‘When I moved from Skull Island to New York I was told of a land where all were equal and there were great opportunities regardless of colour, creed or enormous size,’ explained Mr. Kong. ‘The truth I’ve found is very different. People say ‘it’s a jungle out there’, but let me assure you it’s not. It’s just a load of high-tensile steel, low-friction glass and ridiculous corporate slogans lit up with lamps. How do they expect us to climb that? It’s ape-ist.’

Kong is now threatening legal action against the city of New York, citing severely restricted opportunities for members of the Megaprimatus Kong subspecies. ‘There’s plenty of parking for the disabled, but are there adequate foot and hand holds on the outside of the fascias?’ asked Mr Kong, beating his chest. ‘I expect the architect thought those bi-planes would smash themselves.’

Mr Kong is particularly critical of access arrangements, especially in some of the newer buildings. ‘There I was, my massive left eye staring into the apartment of a screaming woman, and could I get her window open? Could I balls! I picked at it for ages but it was really difficult, and in the end the woman gave up shrieking and went for a bath. That’s the last thing your self esteem needs when you’re trying to terrorise a city.’

In an open letter to New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, Kong has called for an immediate review of government policy on building regulations, demanding wheelchair ramps be accompanied by special giant ape access areas. He is also highly critical of current rooftop safety levels.

‘Many of the skyscrapers in New York are a real hazard for your average giant gorilla. The lack of adequate safety railings makes falling to your death in a hail of gunfire a real possibility. When I think about how I’ve been treated, it breaks my heart,’ admitted Mr Kong. ‘Or it could just be indigestion from eating that hot dog vendor too quickly.’

In place of the current blueprints, featuring a city of pure gold, surrounded by a translucent jasper courtyard and 144 cubit-high surrounding walls, with embossed gates of pure pearl, the Prince has commissioned a Neo-Georgian design by one of his favourite architects Quinlan Terry. According to a source at Clarence House, Charles has already had ‘a quiet word’ about these new plans, ‘Prince to Prince’, with the Prince of Peace: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, hoping to come to some kind of understanding.

The intervention has led to some critics accusing Charles of attempting to short-circuit the Divine planning procedure by which God the Father’s sovereign will is usually exercised: ‘That man seems to have an opinion about everything’ remarked Frank Gehry, designer of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao ‘intensive agriculture, flaky medicine and now plans to stage the end of the World; is there no end to his meddling?’

A spokesperson for Jehovah’s Witnesses publication Watchtower – charged with producing all official artists’ impressions of the End Times – said that they had received no new Divine instructions regarding plans for a New Heaven and a New Earth. ‘His Royal Highness did drop by with the new plans last week, but I can’t see them taking off to be honest. I mean: all those ionic columns and decorative mouldings, pur-leese, it’s just so dated and kitsch.’

‘Back then, people seemed to think that that anything was possible,’ said Neville Bradshaw, head of the commission set up to investigate the validity of non-traditional city design techniques. ‘Cities in the sky they said, and a robot to make your dinner and do the Hoovering. Then to cap it all, this group of rockers came along singing about building a city on nothing more than Rock and Roll!’

No one expected the planning department to even consider this unconventional proposal, but the cost implications attracted the attention of the cash-strapped city’s accountants. ‘Of course everyone who was not in the know got very excited,’ said Bradshaw, ‘thinking this was the end of costly and complex demographic studies and utility planning. Just build whole cities on an abstract concept – on a sound, a type of hard to define modern music.’

In addition, witnesses recall that the band’s presentation was much easier to understand for everyone in the Mayor’s office who knew nothing about building or architecture. Awkward questions as to the durability of rock music as a building material were answered with very confident assertions from fellow rock musicians who claimed that ‘Rock and Roll will never die’ and that ‘Rock and Roll is here to stay.’ ‘I remember them all looking really impressed by that,’ said the Mayor’s secretary. ‘But by then the planning meeting had kinda degenerated; all the guys were pretending to play the guitar and shaking their heads up and down.’

Unfortunately Los Angeles lies on the San Andreas fault and the commission has concluded that ‘Rock and Roll’ may not provide adequate foundations in the event of even a minor earthquake. During a minor tremor last week, a number of homes were destroyed in the west of the city. The now semi-retired rockers of Starship, happened to be listening back to their most successful record at full volume at their home in Beverly Hills when walls collapsed and the roof caved in. After they were rescued from the rubble, one band member was heard to slur ‘Yeah man, that rocks!’

The fashion dubbed ‘loft un-conversion’ is understood to be a reaction against the insensitive modernisation of Victorian terraced properties, which has seen builders turning dark and pokey roof spaces into useful spare bedrooms with shower and a sky-light.

‘It’s a tragedy that so many of these lovely old properties have been carelessly modernised with no respect for tradition and period detail,’ said Arabella Fortescue from English Heritage. ‘Fortunately more sensitive home owners are now faithfully restoring the traditional old-fashioned loft, complete with old Christmas decorations, embarrassing school reports and the low wooden beam you always hit your head on.’

Builders in London are charging around thirty thousand pounds to take out the new pine staircase and block out the window while specialist interior designers will add the extra detail such as the broken Amstrad printer and dead starling.’

‘My builders worked started on my top floor on Monday…’ said Ms Fortescue. ‘But I insisted they disappeared at lunchtime to work on another job. Honestly some of these builders have got no respect for tradition.’

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