Has anyone made the argument to them that Raleigh’s skyline is absolutely pathetic for a city its size and it acts like an advertisement for the city’s civic health?
A city that has civic pride and a sense of place has a dense downtown with lots of buildings like Seattle or Portland. It says something about the cultural health of a place.
Tall buildings are a committal investment in the community. They signify that it is a place worth staying in. They signal that the downtown is healthy enough that people are willing to work and live there. They signal that the economy is growing there.
When a city has something obviously unhealthy going on in its civic culture it shows. Cities that don’t give a damn about themselves show it in their skylines. Virginia Beach, Fresno, Bakersfield… the message is this is a place to stay temporarily but nobody wants to stay here long enough to justify anything taller. Or if a city is economically depressed like Mobile, Shreveport. The gaps in the skyline are like missing teeth. Or if a city is politically dysfunctional like Albany, or DC, it shows that. It always says something.