Prince Charles, evangelicals and sniffing around London Fields

"I seem to be a dangerous commodity in certain circles and receiving such awards is a relatively novel experience for me," said Prince Charles when he received a Scully Award (previous winners: Jane Jacobs and the Aga Khan) the other day. I also have found myself defending our prince rather a lot over the last few days, much to my surprise. I guess I feel rather sorry for him. Bless him for trying to raise a debate and he's not all nonsense and Poundbury horror - his heart is definitely in the right place. It must be so tough being surrounded by sycophants all the time. I just wish the damn New Urbanists hadn't got their teeth into him - now there's not the slightest chance of weaning him back from the dark side, alas. [Speaking of which I found this scary thread on Cyburbia. How can people express such admiration without irony?]

More strange things: A Christian evangelist theme park is going to be built in Israel. What strange post-post-modernism is this? It's really worth reading the article.

Kevin Harries went to the Social Tapestries pollution mapping project in London Fields that I miniblogged in Ephemera the other day. Looked like he had a good time. I'd like to think that "local people's perception of what it's like to live here... is in the ascendant, in policy terms", as he says. Is this really true? I worry about the attempts to systematise such delicate and subtle perceptions as the inevitable tendency is to simplify to the point of becoming meaningless. But we are also constantly experimenting with possible ways to structure, or at least represent, people's perceptions of their spaces. Which is linked to yet another post I haven't had time to publish yet, tentatively entitled 'On the impossibility of mapping'...