The problem isn't image, it's the actual location. Building a technology center along a ring road leads to a sterile and depressing office park wasteland. (I lived there for 5 years.) Cambridge or Somerville or even downtown Boston are good places to have tech companies, because you're part of an intellectual community. In a Route 128 office park there's nowhere you can walk to, so you never interact with people except in your building.
@robg: reconsider? Your life and work would be better if you were within walking distance of a university and other startups. Yes, it's cheaper in Lincoln, but you would be happier and more connected with half as much space in Central Square.
> Building a technology center along a ring road leads to a sterile and depressing office park wasteland.
You mean like the Shoreline/Charleston/Rengstorff loop in Mountain View?
Silicon Valley has its share of sterile office parks. Actually, Silicon Valley seems more like a suburban wasteland than the Route 128 belt - at least the streets are crooked in Massachusetts, and most of the towns have walkable town centers, and housing tends to follow old cowpaths instead of tract subdivisions.
BTW, I think the Sun/MITRE/Middlesex Turnpike/Burlington Mall area has a lot more going for it than the Google/Mozilla/Microsoft/Charleston area in Mountain View, except for the companies themselves. You've got like 5 restaurants just across the creek from Sun in Burlington, and the mall is a half mile away. The Mountain View office park has nothing but offices, movies, and marsh trails.
I like the Shoreline/Charleston/Rengstorff loop. I live and work there so I often walk in to work. I pass 3 coffee shops on the way all of which are popular with startuppy people. I frequently bump into people I know. It's not as good as Cambridge for intellectual stimulation, but I do end having a lot of spontaneous meetings with relevant people.
Route 128 architecture reflects the Mercantilist view of companies. They all build big self-contained campuses to try to discourage their employees from fraternizing with other companies, lest information be exchanged. I think it's far more productive to have companies interact & share.
I'll take marsh trails over malls any day. A ride on the trail makes a wonderful mental break in the mid-afternoon. IMHO. YMMV.
We found a small cottage on 22 acres (and surrounded by conservation land) that's 2 miles from the commuter station. Know anywhere like that less than 12 miles from Cambridge (or Silicon Valley)?
That was actually the part about the Bedford/Lexington/Lincoln/Concord area that I loved best: there's abundant open space that's still close to the downtown areas. My parents' house is on an acre of land, with maybe 5 acres of woods behind it, and is only a half mile walk from library/postoffice/bank/supermarket/schools.
Still, I feel obligated to point out that some of the foothill communities (Los Altos, Cupertino, Saratoga, Los Gatos) have houses that back up against the mountains, where I imagine you'd get lots of (vertical) open space. The difference is that houses like that go for $5M+ here, while in Lincoln you might be looking at the high hundred-Ks.
Yeah, that quality was really surprising to us. We weren't expecting to move so quickly, but when we found a place we could rent it moved very quickly.
We've wondered what it's like to live in the foothills. How long does it take to get to Palo Alto/Mountain View?
Depends a lot on traffic. With no traffic, it's 5 minutes down 85 to get from Mountain View to Cupertino, maybe 15 or 20 to Saratoga or Los Gatos. With traffic, you're looking at 15ish to Cupertino, maybe half an hour to Saratoga.
@robg: reconsider? Your life and work would be better if you were within walking distance of a university and other startups. Yes, it's cheaper in Lincoln, but you would be happier and more connected with half as much space in Central Square.