Plano is not the suburb it was decades ago, and those who would seek to turn back the clock would do the community a disservice.

Five Plano residents had asked a state court to force the City Council to either reverse its ambitious redevelopment plan or give voters a choice at the ballot box. Last week, state District Court Judge Henry Wade Jr. turned aside that argument, setting up the likelihood that opponents of the city's plan will appeal the decision or otherwise continue their fight.

For various reasons, we're pleased that Plano’s vision for the future won this important legal victory. It is good that the court didn’t force Plano into a corner. Decisions about future growth are best handled by local elected officials and residents, and the ramifications would have reverberated across the state had the court injected itself deeper into the process.

But there is another less legal, more pragmatic reason. Cities, especially first-ring suburbs, must adapt to the times. Plano Tomorrow, the city’s master plan designed to promote sustainable housing and retail, attempts to accomplish that transition.

PlanoFuture, a coalition of residents who oppose the plan, say Plano Tomorrow is inappropriate in a city dominated by single-family homes. The city’s plan allows for several different types of housing in mixed-use developments to serve emerging populations — smaller single-family homes for seniors or town homes for millennials as well as high-density multifamily apartments.

Plano faces a delicate balancing act. Almost all of Plano’s land is developed, the result of the suburb’s explosive growth since the 1980s. Plano requires a development blueprint that better reflects the needs of a new generation of residents and businesses, including redeveloping retail centers that were relevant in the 1980s, but are now problematic.

For Plano to be the city it needs to be, it can’t focus on the past.

Got an opinion about this issue? Send a letter to the editor, and you just might get published.