[hugh3]

Sounds a bit cargo-culty. Those four factors happen to apply to the vast majority of cities in the world, most of which aren't necessarily "flourishing".

And one of the places which least fits the bill is the very place they're trying to replicate: Silicon Valley, where the blocks are long, the population sparse, the buildings mostly from the last few decades, and the whole area ain't nothin' but high-tech.

Now I'd say that Silicon Valley succeeded despite its lousy geography rather than because of it (most people I know who work there hate it and commute from San Francisco) though there's one important exception: the sparse population means that big companies can build those huge campus-like HQs which you just couldn't do in a denser city.