But cap and trade artificially raises the value of one property and forces the residents or commercial tenants to carry the financial burden of several properties.
This isn't New York City where wealthy millionaires can afford such dings, this is a government town with most residents earning an average Joe income.
Furthermore, having to bring several land owners on board just to build one tower would be a horrendously complicated, controversial and lengthy process. What we really need is to relax heights and thin out our buildings, but since that won't happen we'll continue to see the chimeras that our blocks are turning into. And the problem is most planners don't even live downtown, and I wouldn't be surprised if most don't even live in the City of Victoria. Seeing a project on paper is what got us the tragedies like Soho where the balconies of several units back onto the Palladian.
Thinning out buildings still requires low overall FSRs. So either you build on a lot meant for the 1890s and have a building that is extremely thin, or you assemble multiple lots, or you come up with a scheme to buy the air rights of adjacent lots.