One interesting argument in the comments of the SSC NIMBY post is a lot of people are posting who don’t like cities, and are asking why metro areas have to keep expanding.
Which, well, as long as the population keeps growing, cities will grow. I guess you could have ever-sprawling suburbs, but at some point the commutes become impractical.
More telecommuting.
Seriously – given the size of the social gains that could result from decoupling productivity and geography on a large scale – the fact that most creative-class / knowledge-worker / whatever-you-want-to-call-it types are going in to work every day should be seen as a national disgrace.