anyone else dislike Greater Greater Washington?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They're all "gee whiz!!" about "transit" without being actually willing to address the issues that face people trying to drop off kids, get to work, and get home again at a decent hour.

They are focused on policy, not on giving personal advice. Fact is if we had more and better transit, and more housing near it, more people would use it, even if many would still drive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They're all "gee whiz!!" about "transit" without being actually willing to address the issues that face people trying to drop off kids, get to work, and get home again at a decent hour.

The presumption is likely that most people have cars and are able to drop their kids off and wiz to and from work, but for those who don't have cars, and have to negotiate around the city or region, how can things be improved?

No, they are actively hostile towards cars and believe everyone can just bike or metro.

No they aren't. Plenty of people there own cars. They just want more choices, and public policies that favor alternatives to cars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Remember when GGW scolded grieving funeral-goers for temporarily blocking a bike lane? GGW at its classiest!

https://ggwash.org/view/2797/its-not-the-funeral-lane

temporary? Does anyone park permanently? What if they had parked "temporarily"in one of the general travel lanes? Grieving does not give you the right to park whereever you want. Sorry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Remember when GGW scolded grieving funeral-goers for temporarily blocking a bike lane? GGW at its classiest!

https://ggwash.org/view/2797/its-not-the-funeral-lane

Well, that's what happens when every inch of parking lot/green space has a high rise building on it. Tough to find parking spots for the people who need them.

Besides, it was a funeral. Seems tacky and gross to be complaining.

There is plenty of parking in DC (but sometimes you need to pay for it). Green spaces are not parking, so not sure how that is relevant. And the difficulty of parking is not an excuse to park illegally.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Remember when GGW scolded grieving funeral-goers for temporarily blocking a bike lane? GGW at its classiest!

https://ggwash.org/view/2797/its-not-the-funeral-lane

Strange that they would scold a funeral, when posts on GGW frequently suggest that single family home-dwelling senior citizens in places live Cleveland Park and Chevy Chase should just move out to a nursing home and die. Classy, indeed.

No post says that. I am pretty sure comments that say that are subject to deletion by mods. You are attacking a straw man, not real GGW.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GGW thinks everyone should live in places like NoMA ah no thank you

GGW doesn't "think" anything.

It a blog about urban issues in DC with a wide range of different contributors, some of whom disagree with one another.

Many of the contributors do have expertise in the areas they write about though and almost all are personally involved in the issues they post about.

What do you care anyhow? Don't read it if you aren't interested.

nope they are the poster child for "smart growth" which is making mini manhattans at every metro stop in the region

I care because plenty of people in government actually take them seriously

It actually makes sense to have mini-manhattans around each of the of the Metro stations. The region has invested billions of dollars in metro, why not focus population density where it is easiest to use it and provide a car-free option to residents in the region.

If you want to live a car-dependent lifestyle, no one is stopping you.

I actually agree with them that it makes sense to upzone near transit. The problem is even if you did that you would still need hundreds of thousands of places for people to live and infrastructure (Cars/roads) to get them from point A to point B. GGW is like a philsopher who doesn't understand their perfect world utopia is not realistic. The fact that Albert has a car is just the icing on the cake.

GGW does not call for there to be no roads. Straw man.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GGW thinks everyone should live in places like NoMA ah no thank you

GGW doesn't "think" anything.

It a blog about urban issues in DC with a wide range of different contributors, some of whom disagree with one another.

Many of the contributors do have expertise in the areas they write about though and almost all are personally involved in the issues they post about.

What do you care anyhow? Don't read it if you aren't interested.

nope they are the poster child for "smart growth" which is making mini manhattans at every metro stop in the region

I care because plenty of people in government actually take them seriously

It actually makes sense to have mini-manhattans around each of the of the Metro stations. The region has invested billions of dollars in metro, why not focus population density where it is easiest to use it and provide a car-free option to residents in the region.

If you want to live a car-dependent lifestyle, no one is stopping you.

I actually agree with them that it makes sense to upzone near transit. The problem is even if you did that you would still need hundreds of thousands of places for people to live and infrastructure (Cars/roads) to get them from point A to point B. GGW is like a philsopher who doesn't understand their perfect world utopia is not realistic. The fact that Albert has a car is just the icing on the cake.

GGW does not call for there to be no roads. Straw man.

The PP didn't say it did. Straw man.

("Straw Man" is a GGW commenter favorite for when they get called out on their factually dubious urbanist BS, just as "NIMBY" is their favorite way to insult anyone who merely has a difference of opinion. Guarantee this person is an Alpert sycophant.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GGW is all about the affordable housing gravy train going for the handful of developers that have the lawyers and political connections to really gorge on those projects.

GGW's latest mantra is that the way to solve affordable housing and stop gentrification is to upzone the hell out of Upper Northwest. Never mind that Ward 3 contains the second highest number of rent controlled units in DC. GGW wants to upzone large swaths and corridors to downtown height and density zones. What this would mean is that a number of non-class A apartment buildings, which currently are rent controlled, could fall to the wrecking ball and be replaced by bigger upscale, high cost projects. GGW claims that these projects will contain 10% "inclusive zoning/IZ" units, which is true, but those are at a much higher price point than most rent controlled dwellings. So the result will be a net loss of affordable housing, not an increase.

Who will save Ward 3 from gentrification!

As you know rent controlled units are a tiny percentage of the cities affordable housing stock.

As you also know Ward 3 contains very few of the cities affordable housing units.

As you also know Ward 3 has had very little new housing built in the last 30 years and was down zoned in previous Comp Plan cycles because the NIMBY's found an ally in Phil "Being There" Mendelson.

You are spouting non-sense and you know it.

Ok well, how about the facts of what PP asserted? Will the proposed plan increase affordable housing for people who need it, or not? PP seemed to make a good argument.

No - PP is conflating "rent control" and "affordable housing." They are different concepts, and PP is using a bait and switch to argue that Ward 3 has its fair share of affordable housing. That's nonsense.

Rent control is affordable housing. The question is whether the tenant could pay more - but there's no question its affordable housing. I seriously doubt there are a lot of 1%ers living in rent controlled NW one-bedroom apartments. But if there are, go ahead and show me the data.

you would be shocked. Maybe not 1%ers but plenty of people with money. I was one of them. I started off in grad school, broke. And stayed 12 years and was making 85k/year. it was awesome. It was affordable. But am I the person who needs that. Nope

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:David Alpert lives like three blocks from the Dupont Metro yet still feels the need to own a car (he freely admits this). This would be fine -- to eacha his own -- except for the fact that GGW articles routinely pillory people who feel the need to own cars even when they live in walkable neighborhoods. But Alpert being one of those people is conveniently forgotten. He's a massive hypocrite and fraud.

I really don't think that is the case - David freely admits to owning and using a car as do many GGW contributors and commentators. So I think that pretty much sinks the hypocrite and fraud arguments.

To the extent that "GGW" advocates for anything it advocates for a more livable city and region which means a bunch of things among them better use of scarce public space, better design of various things, better alternates to driving alone and better governance. If those policies lead to people who own cars driving less that is a big win for everyone - particularly people who still drive.

In any case you act like GGW is the Matrix - that it is this massive unknowable force coming to take away your car. It is a blog which publishes a pretty diverse bunch of viewpoints.

If you had something intelligent to say they might publish it too.

Really? How many women with kids and daycare drop=offs blog there? Low-income workers who drive in from the suburbs? Disabled people reliant on cars? Section 8 voucher users?

Yeah, that's a pretty laughable claim. It's almost entirely a small group of entitled white people who insist they know best for everyone.

Alpert and many GGW contributors owning cars yet publishing article after article on the evils of car ownership is the essence of hypocrisy. If you can't see that then I'm not sure what else to tell you.

they do not publish articles about the evils of cars. I can't believe ho many of you are spouting off but clearly don't read the blog daily. I am assuming you get your info only from the cleveland park list serves. thats the equivalent to being a fox news junkie. urbanism allows a lot of families to be car lite. We live near a metro and have a car. We use it maybe once a week on the weekend, and thats usually to get out of town. a LOT of families could be like this and would love to be like this. Its not an either/or proposition like the NIMBY "fake news" nuts would have you believe.

[Anonymous]

Greater Greater Washington has become a paid shill for big development interests in and around DC. They disclose that major funding comes from developers, real estate lawyers, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GGW thinks everyone should live in places like NoMA ah no thank you

GGW doesn't "think" anything.

It a blog about urban issues in DC with a wide range of different contributors, some of whom disagree with one another.

Many of the contributors do have expertise in the areas they write about though and almost all are personally involved in the issues they post about.

What do you care anyhow? Don't read it if you aren't interested.

nope they are the poster child for "smart growth" which is making mini manhattans at every metro stop in the region

I care because plenty of people in government actually take them seriously

It actually makes sense to have mini-manhattans around each of the of the Metro stations. The region has invested billions of dollars in metro, why not focus population density where it is easiest to use it and provide a car-free option to residents in the region.

If you want to live a car-dependent lifestyle, no one is stopping you.

I actually agree with them that it makes sense to upzone near transit. The problem is even if you did that you would still need hundreds of thousands of places for people to live and infrastructure (Cars/roads) to get them from point A to point B. GGW is like a philsopher who doesn't understand their perfect world utopia is not realistic. The fact that Albert has a car is just the icing on the cake.

GGW does not call for there to be no roads. Straw man.

Actually, GGW now is calling for traffic calming to be scaled back. They support letting the increased traffic 'flow through the grid' including on the narrow residential side streets. Their reasoning that this will take some traffic pressure off the major arterial roads and make it easier to build more, denser, and taller development.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:David Alpert lives like three blocks from the Dupont Metro yet still feels the need to own a car (he freely admits this). This would be fine -- to eacha his own -- except for the fact that GGW articles routinely pillory people who feel the need to own cars even when they live in walkable neighborhoods. But Alpert being one of those people is conveniently forgotten. He's a massive hypocrite and fraud.

I really don't think that is the case - David freely admits to owning and using a car as do many GGW contributors and commentators. So I think that pretty much sinks the hypocrite and fraud arguments.

To the extent that "GGW" advocates for anything it advocates for a more livable city and region which means a bunch of things among them better use of scarce public space, better design of various things, better alternates to driving alone and better governance. If those policies lead to people who own cars driving less that is a big win for everyone - particularly people who still drive.

In any case you act like GGW is the Matrix - that it is this massive unknowable force coming to take away your car. It is a blog which publishes a pretty diverse bunch of viewpoints.

If you had something intelligent to say they might publish it too.

Really? How many women with kids and daycare drop=offs blog there? Low-income workers who drive in from the suburbs? Disabled people reliant on cars? Section 8 voucher users?

Yeah, that's a pretty laughable claim. It's almost entirely a small group of entitled white people who insist they know best for everyone.

Alpert and many GGW contributors owning cars yet publishing article after article on the evils of car ownership is the essence of hypocrisy. If you can't see that then I'm not sure what else to tell you.

they do not publish articles about the evils of cars. I can't believe ho many of you are spouting off but clearly don't read the blog daily. I am assuming you get your info only from the cleveland park list serves. thats the equivalent to being a fox news junkie. urbanism allows a lot of families to be car lite. We live near a metro and have a car. We use it maybe once a week on the weekend, and thats usually to get out of town. a LOT of families could be like this and would love to be like this. Its not an either/or proposition like the NIMBY "fake news" nuts would have you believe.

And that's the problem with GGW: It writes about how everyone should be "allowed" to do certain things, as if we need to ask GGW for permission. Who is David Alpert or anyone else on that site to say what anyone should be "allowed" to do?

Luckily, the GGW smart-growth echo chamber is quite small.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They're all "gee whiz!!" about "transit" without being actually willing to address the issues that face people trying to drop off kids, get to work, and get home again at a decent hour.

They are focused on policy, not on giving personal advice. Fact is if we had more and better transit, and more housing near it, more people would use it, even if many would still drive.

No, the advocate policies that would make life actively more difficult for people who have to drive. Also they advocate for policies that clearly favor the gee-whiz crowd over other constituencies -- the bike lane funeral parking is a great example of that, as well as the damn fool street car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:David Alpert lives like three blocks from the Dupont Metro yet still feels the need to own a car (he freely admits this). This would be fine -- to eacha his own -- except for the fact that GGW articles routinely pillory people who feel the need to own cars even when they live in walkable neighborhoods. But Alpert being one of those people is conveniently forgotten. He's a massive hypocrite and fraud.

I really don't think that is the case - David freely admits to owning and using a car as do many GGW contributors and commentators. So I think that pretty much sinks the hypocrite and fraud arguments.

To the extent that "GGW" advocates for anything it advocates for a more livable city and region which means a bunch of things among them better use of scarce public space, better design of various things, better alternates to driving alone and better governance. If those policies lead to people who own cars driving less that is a big win for everyone - particularly people who still drive.

In any case you act like GGW is the Matrix - that it is this massive unknowable force coming to take away your car. It is a blog which publishes a pretty diverse bunch of viewpoints.

If you had something intelligent to say they might publish it too.

Really? How many women with kids and daycare drop=offs blog there? Low-income workers who drive in from the suburbs? Disabled people reliant on cars? Section 8 voucher users?

Yeah, that's a pretty laughable claim. It's almost entirely a small group of entitled white people who insist they know best for everyone.

Alpert and many GGW contributors owning cars yet publishing article after article on the evils of car ownership is the essence of hypocrisy. If you can't see that then I'm not sure what else to tell you.

they do not publish articles about the evils of cars. I can't believe ho many of you are spouting off but clearly don't read the blog daily. I am assuming you get your info only from the cleveland park list serves. thats the equivalent to being a fox news junkie. urbanism allows a lot of families to be car lite. We live near a metro and have a car. We use it maybe once a week on the weekend, and thats usually to get out of town. a LOT of families could be like this and would love to be like this. Its not an either/or proposition like the NIMBY "fake news" nuts would have you believe.

And that's the problem with GGW: It writes about how everyone should be "allowed" to do certain things, as if we need to ask GGW for permission. Who is David Alpert or anyone else on that site to say what anyone should be "allowed" to do?

Luckily, the GGW smart-growth echo chamber is quite small.

But it is very well funded (by development interests) and well organized.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They're all "gee whiz!!" about "transit" without being actually willing to address the issues that face people trying to drop off kids, get to work, and get home again at a decent hour.

They are focused on policy, not on giving personal advice. Fact is if we had more and better transit, and more housing near it, more people would use it, even if many would still drive.

No, the advocate policies that would make life actively more difficult for people who have to drive. Also they advocate for policies that clearly favor the gee-whiz crowd over other constituencies -- the bike lane funeral parking is a great example of that, as well as the damn fool street car.

The whole point is to reshape our built environment and provide transportation options so people don't HAVE to drive. The evolution of the single occupancy vehicle is the worst gift bestowed to mankind.