The Washington Post has a story about the possible plans for replacing a parking garage and a fire station with housing at 1617 U Street NW. Here’s what the site looks like:

The two ugly square things in the foreground are what would be replaced with housing. If they were replaced with two buildings the size of the Balfour (the seven story building at the right), it would add over 100 apartments (possibly more). As the story notes, it’s your bog-standard urban battle over new construction. As you can imagine, some in the neighborhood are for redevelopment, and some are against.

I italicized in the neighborhood for a reason: this is about an eleven minute walk from my home. Do I count as part of the neighborhood? I don’t mean that to snark: if I want to stay in the broader neighborhood*, more housing might lower prices, and that helps me.

I bring this up because, when we have discussions about housing, people discussing it often speak in the ‘disinterested policy’ sense–more housing can (doesn’t always) lower rents for a city or a region. But this would affect my housing costs, even though I’m not across the street from the proposed development.

In other words, regardless of YIMBY or NIMBY, at what point are we allowed to call it MBY (my backyard)? Because I walk by there often; it’s not some distant, abstract place. And I would like to see more housing in the neighborhood.

*This is part of the U Street Corridor, but is a block from the northern edge of Dupont Circle.