I live in Mt View, and I can tell you that a rallying cry of anti-development people is "Do you want Mt View to become Tokyo?"
There is a large contingent of people who own single family homes who want to keep things exactly as they are now. They vote in elections. The contingent of people who DO want development largely doesn't live here, so they don't vote. There is no constituency of people who will live here in 10 years when we have higher density!
Los Angeles sprawled before it became the center of gravity for the cult of the car. It was like that when people were getting around via street cars and on foot.
Its sprawl is rooted in the logistics of desert development. You had to develop large tracts to cover the costs of the water infrastructure. Without water infrastructure, you weren't going to develop anything.
There are myriad forces that shape given cities. I'm disinclined to accept the notion that our current car cult mentality is inevitable, irreversible, etc. and we can't do anything good anymore "like they used to do."
Seems like "becoming Tokyo" would be an improvement. (But I still find the comparison hyperbolic and ridiculous. It sounds like a deluded scare tactic, frankly.)
Hmm, I would be a bit skeptical of that figure without observing incorporated city limits and how far out they extend. Sometimes population figures include the "metro area" as well.
This is a very good point, as there are western regions of Tokyo that after much lower density than central Tokyo. A good measure may be to look at the density in Minato-ku.
Minato has a population density of 10850/km2, Shinjuku of 18500/km2, Meguro of 18900/km2, and Nakano wins out at 20,700/km2. (Nakano winning surprised me. It's pretty low-rise for Tokyo!)
There is a large contingent of people who own single family homes who want to keep things exactly as they are now. They vote in elections. The contingent of people who DO want development largely doesn't live here, so they don't vote. There is no constituency of people who will live here in 10 years when we have higher density!