The suburbs are reaching for the skies with towering new apartment and shopping complexes, but some are worried that a federal law will ground the District. All over the region, developers and town planners are either building or contemplating high-rise developments with homes, shops and restaurants worth billions. The so-called “New Urbanism” calls for cities and towns to be built up, rather than sprawled out — and projects like White Flint, Rosslyn-Ballston and Reston Town Center have already been approved. Places where plans are being weighed to create skyscraper developments include Tysons Corner and New Carrollton. But an 1899 federal law restricting the size of buildings in the District has some worried that the capital may miss the revolution. “Given that there’s a limited amount — and a shrinking amount of developable land in D.C., there’s a finite limit to square footage,” said architect and University of Maryland professor emeritus Roger Lewis. “What’s been suggested by me and a lot of others is that there are probably places in the city — and I don’t mean everywhere — where I think the height limit could be reconsidered.” The height limits were imposed after horrified congressmen saw the 164-foot Cairo hotel rise in the 1890s. The Heights of Buildings Act confined future developments to about 130 feet. That means that when trying to attract businesses and renters, D.C. is handicapped compared to its suburbs, Lewis said. Right now, “it’s a wash,” because the height cap also artificially inflates lease prices by creating scarcity in the District’s rental market. But Lewis and others are worried that as more high-rise projects are built, it’ll be harder for the District to attract — and keep — residents. Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, said he appreciates those concerns, but he’s not sure the problem has become critical yet. “D.C. has fully participated in this boom,” Schwartz said. “It’s just a question of when will it be a problem?”
