And future generations will probably be saying the same thing about the copy and paste designs of tomorrow. What American cities are building right now is what’s feasible and affordable. That’s why five-over-ones are so popular. And some of the buildings going up right now will eventually go away, and people will complain, and the cycle continues.
Quick little sidebar on that subject: NYC’s beautiful brownstones were actually pretty controversial when they started being built. At the time, the material was abundant and cheap in the Tri-State region, so it was popular among the middle class. However, a lot of people thought the brown color was hideous and redundant, and the stone itself was apparently rather weak and tended to crumble (most remaining brownstones are believed to have been resurfaced with a cement-based composite). All that to say, what’s “copy and paste” now could be iconic tomorrow, or it may not be, but in both cases, developers were/are doing what’s both affordable and feasible in the existing market.
The reality is that Raleigh needs to try to keep up with the growth of the region, and the Holiday Inn, as it exists today, is terrible land use on prime real estate. If it has historical or architectural significance beyond just “it looks different,” then that would justify preservation… but it just doesn’t. It’s an odd building that didn’t age gracefully, and, at this point, it’s probably the worst hotel experience in downtown (not to say it’s necessarily a bad experience, but I highly doubt it’s on par with any of its competition).
So the options become: keep it as is and let it continue to age and deteriorate, spend a comical amount of money to gut the whole thing and attempt to modernize it, or replace it altogether. The first two only make sense if it can either compete with neighboring hotels or if it becomes a legitimate tourist attraction, and I don’t think either of those are attainable, so the clear choice becomes replacement.
[Edit: minor phrasing change for grammar purposes.]
