Hacker News Reader

At least in downtown areas, Seattle is infamous for having some of the least restrictive zoning laws in the country. I was advised not to pay any premium for a condo with a nice view, for example, because there is almost no such thing as a "protected view" in the city, unless you're physically situated such that no theoretical future building project could obstruct it.

View on HN

While this might be accurate of downtown, you've lost the forest for the trees. Seattle absolutely has protected views for many of the single family houses. If they expire, it's on 30-40 year time horizons. Most of the city's land is single family housing (often with large minimum lot size).

If you want to know what Seattle is actually infamous for: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_process

Reply on news.ycombinator.com