Legal Commentary

In the midst of a pleasant visiting semester in nyc, and thinking about other substantial time spent at wonderful law schools in rather different areas of the U.S. (noCal, C-ville, soCal, Austin TX, and now nyc), I am intrigued by the following:  with the convergence of law school salaries and culture (very roughly speaking, of course) around a certain mean, and controlling somewhat for rankings, isn't it all about location, location, location?

Given the enormous variation in municipalities -- a point reinforced in important recent academic work including the Bishop's "The Big Sort" and Glaeser's "Triumph of the City" -- will the law school hiring future belong to a cluster of schools located in "hot" areas?  More provocatively, will the vaunted "rural college town" go the way of the dinosaur? 

Any number of intense conversations with colleagues contemplating moves or, earlier, fretting about first-job offers, suggests that the urbanity of the law school, in all the multiple meanings of that word, is mattering a great deal indeed.  In the eye of the beholder?  Perhaps.  But I throw out the query:  Are y'all working more creatively to sell the city? the state? a hopeful story of progress in "Middleearth Law School" or "Skyscraper State?"