Monday, June 12, 2006; A20

Lyndsey Layton ["Alley Homes Fight for Respect -- and Trash Pickup," front page, May 29] reports that alley housing is making a comeback in Washington. She outlines the challenges of resurrecting this style of housing, making a good case for Ellen McCarthy, the District's planning director, to reexamine the laws that restrict it. It appears that exceptions to the law requiring at least a 30-foot-wide alley have already been made.

The arbitrary nature of these exceptions has derailed an excellent opportunity to creatively use alley space to develop high-quality affordable housing in the U Street corridor. ONE DC has picked up the fight that Manna Inc., the city's leading nonprofit developer of affordable housing, began -- for the right to develop a proposed nine-unit project known as Temperance Row on donated land previously used as alley housing.

So while the article describes the photographer, the carpenter-turned-developer and the playhouse owners as bringing a welcome presence to the alleys in units described as "affordable," Temperance Row has faced a series of delays and negative rulings from the Board of Zoning Adjustment, despite being approved by all other relevant city agencies and neighborhood organizations.

Does the exception to the 30-foot rule come when you are perceived as a positive -- read "gentrifying" -- force in a neighborhood? Does the exception exclude those who are upfront about their desire to build affordable housing for the selfsame people who make the city run but do not have such exotic, arts-related occupations? I was happy to read that Ms. McCarthy was amenable, and I hope that the answers to these questions spur on her investigation of the rules, given the city's constant affirmation of its commitment to affordable housing.

TANIA B. JACKSON

Washington