How to Bring Geeks to the Grove

Last week, a post about Apple's building spree in other parts of the country set off a discussion about why the software giant—which operates a distribution center in Elk Grove—wasn't expanding here.

One reader, a software developer himself, laid out a six-point program for luring tech companies and the geeks that work for them to the Grove. We found it interesting, so we're reposting it here.

Readers, what do you think of his ideas? Should the city focus more on attracting tech companies and their employees?

Here's the original post from reader Socrates:

I'm a software developer and I'd rather be right here in Elk Grove than down in Cupertino or Palo Alto, or up in Seattle with the 'soft...It is unlikely that a software company like Apple would move engineering and development work out to EG, but not impossible...

Having known quite a few developers and worked at a few well-known startups and software companies, I can think of a few not-so-obvious things that might attract software companies and the employees that love them to Elk Grove:

1) Bike and pedestrian trails. The more and longer, the better. I don't know why but devs love bikes: it appeals to their geary, geeky nature, perhaps. The Burke Gilman trail up in Seattle is loved by the Softies and Amazonians and Adobe-heads.

2) Fake lakes, big ones, with miles-long pedestrian trails around them. Elk Grove still has enough open space to make this happen. See Seattle's Green Lake for a template. The houses are old and tiny around Green Lake, but it is nonetheless a highly desireable Seattle neighborhood.

3) More parks, especially large regional parks. Software types like geeky team games like Ultimate Frisbee, and geeky solo/small group games like frisbee golf courses.

4) A patina of high quality culture. Something like a small repertory theater would do, with an appropriate performing space. Seattle had the Seattle Rep, but even something on the scale and quality of Stockton's (outstanding) Civic Theatre would be enough.

5) Harder: connectedness to mass transit. Bringing the light rail down to key points in EG would be great, because it fits in with the bike geek thing. Geeks want to ride their bikes. Bikes are permitted on Sacto's light rail system. Geeks would be happy knowing they could get up to the American River Trail with their bikes from EG.

6) Awards and recognition. Life is an elaborate game for many developers, and they like to know their current score. Intangible attention and recognition might motivate more than you imagine.