D.C. Mayor Vince Gray sounds like he’s been reading a few of our latest posts.​ Fresh from his time in the slammer for protesting Congress’ meddling in the District’s budgetary decisions Gray at an Urban Land Institute event on real estate discussed the potential benefits that increasing the amount of housing in the downtown core could have on the city and the region.

As projects like CenterCityDC bring more jobs and housing to the downtown area the demand for urban housing builds on itself. As Liz Farmer in the Examiner notes experts predict that young professionals will continue to move to the region and will continue to want to live in mixed-use walkable urban areas like downtown D.C. and Rosslyn. As more and more people move in to these areas they should become increasingly “neighborhood-y” as long as good urbanist principles are adhered to.

Mentioning the redevelopment potential of St. Elizabeth’s in Southeast Washington as one of several specific cases Gray said that the future of D.C. is transit-oriented urban development. It’s great to hear this kind of talk and prioritization of urbanism from one of the region’s key leaders.