AHC: Washington DC a major city

"As of the 2010 Census Bureau estimate, the population of the Washington Metropolitan Area was estimated to be 5,582,170 (+16.39%), making it the seventh-largest metropolitan area in the country."

Done.

If it is Washington, DC proper, then it would need to expand in physical size.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington-Arlington-Alexandria,_DC-VA-MD-WV_MSA#cite_note-3

I said CITY. I don't Metropolitan area. But Im a New Yorker, so I don't need to. :D Pure city wise. I would suggest not having the southern portion retracted.
 

Solroc

Banned
Either the Bank of the United States survives, or the retrocession by Virginia fails or is nullified. I wonder, can the U.S. government take back Virginia's portion of D.C. post-Civil War as punishment?
 
Too bad Washington is on soft ground, skyscrapers would help.

I suppose more building in general, since the city has a spread out feel with plenty of greenery (not just at the Mall, either)?
 
Something else that would help is not having the restrictive building codes and limits.
 
There had been loose talks in the past of giving everything but the actual government buildings back to Maryland. Would this be legal for this challenge? Doing this could have also lifted the burden of the current boundaries, as it could have absorbed other neighboring towns without dealing with a state government.
 
Are we talking solely financially? Because I've always thought that D.C. was a pretty damn important city, as capital of the United States. (Even if its traffic sucks :D)
 
I wonder, can the U.S. government take back Virginia's portion of D.C. post-Civil War as punishment?
No, it can't; you'd need consent of the Virginian state government. Of course, the Unionist-founded Restored Government of Virginia would probably consent if they were pressed.

It might've been even simpler, though, not to retrocede it in the first place.

Too bad Washington is on soft ground, skyscrapers would help.
The other problem is that there's a law saying no building can be higher than the Washington Monument. Of course, the soft ground might be a problem, too - would it count if we founded Washington City on a different site in the first place?
 
No, it can't; you'd need consent of the Virginian state government. Of course, the Unionist-founded Restored Government of Virginia would probably consent if they were pressed.

It might've been even simpler, though, not to retrocede it in the first place.


The other problem is that there's a law saying no building can be higher than the Washington Monument. Of course, the soft ground might be a problem, too - would it count if we founded Washington City on a different site in the first place?

I've actually always wondered about this, is there any link describing other potential sites? I've read that Cincinnati was supposed to become the US Capital in the event of Washington falling to the British.
 
Ah, the old chestnut about no building being allowed to be higher than the Washington Monument. The actual limit is "the width of the adjacent street plus 20 feet" and the reason for passing it was less to preserve views of the Monument than it was horror at the Cairo Hotel mixed with aesthetic conservativism.
Moving on from pedantry to actual useful things, the biggest issue that hasn't been mentioned is that DC got off to a late start as a city. Sure it was founded in 1791(discounting Alexandria and Georgetown), but practically speaking once the Georgetown and Alexandria harbors went south there wasn't much to drive its growth as a city until the civil war. Maybe the trick is to weaken Baltimore as a port somehow, since I get the impression it was the main regional center of gravity at this point? I don't know if that's doable, though.
EDIT: I am aware that there were gristmills and the like in Rock Creek, but it'd take more than that.
 

Warsie

Banned
I said CITY. I don't Metropolitan area. But Im a New Yorker, so I don't need to. :D Pure city wise. I would suggest not having the southern portion retracted.

remove the restriction making no building taller than the capitol/update the capitol building every 50 years to make it more furutsistic and tall like a sci-fi capitol

EDIT: i see 3-4 people got to that first. Also OTL DC was/is a major city for black american politics and culture. Yes, a cheap outing but still.
 
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I've actually always wondered about this, is there any link describing other potential sites? I've read that Cincinnati was supposed to become the US Capital in the event of Washington falling to the British.
The Residency Act said it should be somewhere on the Potomac River and left the exact site up to President Washington. I've read a lot of people were thinking it'd be somewhere further west to anticipate future westward expansion. A capitol at Harper's Ferry could make for an interesting TL...
 
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