Another five over one (which is what I think you mean) is not the same as a whole neighborhood getting razed and replaced with towers in the park. By the way,

Another five over one (which is what I think you mean) is not the same as a whole neighborhood getting razed and replaced with towers in the park. By the way, the whole point of streamlining permitting and zoning processes are to get rid of the unreasonable watering down of every proposal because as you state the end result is worse for everyone, aesthetics included. Also it isn’t just about historic structures, there’s situation like that San Francisco Mission District strip-mall-esque laundromat steps from the BART station, that can’t be replaced because NIMBYs are afraid of “changing the neighborhood character.” If crap architecture like that ends up in the same historic bucket then whoever is declaring 80% of every city as being “historic” has done a disservice to anyone who wants to actually protect historic architecture by diluting the name for their anti-change cause.