The DMV needs a YIMBY revolution

[Anonymous]

Vibrant mixed-use urban density now! Let’s not stop until Chevy Chase DC looks like Rosslyn and Cleveland Park looks like the Navy Yard!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Vibrant mixed-use urban density now! Let’s not stop until Chevy Chase DC looks like Rosslyn and Cleveland Park looks like the Navy Yard!

If DC raised the height limit MoCo wouldn’t see substantial new housing for 20-25 years.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Unironically.
Most of you will hate this but I don’t care. We all need to suck it up and move into the 21st century, 25 years too late.

No more tweaking around the edges with low-level zoning reform or a few more metro stops or buses here and there. We need a broad scale systematic urban planning overhaul that completely eliminates single family zoning anywhere inside the Beltway.

Single family zoning is simply unsustainable. We can’t grow our economy if we don’t have new residents and we can’t have new residents if we don’t have homes. And if we don’t have more homes near better, reliable transit, then everyone will be more miserable stuck in traffic and less productive at work and less economically competitive. We need to completely eliminate suburban sprawl. The 1950s planned communities need to stay in the past. In a perfect world we’d move everyone closer in to promote re-wilding of our exurbs.

Nobody should be living in a single family suburban home and drive an SUV. It should be either urban, dense multi family dwelling walkable 15-minute neighborhoods, or rural homesteads, preferably using their land for organic family farming and solar fields and green spaces.

If it weren’t for American “but muh freedumb!” selfish ideology, I guarantee we would all have a much higher quality of life with less traffic, less stress, stronger communities, less obesity, and a better economy.

Bring on the YIMBY revolution.

I totally agree with you. Bring it on! And I am in the far out suburbs with an SUV and an annoying commute.

How do we get there? It doesn’t seem like the market will make it happen. In the Sun Belt, housing prices have gone up more than they have here in the past five years and construction is slowing down in the Sun Belt as prices drop a little from their highs. Here we didn’t build enough housing to make prices go down at all but they’ve still gone up less than it has in places like Austin in the past five years.

the cognitive dissonance embodied in this post is truly something to behold

[Anonymous]

Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Where is this, and who is the builder?

Who was the agent?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Did you look at the property records to see if your neighborhood has any covenants. You might have standing to sue them, stop construction, potentially get compensation for damages, if they are violating the covenants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Did you look at the property records to see if your neighborhood has any covenants. You might have standing to sue them, stop construction, potentially get compensation for damages, if they are violating the covenants.

Lawyer up, file once they have signed their contracts with the subs and begun substantial work. You might eventually lose but you can make it hurt for a while.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:At some point you selfish NIMBYs need to get it through your thick skulls that America needs to GROW and believe it or not we can build a school or two if necessary. Your obsession with your property values is obvious.

Then please inform the “thick skulls” running Alexandria of this because they are apparently incapable of building new schools despite having the largest high school and two of the largest middle schools in the state.

But no, you won’t do that. You’ll just pretend that any concerns about your policies are immediately invalid.

+1 I don't mind density. I'm from NYC. If someone wants to buy a close to metro house and knock it down and build a triplex, such is life. But the urban planning that I've seen in Maryland in terms of inadequate planning for increased traffic and school overcrowding is just making it such that they're wrecking quality of life and our kids' educational future.

They don’t care one bit. Likely that they welcome it as they don’t like the very idea of suburbia.

Weird bike riding libertarians in Che Guevara tshirts, rooting for the bus as mass transit? We are doomed.

Of all the silly ideas in this thread, the idea that buses are not mass transit must be the silliest.

Well, at least you admit that it’s just a bus, and not some magical super bus that people are actually going to use. We’ve made some progress.

It’s mass transit in the same way a large enough donkey cart would be, but it don’t think that’s a good system on which base changes in zoning and parking requirements.

Most people would rather have trains than buses to be sure. But most people when considering costs and benefits, and the terrible track record of the Purple Line which has billions in overruns and nothing to show for it a decade later, would rather have a functioning bus rapid transit lane which is quick and still manages to move a lot of commuters. I've seen it in several cities and it works well.

While much of that is true none of that means that we should treat bus stops the same as metro stations in terms of density and targeted development subsidies.

Good news! Nobody is proposing to do this! You can rest easy.

Except you are lying. The thrive plans turn BRT stops into metro stops in terms of density and incentives.

Oh, BRT stations! I thought you were talking about bus stops.

They're still bus stops and nothing more. The weird use of pretend language is the thing that turns people rabidly away from your ideas, gets you labeled as a crazy, and is why people say that you all lie all the tine

Says someone who never takes any bus. Here is an explanation:

A BUS STOP consists of a bus stop sign, on a pole, next to the road. In Montgomery County, there is also a concrete square for people to stand on. If you're lucky, there's a little wall you can sit on, and if you're super lucky, there's a whole bus shelter. There is probably no safe place to cross the street. There might be a sidewalk, or there might not be. There might be a streetlight near by, or it might be dark. If you use a wheelchair, you have to wait for the bus to kneel. When it's raining, passing drivers splash you with nasty street water.

A BRT STATION has a platform, lighting, real-time bus arrival information, a ticket machine, and a shelter. There is a sidewalk. There is a safe place to cross the street. There is level boarding, or a ramp. There are, or are supposed to be, bus-only lanes, so that the bus drivers don't have to merge in and out of car traffic.

There! Now, next time this comes up, you don't have to sound ignorant or like you don't know what you're talking about.

Except for the dedicated lanes, this is what every bus stop should be, so you’re just describing bus stops. More density near bus stops along dedicated lanes makes sense.

It might be what every bus stop should be, but it is unfortunately not what every bus stop is. So it is actually not a description of a bus stop.

It is a place where a bus stops. That means it’s a bus stop. If you’re saying it’s only BRT if it has dedicated lanes, then I agree. Everything else is a not really mass transit. It’s transportation of last resort.

What an ignorant comment.


For me, a car and bicycle owner, the bus is my first choice for some destinations, just as Metro is for other destinations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:At some point you selfish NIMBYs need to get it through your thick skulls that America needs to GROW and believe it or not we can build a school or two if necessary. Your obsession with your property values is obvious.

Then please inform the “thick skulls” running Alexandria of this because they are apparently incapable of building new schools despite having the largest high school and two of the largest middle schools in the state.

But no, you won’t do that. You’ll just pretend that any concerns about your policies are immediately invalid.

+1 I don't mind density. I'm from NYC. If someone wants to buy a close to metro house and knock it down and build a triplex, such is life. But the urban planning that I've seen in Maryland in terms of inadequate planning for increased traffic and school overcrowding is just making it such that they're wrecking quality of life and our kids' educational future.

They don’t care one bit. Likely that they welcome it as they don’t like the very idea of suburbia.

Weird bike riding libertarians in Che Guevara tshirts, rooting for the bus as mass transit? We are doomed.

Of all the silly ideas in this thread, the idea that buses are not mass transit must be the silliest.

Well, at least you admit that it’s just a bus, and not some magical super bus that people are actually going to use. We’ve made some progress.

It’s mass transit in the same way a large enough donkey cart would be, but it don’t think that’s a good system on which base changes in zoning and parking requirements.

Most people would rather have trains than buses to be sure. But most people when considering costs and benefits, and the terrible track record of the Purple Line which has billions in overruns and nothing to show for it a decade later, would rather have a functioning bus rapid transit lane which is quick and still manages to move a lot of commuters. I've seen it in several cities and it works well.

While much of that is true none of that means that we should treat bus stops the same as metro stations in terms of density and targeted development subsidies.

Good news! Nobody is proposing to do this! You can rest easy.

Except you are lying. The thrive plans turn BRT stops into metro stops in terms of density and incentives.

Oh, BRT stations! I thought you were talking about bus stops.

They're still bus stops and nothing more. The weird use of pretend language is the thing that turns people rabidly away from your ideas, gets you labeled as a crazy, and is why people say that you all lie all the tine

Says someone who never takes any bus. Here is an explanation:

A BUS STOP consists of a bus stop sign, on a pole, next to the road. In Montgomery County, there is also a concrete square for people to stand on. If you're lucky, there's a little wall you can sit on, and if you're super lucky, there's a whole bus shelter. There is probably no safe place to cross the street. There might be a sidewalk, or there might not be. There might be a streetlight near by, or it might be dark. If you use a wheelchair, you have to wait for the bus to kneel. When it's raining, passing drivers splash you with nasty street water.

A BRT STATION has a platform, lighting, real-time bus arrival information, a ticket machine, and a shelter. There is a sidewalk. There is a safe place to cross the street. There is level boarding, or a ramp. There are, or are supposed to be, bus-only lanes, so that the bus drivers don't have to merge in and out of car traffic.

There! Now, next time this comes up, you don't have to sound ignorant or like you don't know what you're talking about.

Except for the dedicated lanes, this is what every bus stop should be, so you’re just describing bus stops. More density near bus stops along dedicated lanes makes sense.

It might be what every bus stop should be, but it is unfortunately not what every bus stop is. So it is actually not a description of a bus stop.

It is a place where a bus stops. That means it’s a bus stop. If you’re saying it’s only BRT if it has dedicated lanes, then I agree. Everything else is a not really mass transit. It’s transportation of last resort.

What an ignorant comment.


For me, a car and bicycle owner, the bus is my first choice for some destinations, just as Metro is for other destinations.

That is a factual comment. The vast majority of people don't ride the bus regularly and have no interest in using the Bus.

[Anonymous]

Tonight is the first community listening session hosted by Montgomery County Council President Andrew Friedson and Montgomery Planning Director Jason K. Sartori on the Attainable Housing Strategies initiative, a set of potential zoning modifications we developed and recommended to the Council by the Planning Board.

The modifications would allow property owners to have the option to build a wider range of housing types in areas for decades that have only allowed one single-family detached home per lot.

Learn more and sign up to give your input: https://bit.ly/3M8r3qA
Check out the Attainable Housing Strategies website: montgomeryplanning.org/ahs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Where is this, and who is the builder?

Who was the agent?

It is on the 3800 block of 14th St. off Quincy St. I'd rather not say the builder but there is a big sign out front. I don't think there is an agent because they are rentals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Did you look at the property records to see if your neighborhood has any covenants. You might have standing to sue them, stop construction, potentially get compensation for damages, if they are violating the covenants.

One of the neighbors checked and there are no covenants except for one restricting the home purchase to those of the Caucasian race with no Negroes, Syrians, or Persians allowed. As long as they allow those people to rent, I guess they aren't violating the covenants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Did you look at the property records to see if your neighborhood has any covenants. You might have standing to sue them, stop construction, potentially get compensation for damages, if they are violating the covenants.

Lawyer up, file once they have signed their contracts with the subs and begun substantial work. You might eventually lose but you can make it hurt for a while.

Is there a fund we could use to pay for the lawyer? We were told if we lost a lawsuit, we would have to pay for the builder's lawyer too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Did you look at the property records to see if your neighborhood has any covenants. You might have standing to sue them, stop construction, potentially get compensation for damages, if they are violating the covenants.

One of the neighbors checked and there are no covenants except for one restricting the home purchase to those of the Caucasian race with no Negroes, Syrians, or Persians allowed. As long as they allow those people to rent, I guess they aren't violating the covenants.

I think you are being sarcastic. Obviously, that covenant is illegal and no longer enforceable, but the other provisions if existing are likely still valid. There was a VA Supreme Court case about this a few decades ago and other provisions of the covenant are usually severable and still enforceable even if segments of the covenant are no longer legal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, the old house is down and the new missing middle plex is going up on our street. When I objected to the builder, he shrugged and said that we had elected the county board who approved the missing middle housing. It's going to be rental and he is planning to rent the apartments to multiple groups because it will maximize returns. It can be potentially 16 adults in the building with parking for three cars. I hope the other 13 use bikes or scooters because there is little street parking.

Where is this, and who is the builder?

Who was the agent?

It is on the 3800 block of 14th St. off Quincy St. I'd rather not say the builder but there is a big sign out front. I don't think there is an agent because they are rentals.

Well that doesn’t much help in boycotting them, but I’m sure that it’s easy enough to find out.