Over the weekend, Jessica Hume - The National's architecture reporter - put together a very interesting piece about what Yas Island means for the future of development in Abu Dhabi. Khaldoon al Mubarak, the chief executive of Mubadala and head of the Executive Affairs Authority, said that the island would act as a blueprint for Abu Dhabi's future.

"We used Yas as almost the future urban component ... we wanted to test things out," he said. Pointing to the shaded pavements, street lighting, cycleways, even the materials being used, he said, "these are things not typical for Abu Dhabi which hopefully will be typical in the future".

Photo caption: Abu Dhabi - November 4th, 2009. New light posts line the sidewalks on Yas Island. Jessica Hume, The National's architecture correspondent, says they look like "blades of grass". Galen Clarke/The National

Ms Hume takes a walk on the island to experience the blueprint first hand and finds pedestrian walkways "good enough to rival any in the world" and street lamps that look like "blades of grass". Find the article here. Her observations are well worth reading.

If these things come to Abu Dhabi, they will go a long way to making the city more liveable. Over the weekend, this reporter took a walk with his father from Lebanese Flower to the Beach Rotana, where he was staying. The walk was arduous, with construction work spilling over onto the sidewalk, a constant need to climb up and down curbs, and a lack of any signage to guide us on our trek.