I've mostly lived and worked in Chicago. I live in the city, and commute by CTA. My colleagues who live much further out in the suburbs, and commute by Metra, often spend about the same amount of time in transit as I do.

If there's a story here, it's that the halcyon days when people could efficiently get around a megalopolis on highways are gone, and most the value proposition of those giant self-contained office parks out in the suburbs is gone with it.

Which isn't to say that it doesn't make sense to build offices out in the suburbs, just that they better still be reasonable to access from a train station. And that doesn't even necessarily mean "close" - many people in Chicago still have the better part of a mile left to walk after they get off the train. But they have the benefit of infrastructure to support walking -- a mile walk in the city itself is a much less daunting proposition than a mile walk in Naperville.