Ah well, always the NIMBY accusers come out. I ignore them.
After living in my urban core neighborhood for 25 years I have learned that you fight for your neighborhood, the development you want there, and yes even the sort of people you want there because--guess what--people with crappy values suck as neighbors.
Over 25 years we have fought an open prison within 1 block from our house, burnt out high rise public housing towers, multiple section 8 developments, etc. My neighborhood is the strongest and most organized of all neighborhoods in this city. No ones messes with us, the politicians know better than to pull crap on us.
Across the street from where I live was 1 block of undeveloped land. For 25 years we wanted single family housing to go up there. For 25 years we waited. During the housing boom we watched developers market plans for high density high end (and terrifically ugly, not-to-scale block building) and miraculously, the market rejected those plans. No one wanted to buy 'em. Did I mention that they were ugly and out of character for our neighborhood?
Then, after the housing boom and with deflated prices for this property, a reasonable builder came along with a plan to build nice single family houses where he would make a modest profit. These house are actually very high end, ranging from $365,000 to $600,000 and that's a lot in my area. While the designs aren't completely fabulous, they are nice. I am happy with them and I like looking at them. They did have to conform to design standards for our neighborhood.
New people are willing to spend this kind of money in our urban core neighborhood because we are known as a nice place to live, despite city crime. Our streetscape is handsome, many of the Victorian houses are fabulous, and neighbors take an active role in neighborhood upkeep. We work with the city for the big stuff and we spend endless hours on landscaping, building extra features, etc. etc.
Briefly I will will say that my political leanings changed from liberal to conservative over the years of watching the federal government try its best to f*ck up my neighborhood and the nearby area with its ridiculous housing policies. My neighborhood was brought back from a slum by urban pioneers who fought for every brick and cornice here and the feds don't give one crap about that. But I digress.
OP, I don't know how you stop development that you think is unrealistic, other than putting pressure on your political representatives. If you city's planning agency thinks this is appropriate development, there isn't much you can do about it. But getting involved politically to drive an urban plan is a good way to channel your energy and to head off the next bad building project.