We need homes. A lot of homes. Not just affordable, but also middle-income homes.

[Anonymous]

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You can try to change the law. But I bought in reliance on it, and I will fight any change. I have just as much right to do that as you do to try to change the law. And yes I would like my neighborhood less if it became much denser. So I will oppose a significant increase in density. Why shouldn’t my opinions and preferences matter when it comes to where I live? (You’ll never convince me a single one of you is some totally selfless, altruistic being who always prioritizes the greater good over self interest.)

I'm trying to imagine how this would go over at a public meeting where you stood up and said this.

Why would I do that?

There’s plenty of valid arguments that I can and have made that have nothing to do with self interest.

Such as?

I’ve been making them in this thread. Not gonna recap here.

I just reread the thread and didn't see any. So what are they?

They might be a bit hard to find. You have to sift through quite a lot of entitled snowflake whining.

I sifted through plenty of entitled snowflakes whining about how their neighborhoods should be encased in amber and never change. I couldn't find any cogent arguments about why neighborhoods shouldn't be upzoned that have nothing to do with self interest. What are they?

Neighborhoods “encased in amber”? Dramatic much?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

Well, this is a cogent argument. You are just choosing to ignore it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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You can try to change the law. But I bought in reliance on it, and I will fight any change. I have just as much right to do that as you do to try to change the law. And yes I would like my neighborhood less if it became much denser. So I will oppose a significant increase in density. Why shouldn’t my opinions and preferences matter when it comes to where I live? (You’ll never convince me a single one of you is some totally selfless, altruistic being who always prioritizes the greater good over self interest.)

I'm trying to imagine how this would go over at a public meeting where you stood up and said this.

Why would I do that?

There’s plenty of valid arguments that I can and have made that have nothing to do with self interest.

Such as?

I’ve been making them in this thread. Not gonna recap here.

I just reread the thread and didn't see any. So what are they?

They might be a bit hard to find. You have to sift through quite a lot of entitled snowflake whining.

I sifted through plenty of entitled snowflakes whining about how their neighborhoods should be encased in amber and never change. I couldn't find any cogent arguments about why neighborhoods shouldn't be upzoned that have nothing to do with self interest. What are they?[/quote

]

I love how when anyone dares push back at a GGW person their default response is name-calling. Happens every time. So childish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

No need for anything additional what? Duplexes shouldn't be allowed in that area (not required, just allowed) because why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

No need for anything additional what? Duplexes shouldn't be allowed in that area (not required, just allowed) because why?

What is it your business? You don't live there and would not be able to afford a house or a duplex there anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

No need for anything additional what? Duplexes shouldn't be allowed in that area (not required, just allowed) because why?

Because the residents do not want them. Deal with it. The only groups pushing for upzoning in Ward 3 are small time real estate developers and those who can't afford to live in Ward 3. If you can't afford Ward 3, look elsewhere, like generations before you who now live elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

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How do you think those neighborhoods got to be like they are now? Developers have been doing that all over the place. (And yes, Trinidad and Brentwood are definitely poorer than AU Park.)

"Poorer than AU Park" is not usually what people mean, when they talk about "poor neighborhoods."

Anyway, I don't understand the argument here. Developers are voluntarily developing in poor neighborhoods (defined as: poorer than AU Park), and so therefore additional housing in AU Park shouldn't be allowed?

No, more housing in AU Park SHOULD be allowed. One PP has been suggesting that developers are not doing anything elsewhere in the city and that the push to upzone Ward 3 is just a stalking horse for developers' desires to build there. In reality, developers have already been building all over the city, and one advantage of encouraging building in AU Park is that at least it doesn't entail any of the concerns about gentrification.

The idea that we shouldn’t invest in or build in communities outside of Ward 3 for fear of gentrification can do genuine, lasting harm to those communities. Abandoning communities or leaving them to stagnate because lower income black people live in them actually hurts - not helps - the cause of social justice.

No one here said we shouldn't invest or build in communities outside of Ward 3, or abandon them. But we also shouldn't just push all new development into those communities, especially without any advance consideration to the results of doing that, in the name of "improving" them. Nor should we resist building different kinds of housing, and more affordable housing, in already wealthy predominantly white neighborhoods because residents of those neighborhoods think that housing would be better put somewhere else.

Other Wards of the City have been underdeveloped for decades. That is where development should take place.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

No need for anything additional what? Duplexes shouldn't be allowed in that area (not required, just allowed) because why?

Because I do not want to live next to a duplex in my SFH neighborhood. And, if they are built, I leave town. And guess what. Driving out the top 5% of income generators will destroy the tax base. And they want to live in SFH in SFH neigborhoods

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

How do you think those neighborhoods got to be like they are now? Developers have been doing that all over the place. (And yes, Trinidad and Brentwood are definitely poorer than AU Park.)

"Poorer than AU Park" is not usually what people mean, when they talk about "poor neighborhoods."

Anyway, I don't understand the argument here. Developers are voluntarily developing in poor neighborhoods (defined as: poorer than AU Park), and so therefore additional housing in AU Park shouldn't be allowed?

No, more housing in AU Park SHOULD be allowed. One PP has been suggesting that developers are not doing anything elsewhere in the city and that the push to upzone Ward 3 is just a stalking horse for developers' desires to build there. In reality, developers have already been building all over the city, and one advantage of encouraging building in AU Park is that at least it doesn't entail any of the concerns about gentrification.

The idea that we shouldn’t invest in or build in communities outside of Ward 3 for fear of gentrification can do genuine, lasting harm to those communities. Abandoning communities or leaving them to stagnate because lower income black people live in them actually hurts - not helps - the cause of social justice.

No one here said we shouldn't invest or build in communities outside of Ward 3, or abandon them. But we also shouldn't just push all new development into those communities, especially without any advance consideration to the results of doing that, in the name of "improving" them. Nor should we resist building different kinds of housing, and more affordable housing, in already wealthy predominantly white neighborhoods because residents of those neighborhoods think that housing would be better put somewhere else.

Other Wards of the City have been underdeveloped for decades. That is where development should take place.

Absolutely. It was the neglect of the rest of the city that led it to be dominated by poverty. Racial and economic justice for that neglect has to be public (and private) investment.

[Anonymous]

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Yeah you can count me among the commenters who dislike GGW. They’re hypocritical, and they work to promote the interests of developers. Just like back when they were getting $$$ from WMATA that they didn’t disclose and then ignoring all of the metro’s glaring problems.

You can have any opinion you want, but it doesn't invalidate the reality that they are, in fact, advocating for upzoning/upFLUMing everywhere, not just Ward 3.

I’m not reading the link, but a lot of neighborhoods don’t need any upzoning in order to be further developed. So if their real goal is development and building more homes, why not start there?

They can theoretically be in favor of upzoning everywhere but to me it sounds like a convenient smokescreen for what their developer buddies really want to do (i.e., upzone in places like Ward 3).

Maybe read the link.

Here it is again: https://ggwash.org/view/75544/were-reading-amendments-to-the-comp-plan-heres-our-critique-of-how-the-flum-works

I told you why I won’t. Once GGW was caught taking money from sources and then writing in a way favorable to those sources, they discredited themselves.

How is this relevant to the point that they are, in fact, calling for upzoning/upFLUMing the whole city, not just Ward 3?

I don’t spend my time reading material from discredited sources. If you have an argument you want to make, why don’t you just make it yourself?

Let's recap.

A PP: How come they're not calling for upzoning/upFLUMing the whole city?
Me: They are. Look, here's a post on GGW saying just that.
You: I don't read GGW.
Me: Ok, but here's a post on GGW saying just that, even the PP said nobody is saying it.
You: I don't read GGW. Why don't you make your own argument?

I will reiterate: I think calling for upzoning throughout the whole city is a disingenuous smokescreen to accomplish what developers really want, which is to upzone in areas like Ward 3. There is a ton of development that could take place right now at this very moment without any need for upzoning. Think of all the new homes that could add! Why focus on changing the laws (a process that will involve a lengthy, drawn-out fight and may not happen at all) if your real goal is simply to add housing? Developers can add housing right now; no upzoning needed.

Because upzoning will enable more housing to be built than the status quo. Why is this so difficult for you to believe?

DC has fewer residents than in 1950, so I question the basic premise of a "crisis." What is really driving this issue is that developers do not want to build other than in Ward 3.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Everyone can buy whatever home they can afford. That’s how it works, and that’s how it essentially will always work. Home values exist on a spectrum in which less desirable homes in less desirable areas cost less and more desirable homes in more desirable areas cost more. It’s never going to change. If you want to buy something, you have to pay for it. Sometimes that means taking a job you don’t love because you want the paycheck or doing something else you don’t want to do, but that’s life. Sometimes that means some homes or even some neighborhoods will always be out of reach, but that too is life. Some of you do sound a bit entitled.

That's nice.

Also nice: if there were more housing in [that area where you don't want there to be more housing], so that more people would be able to buy (or rent) a home they can afford in that area.

Your issue is that you feel entitled to buy into the neighborhood that you apparently can't afford. Welcome to the real world!! I can't afford to buy a horse farm in Middleburg, but so far I have survived.

[Anonymous]

I'm still wondering why the only answer is upzoning even though developers haven't built projects that are already approved. Wouldn't it be faster to get projects that already are approved delivered? Why not a package of reforms that includes upzoning, punitive fees for approval extensions, and taxes on airbnb conversions? That would deliver a lot of housing by making more land available for denser development and penalizing developers who delay because they want to keep prices high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm still wondering why the only answer is upzoning even though developers haven't built projects that are already approved. Wouldn't it be faster to get projects that already are approved delivered? Why not a package of reforms that includes upzoning, punitive fees for approval extensions, and taxes on airbnb conversions? That would deliver a lot of housing by making more land available for denser development and penalizing developers who delay because they want to keep prices high.

And DC needs to enforce its so-called Inclusive Zoning laws and regulations. Why is it that even developers of Planned Unit Developments -- which are supposed to provide additional community benefits like more affordable housing in exchange for being allowed greater height and density than zoning provides -- deliver barely the statutory minimum? We know why: creative zoning lawyers and, more importantly, the cozy relationship between developers and DC politicians and regulators. For example, the Cathedral Commons-plex in Cathedral Heights doesn't even have 8 percent Inclusive Zoning units, despite gotten PUD approval for extra height and density. What a joke! Bowser and her pals should stop pushing up zoning as the answer to affordable housing, when they don't have the fortitude to enforce the affordable housing provisions that DC has.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm still wondering why the only answer is upzoning even though developers haven't built projects that are already approved. Wouldn't it be faster to get projects that already are approved delivered? Why not a package of reforms that includes upzoning, punitive fees for approval extensions, and taxes on airbnb conversions? That would deliver a lot of housing by making more land available for denser development and penalizing developers who delay because they want to keep prices high.

How about punitive fees to building management companies that let commercial space lie fallow for years on Connecticut and Wisconsin and use that to wash through write off money, rather than rent at a more reasonable rate to retail and dining? This city honestly has no idea what vibrancy actually is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wisconsin - Friendship to Gtown is going to be a mess with the Fannie Mae and then Mazza development. Tons of congestion and pollution. With those two massive build ups - no need for anything additional - no need to mess with the SFH Zoning.

No need for anything additional what? Duplexes shouldn't be allowed in that area (not required, just allowed) because why?

Because I do not want to live next to a duplex in my SFH neighborhood. And, if they are built, I leave town. And guess what. Driving out the top 5% of income generators will destroy the tax base. And they want to live in SFH in SFH neigborhoods

+1
And why no duplexes? Have you been on 36th and Calvert to the hospital? I see lots of tear downs and larger expensive homes being built. And next to some of those? Duplexes that appear to be rentals - not taken care of by whomever is occupying them. Soon, no doubt to be tear down/build ups. My point? Money talks - BS walks. As long as there is a demand for expensive homes in Ward 3 - there is no incentive to pack more people in at a discount rate.