D.C.’s Fear of Heights

…Urban expert James Kunstler argues that energy shortages will scare residents away from skyscrapers because no one wants to climb 50 flights of stairs during a brownout, but that should only scare residents away from skyscrapers without backup generators. If anything, energy shortages should scare residents away from their gas-guzzling suburban commutes.

If that ever happened, Washington would be well situated to lead the way into a new age of urban sustainability. It has excellent public transit, with plenty of room for denser development along the major routes. Nine percent of its residents already walk to work, the most of any U.S. city, and that figure could easily expand with smarter growth. The height restriction is not the only impediment to that growth, but it would be a lot easier to repeal than the region’s car-dependent culture, or the knee-jerk anti-density crusades of urban NIMBYists.

Washington Post