The other option would be to change the block time to 2 minutes.
I'm not sure why that wasn't discussed more.
The block time set to 10 minutes is permanent so changing that would be infinitely harder than changing the 1mb cap which has always been a temporary measure from the start.
Change something permanent and you open Pandora's box to future permanent things changing. Then nothing is permanent, and nobody trusts bitcoin anymore, and becomes worthless.
Changing something permanently doesnt mean that it will become worthless as we still dont know the real effect of what might happen after the change. The change could give a better good for bitcoin to stand up in the future because unchange thing remains to stay at the past and not the futuree