It could be that the experience of others has been the opposite of mine; meanwhile, by mentioning the Marsa project, I have no wish to bring it any kind of bad luck. Still, I have to state that since it was launched, whenever I drove through the area, traffic seemed to be well under control and proceeding at a satisfactory pace in the circumstances. The temptation actually is to say that the flow of traffic has improved on what it used to be.

True, this might be the case because much of my driving there happened during the Easter period.

Even so, it is quite clear that a lot of thought and much more planning than was previously carried out, are now taking place prior to the launch of new, largescale infrastructural projects. That approach is effective and giving good results. It deserves total support. 

***

Safegarding farm land

The authorities which oversee building permits have long ago lost the excessive powers they enjoyed to even intervene if in their view, developers had made incorrect profit calculations when deciding whether instead of building three shops, they should go for two.  Today however, with the changes that continued to be made to the structures which regulate and oversee construction projects, new and old, the pendulum has swung largely to the other side.

It’s just too much.

And this not least when agricultural land needs to be consolidated. Too many tricks are being successfully played in order to further reduce the extent of such land. Too often, the voices within the structures of environmental protection that are positioned to defend farmland in a way that is technically independent, are being placed in a minority.

There exist too many loopholes through which a developer can wriggle in order to overturn at his/her third or fourth effort any negative decision even when it was delivered and confirmed once and twice.

We need to put the brakes on.  

***

Confidential?

One could consider as almost comic the scandal that erupted over the use by Cambridge Analytica of data about millions of internet “clients” in order to mount effective campaigns by which to influence the views of whole nations.

It is “comic” despite the fact that in and of itself what happened is scandalous, hugely scandalous. But everything that we knew about how the internet operates should have alerted us all to the fact that an enormous and complete technical apparatus has been established which can follow and record all that is done when one enters its system.

There is of course the pretence that you need give your permission for your inputs to be recorded, or if you are to receive promotional messages. And so, if for instance you tap a travel website to book a holiday, expect later to receive from all sides proposals for travel options about which you never dreamed, as well as other offers that will have nothing to do with your original intentions.

The real point is this: it has become clear that with the internet a most effective machine has been constructed by which to monitor all those who interact with it. Once it was there, that it would eventually be deployed became a sure thing.