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Yesterday the Gaza war thread continued as the most active thread. Skipping, that one, the most active thread was titled, "Alexandria on the Cusp of Eliminating All SFH Zoning" and posted in the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum. The original poster claims that Alexandria is plagued by a number of negative factors such as failing schools and an increasing number of murders and now the Council is going to completely destroy the city by eliminating zoning for single family housing. There is apparently a vote on this topic today. First, just to clarify what this proposal is all about. Currently, some parts of Alexandria are zoned exclusively for single family houses. In an effort to expand housing options, the Council proposes to remove this zoning and allow the development of multifamily housing units in those areas. Posters variously see this as either enhancing the value of their property or destroying it. Those in the first group suggest that what is now a single family home could be sold for a higher profit if it were purchased in order to develop multifamily housing. Others, on the other hand, believe that higher-density will destroy their current community and cause their current homes to lose value. This illustrates the dilemma of housing costs. Those in search of housing are eager to see more affordable housing which, proponents of development argue, can best be achieved by increasing the supply of housing. As such, encouraging the replacement of single family homes with multifamily units should increase affordability. But those who currently own property are not interested in seeing it lose value and that is exactly what they fear will happen if their current property is suddenly surrounded by lower-cost housing. Regardless, there is no agreement about the best course of action. Some posters think it makes sense to sell to a developer and take the money and run. Others think staying put until single family homes are scarce and sell for a significant premium makes more sense. Several posters are also worried about an increased number of residents overburdening city services, especially schools. Anger with the proposal is such that many posters who apparently currently own single-family homes make all sorts of threats about how they will react, such as turning their homes into brothels or raising pigs in their back yards. Sadly for these posters, the new zoning proposals will not allow for brothels or pig farms.