But the old IBM campuses outside of NYC are actually like this. They are usually one or two hours from NYC, in really leafy forested areas...basically country side. People commuting from the city to those places (eg Yorktown in West Chester) are the first ones google attracted with their In-City office, they were extremely successful just because they were in the city and IBM wasn’t.
Of course I accept that not everyone wants to live in a city. The point is, though, that you have to make serious sacrifices if that's your first priority -- you need to either accept a long miserable commute, or acknowledge that you're limiting your ability to grow into the top tier of your chosen profession. Cities have very real beneficial network effects for businesses.