Definitely a language bamboozle, but the author has a point: in a residential-only subdivision, dense houses feel "squeezed in" to a lot size for no real purpos

Definitely a language bamboozle, but the author has a point: in a residential-only subdivision, dense houses feel "squeezed in" to a lot size for no real purpose. If you can't walk to anything other than identical houses, why locate them that close? Only justification I can imagine is "to make the developers more money on the same lot size." Of course, I'm no fan of ultradense living. But in cities that have lots of businesses, parks, public transit stations, etc to walk to, density is a huge win, and the author uses the positive term to convey that. Essentially the same trait is positive in one context but negative in another. Consider cakes and apples. Everyone wants a juicy apple. Nobody wants a soggy cake.