Toll brothers pulled out of my city in Lone Tree, CO on a similar development (leaving half paved streets and lighting – just like the 60 minutes episodes on ghost towns), do not have faith in this developer they are not doing as well as they suggest. In the end, the land was acquired by another developer (thank goodness) and townhomes are slowly filling the empty streets. Sadly, the small ‘village’ of Ridgegate is and will most likely remain dirt for some time – just like the promenade of Dublin.

Please don’t dismiss Lone Tree as a comparable either, as it had more to offer. For all the demographic types, Lone Tree had better schools, better transportation, and was money magazines #8 in the nation on 6-figure cites boasting a 137k median household income (check it out). My house actually sold in 16 days 2 months ago. My point being, It will take some time for all this to pass over and Dublin has a long way to go.

Don’t expect a promenade anytime soon as the city has no anchor stores to that end of town, no Bart, and plenty of better cities/ land to choose from. Additionally, Dublin has never been very good at being a ‘good’ city. It has always been seen as the ‘ghetto’ of Pleasanton and San Ramon.

Wait, I would choose Dublin over Lone Tree for one reason – there is no place quite like the Bay Area and the Bay is a beautiful place. I would choose Dublin over Livermore in a second!

Maybe I just need to wait until Dublin hits rock bottom.

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2009/moneymag/0907/gallery.bplive_6_figure_towns.moneymag/8.html

Also financial/investment/insurance, accounting, legal firms can be good fit for Dublin.

I hope that some day all the car dealerships can be replaced by high rise office buildings for investment bankers, lawyers, doctors, engineers, biologists, accountants, fashion designers and other creative class. Dublin has Bart, 580, 680, state of the art infrastrucure, new housing stock and wide pedestrian sidewalks, we should use these to attract create workers to make our land more productive and more valuable.

I hope these knowledge workers will live in Dublin to enjoy the wonderful Tassajara Prep, abundant parks, all the shopping and dinining choices.

Plus, our walkability score can be very high if we plan well. Walkability is becoming a very important attraction for knowledge workers. Dublin seems to have the best potential to be a walkable community, I really like the wide sidewalk along Dublin Blvd. We need to plan more local serving stores, restaurants, coffee shops ect within walking distance. These kind of neighborhood businesses will be stable and increase the attractiveness of the city.

http://ir.taleo.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=444214

While the returns can be phenomenal, developers are required to invest a significant amount of upfront capital for projects. In a market like this, cash is king.

Cheers, John Z.

Thx, John Z.