Professor Gemunu Fernando of the University of Moratuwa in Colombo, Sri Lanka, was explaining to me that the second phase of an architectural project of his will be built to a significantly greater height than originally intended because the Sri Lankan planning authorities had recently raised the district’s floor-area ratio, which regulates the relationship between the amount of land available for development and usable space erected upon it. In general, the higher the ratio, the greater the building height. I asked him why was the ratio changed. He looked at me and smiled: “Well, it dramatizes development.”