pesto:
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My thoughts exactly. In most areas 5-7 is either acceptable to the locals or they will not oppose it strongly. And it is much more conducive to looking and feeling like a real city than scattered high-rises among vacant lots and sfh's.
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Our smart growth advocacy group here in DC,
Ward 3 Vision, had a smart-growth panel discussion earlier this week with Chris Leinberger (Brookings/University of Michigan), Roger Lewis (architect professor at the U. of Maryland) and Harriet Tregoning, the head of DC's Office of Planning.
Roger Lewis said that the most important part of buildings are the bottom 30 feet of them. He said whether they have cupolas or spires is not at all important. What is important is the street-level detail (amount of windows and doors, width of the sidewalks, number of curb cuts).
This has been discussed frequently here before but DC doesn't have a bulding taller than 12-13 stories. Most buildings in Madrid or Paris are less than 7 stories. If there are more buildings like the ones in Santa Monica posted above and these regions were connected by good rail transit, Southern California would be doing fine.