tokyo-Osaka) and France
(Paris-Lyon).

Some will say Acela, but it is only profitable if you ignore capital
expenditures.

~~~
the_watcher
That's what I thought. Ignoring capital expenditures could make lots of
unprofitable businesses look profitable.

~~~
protomyth
I've learned a lot of journalists don't look at the footnotes or supplemental
tables when they write articles. It does provide a good indicator of
competence though.

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varelse
2025: That's the (%$&!ing ridiculous) year that BART is scheduled to open up
in downtown San Jose:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_San_Jose_%28BART_stati...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_San_Jose_%28BART_station%29)

In the meantime, downtown Oakland has many of the same problems (and a
surprisingly similar crime rate) as downtown Santa Cruz (OK Oakland is more
violent by a bit). The former is right next to San Francisco and the latter is
right next to UCSC, both technological hotbeds.

I wouldn't want to live in either place because they're just not safe(tm) and
by that I mean the perception more than the reality.

SF dealt with such issues by pushing all the "undesirables" out of the center
of the city and into the residential neighborboods. I wonder how Oakland would
deal with this. Santa Cruz OTOH continues to stick its head deep into its own
digestive endpoint and deny such problems even exist.

~~~
Aloha
Moving to SC has one big issue - Highway 17.

It's one of the most dangerous highways in the State of California - even
worse I'd argue than CA-152.

~~~
varelse
Route 17 should not be an issue. Santa Cruz _should_ be filled to the brim
with tech jobs incubated by the mere existence of UCSC and its top-notch CS
department. It's a beautiful place with ugly problems.

It's washed out hippy and NIMBY central with a crony government that presides
over an unconscionable crime and homeless rate as well as a runaway meth
problem.

In just the past few weeks there have been drive by shootings and a mental
case driving a car into the lobby of a downtown theatre and slicing his own
throat with a shard of windshield glass. Last year, the most famous thing that
happened there was two cops getting gunned down:

[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/25/us/violence-spurs-
identity...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/25/us/violence-spurs-identity-
crisis-in-free-spirited-santa-cruz.html?pagewanted=all)

I harp on Santa Cruz because based on the shenanigans there, I don't think the
great Oakland migration is going to happen. There are just too many other
places to live in the bay area. What we need is a county-wide moment of
clarity about mass transit. I'm not expecting that either. I'm expecting
status quo. In an age when we could at least work partially remotely, the
trend is running towards banning telecommuting and pushing more and more
people into coding boiler rooms. Yuck.

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ulfw
Transportation from the valley to Oakland is just too bad. How will all the SV
folks who live in... well... SV get to Oakland? There's no BART from
Cupertino, Palo Alto or Mountain View. And driving is HELL. Every tried going
a few miles on 880 in rush hour? Now try to go thirty, fourty miles or more!
Good luck.

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nostrademons
Why not Mountain View?

It's much easier to move a number of local businesses in and construct high-
rise apartments than it is to move a bunch of tech companies with thousands of
employees. I predict that we're a lot more likely to see hip restaurants,
bars, bubble-tea shops, and cultural venues move into Mountain View than we
are to see Google and Facebook move to Oakland.

It's already happening to some extent. My girlfriend grew up in Silicon Valley
- she says that the Mountain View downtown has changed dramatically since she
was in high school. We're seeing high-rise apartment towers going up near San
Antonio, along with a number of walkable shops and supermarkets near their
base. A number of mid-rise apartment complexes and townhomes have gone up by
the Caltrain station and downtown, where it's already walkable. And there's
been a longstanding plan to build high-rise apartments with ground-level shops
north of 101, within walking distance of the Googleplex. This plan has been
blocked a few times by the Mountain View city council, but 3/4 of the voting
block opposing it is retiring this year.

~~~
SilasX
>It's much easier to move a number of local businesses in and construct high-
rise apartments than it is to move a bunch of tech companies with thousands of
employees.

True, but then a certain dominant Mountain View company is already running the
n-th largest transportation network to commute people from SF/upper peninsula
down to them, so in many cases it would just be like "hey, stop commuting as
far".

~~~
pm90
That would free up a LOT of space in SF, so I think even that scenario isn't
bad

~~~
SilasX
You mean it's _currently_ freeing up space in SF? Because the status quo is
where your commute is shorter in proportion to how close to Mountain View you
are. The hypothetical was where they'd move to SF, where proximity that city
would determine commute distance.

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mathattack
Once you leave San Francisco and Silicon Valley, why stop in Oakland? Why not
go to Walnut Creek or San Ramon?

~~~
WalterSear
Because Walnut Creek.

~~~
stevvooe
Many people carry out fruitful lives in The Nut.

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the_watcher
Silicon Valley has already moved north. PG has mentioned that at the beginning
of YC, they saw startups based in SF as a warning sign, now, they have an
office in the city. It started out in Palo Alto, now SF is pretty clearly a
part of it. It wasn't always.

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jboggan
I think moving south to Silicon Beach is a better idea.

[http://www.accuweather.com/en/us/santa-monica-
ca/90401/daily...](http://www.accuweather.com/en/us/santa-monica-
ca/90401/daily-weather-forecast/337241)

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pessimizer
Makes sense. People coming from San Jose are the only ones likely to think
that Jack London Square is cheap and convenient for shopping.

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muzz
Another article wondering why City X hasn't attracted more of a tech community
given some spelled-out advantages over Silicon Valley.

Rather than wondering why markets don't act the way one wants them to, we
could learn more by trying to understanding why markets do what they do.

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eugeneross
So Oakland = Silicon Valley 2.0? It seems plausible that the new 'up and
coming' start-ups would seek territory in unconquered land such as Oakland,
but for companies already established in SV to move to Oakland - I don't see
it.

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tatalegma
I don't imagine it ever replacing SV, but supposing a tech scene did take root
in the East Bay, where do you think it would be? Think something analogous to
"Silicon Alley", AKA Dumbo/Red Hook in Brooklyn, NY.

~~~
akgerber
Silicon Alley is the general Union Square area. There are quite a few tech
offices in Dumbo, and starting to be more in Williamsburg/Greenpoint and
Downtown Brooklyn, but very few in Red Hook, which is one of the least
transit-accessible neighborhoods in Brooklyn.

~~~
tatalegma
Sorry I am not super familiar with the neighborhoods. I think of Red Hook and
Dumbo as the same for some reason, I am thinking of one neighborhood (with
lots of tech companies), but not sure which of the two is the name of it.
Apparently it's Dumbo.

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Aloha
I'd actually argue the tech center should leave the bay area and colonize a
part of the country where land is cheap and plentiful - it could be an
existing metro, like DFW - or something completely greenfield.

~~~
pm90
Kinda what is happening to Austin, with all the California techies moving in

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jongold
What's Oakland like in SF neighbourhood comparisons? I've never been on any of
my visits to the Bay Area. I'd heard it was gross & ghetto, but lots of SF is
pretty disgusting too…

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derwiki
Doesn't distance to Sand Hill road play a role in VC-run Silicon Valley
company locations?

~~~
derwiki
Curious on the downvote -- was my question too offtopic?

~~~
lutusp
In all public forums there are people who never post, who only express their
opinions by voting, and there is often no perceptible logic or pattern to
their votes. I would call them the silent incoherent majority.

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michaelochurch
I like that "moving north" idea, but why not Portland or Seattle?

The West Coast itself still has a great appeal to many, and Portland is still
affordable, quirky, and frenetic.

~~~
stevenbedrick
Housing in Portland (particularly rental housing) is getting less affordable
by the day, and the city is _very_ aggressive about land use planning. This
is, of course, one reason why the city is so nice... but it also means that
there is a very fixed amount of buildable space, literally all of which is
already taken. Infill is certainly happening, but the city really can't absorb
any larger of a population increase than it already has over the last couple
of years.

~~~
mullingitover
Beaverton is just over the hill, and it's a short MAX ride to downtown.

~~~
stevenbedrick
Very good point.

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crassus
I wouldn't choose engineers based on who needs the money, and I wouldn't
choose a location based on who needs the tax revenue

Berkeley appears more pleasant than Oakland, though further away.

As much as I find it unappealing, I notice more things happening in Oakland.
For now, it looks like the hippest devs are moving there first, guys like
substack who seem like they enjoy a bit of chaos, crime, and dirt. Engineers
with kids aren't going to live there, though

~~~
jonnathanson
_" Berkeley appears more pleasant than Oakland, though further away."_

In the grand scheme of things, it's not that much farther. We're talking 2-3
short BART stops.

The bigger issue with Berkeley is real estate. Oakland was zoned industrially,
it's got a lot of cheap space, and it can bear the load of big company HQs and
apt/condo conversions. I'm not sure Berkeley can absorb scale as easily, at
least as it's currently laid out.

~~~
crassus
The crime rate also has something to do with the cost of space

