Thanks, Alex. It is a real mental shift, which I didn't fully explore in this piece as I got a bit sidetracked by the whole urban planning side. But I do think that a lot of that very productive social contact of young kids - the rubber snakes days! - at local playgrounds and parks happens because of more apartment-based living.

And as I say here, Benidorm's model manages to give half a million landlocked Spaniards and rain-scourged Northern Europeans their fortnight of sun and sand. It simply couldn't happen without stacking 'em high. I used to drive past the city and sneer at it - I now realise what a priggish fool I was.