Why this word is great
BRUSSELIZATION — [Noun] The careless introduction of high-rise buildings into traditional residential neighborhoods, often resulting from lax urban planning. From Brussels (the capital of Belgium) + -ization (suffix denoting a process), referencing the haphazard urban development in Brussels during the 1960s and 1970s due to weak zoning regulations. Unlike "gentrification" (which implies deliberate, often upscale redevelopment displacing lower-income residents) or "urban renewal" (which suggests systematic improvement of infrastructure), Brusselization is the architectural equivalent of a shrug—unplanned, uncoordinated, indifferent. It is the brutalist monolith looming over a row of 19th-century townhouses, the sudden canyon of glass and steel where a cobbled street once meandered, the way a city’s skyline can fracture into dissonance overnight. A reminder that progress, untethered from vision, is merely change without meaning.