Eventually, this stuff really starts to wear on you.

People and papers can’t talk about 300 foot buildings in Rosslyn and Crystal City without invoking the M word. Christ almighty. Get out occasionally, folks. Get on a train and visit New York City.

It’s shocking, too, to see that residents greeted plans for Crystal City with complaints about the height and density. At some point, leaders have to lose their tempers with these people. We’re at the heart of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country, and it’s not getting any smaller. Where, exactly, would residents prefer that new housing go? Should we just take all of Virginia north of Richmond and make it one grand subdivision? I bet that if we really try, we can have folks sitting in stop and go traffic from eastern Ohio into the District every day, all the time.

I suppose some feelings will get hurt if we tell folks outright that this isn’t their grandmother’s Washington, with sleepy little houses a stone’s throw from downtown. We just can’t afford to protect these little suburban fairy tales. If a 300 foot building at a Metro station across the river from one of the nation’s largest central business districts is just too much for folks to bear, then they might want to look into relocating. The cost–in time and money, environmental damage, and overall quality of life–is too great for us to indulge them.