Talk:Medway (disambiguation)

Requested move 23 October 2018

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. (non-admin closure) В²C ☎ 01:46, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

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• Medway (disambiguation) → Medway
• Medway → Borough of Medway

– The district is often called "Borough of Medway" [1] (click on "Try a wider place search") see WP:UKDISTRICTS. While the conurbation is called "Medway Towns" (this is what A-Z uses in the town plan). The area is named after the River Medway and even if the district was called just Medway it doesn't clear PT#1 [[2]] [[3]]. A Google Book search returns mainly results for the river. There is also a ward in Tonbridge and Malling district. Crouch, Swale (talk) 13:21, 23 October 2018 (UTC) --Relisting. В²C ☎ 00:31, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

The council refers to itself consistently as "Medway Council" and the area as "Medway". There used to be a Borough of Medway (and its council) from 1974-1979 when it changed name to the Borough (later City) of Rochester-upon-Medway. The only legal and consistent terms seem to be "Medway" and "Medway Unitary Authority". I would therefore suggest:

• Medway (disambiguation) remain as is.
• Medway → Medway Unitary Authority
• Medway Council remain as is (pro tem. This probably ought to be merged with Medway Unitary Authority, but that is a different discussion).
• River Medway → Medway, this is the principal and historic meaning (see Crouch, Swale's book search above).

Martin of Sheffield (talk) 14:19, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

• @Martin of Sheffield: The current borough is "Borough of Medway" although that may not be as common as some others, there is already a bunch of other unitary authority boroughs that are disambiguated in this way such as Borough of Bedford, Borough of Swindon and Borough of Milton Keynes, see WP:UKDISTRICTS#Naming conventions. There is also an article on the current borough at Borough of Chorley for example and the former one at Municipal Borough of Chorley. I did consider Medway Towns which appears to be the original location of this article but that would be problematic as the current borough includes areas outside of the Medway Towns.

I also don't think that the river is primary for "Medway", even though its the original use and even if it was like Thames, the river should still be at River Medway. Crouch, Swale (talk) 14:33, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

• Maybe even Borough of Medway (current) (or something similar if that violates NC) however Borough of Medway already redirects to Medway and we could just add a hatnote to the City of Rochester-upon-Medway. Crouch, Swale (talk) 14:42, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose What a weird request.Medway Borough Council existed for 4 years between 1974 and 1979, when it renamed itself City of Rochester upon Medway to reclaim its city status, and there is a lot of history about that. On the formation of Medway in 1998 extreme care was taken to refer to the new unitary council as the MTC, (Medway Towns Council)- consultants were employed to sort out the name mess and the logo so there wasn't the same mess as was made in 1974 and it was decided that Rochester had to lose its city status, and the headquarters of the unitary had to be away from Rochester. As Medway knows, naming cannot be over-simplified. List of urban areas in the United Kingdom shows that Medway is the 33rd largest urban area ahead of Northampton and Norwich with a population of 243,000. Sorry, if it is not tidy but blame the sixth century Kingdom of the Kentish, and particularly the Bretwalda, Æthelberht. ClemRutter (talk) 14:38, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

As noted the urban area is "Medway Towns" rather than just "Medway". Crouch, Swale (talk) 15:23, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I hesitate to add to Clem's deep knowledge of Medway, but it is illuminating to see the Government's take on this. SI 2235 of 2002 is "The Borough of Medway (Electoral Changes) Order 2002", but then proceeds to refer to "the borough(2) of Medway" (note the lower case) where footnote (2) says "The non-metropolitan district of Medway has the status of a borough". Footnote (6) is also illuminating: "See the District of the Medway Towns (Parishes and Electoral Changes) Order 1997 (S.I. 1997/776). The name of the borough was changed from Medway Towns to Medway on 1st April 1998". The SI internally defines (§2) "'borough' means the borough of Medway", again note the case – "borough" is a geographic descriptor and not part of the name. @Crouch, Swale: Good point about Thames being a redirect to River Thames, I'd be happy to amend my suggestions to:

• Medway should be a redirect to River Medway

if it would help you. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 15:37, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

The name is used for Swindon in which "borough" means the borough of Swindon [4] but the article is at Borough of Swindon. I would usually support that the original should take precedence but given that the river would usually be searched and referred to as "River Medway" I doubt that considering the large number of articles on the DAB page that it should be primary (such as places outside of England, including other rivers). As some facts show the river and some the district is primary, the inevitable outcome is that the DAB will be at the base name (and there will be lots of links to fix). But yes if the river was to be primary, we should just redirect "Medway" to it. Crouch, Swale (talk) 17:51, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

You can't use Swindon as an example. It has always been a coherent town, unlike the Medway Towns with its competing towns and cities. This argument has been rumbling on since 1944 and in 1960 amalgamation plans were wrecked by Gillingham wandering off in a huff. AFAIK Swindon never had Stratton St Margaret disputing plans for Swindon Borough! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 21:21, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Yes but we shouldn't name this differently to the other districts with borough status unless this is an exception (WP:CONSISTENCY). Crouch, Swale (talk) 19:19, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Do bear in mind that WP:CONSISTENCY is only a redirect to WP:Article_titles#Deciding_on_an_article_title, it's not even listed as a recognised shortcut. The policy lists 5 points: Recognizability, Naturalness, Precision, Conciseness and Consistency. The very next sentence says: "These should be seen as goals, not as rules.", so lets not pretend that quoting WP:CONSISTENCY trumps any previous discussion. Now consider the three core content policies: Verifiability, No original research, and Neutral point of view. Reference to Statutory Instruments (which are HMG official publications) and the council website does not support the use of "Borough of Medway". WP:NOR: you appear to be conducting a form of WP:SYNTH which by definition is OR. Finally WP:NPOV we need to be guided by the best independant sources, and I put it to you that HMG and the council are those best sources. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 08:55, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Do sources recognize "Borough of Swindon" but not "Borough of Medway". As I pointed out above, LGBCE uses a lower case "b" for Swindon. If you think Swindon is incorrect then you should probably seek a wider forum, titling this differently to the others, we should not title one differently based on a local decision. Crouch, Swale (talk) 09:45, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't know about Swindon, it was your example so I would have thought you were au fait with the details. You need to research it and if you think it is wrong raise the issue there. WP is an encyclopaedia, not a naming scheme, and our role to to report on established sources not to indulge in Linnaean phantasies. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 10:04, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

@SilkTork: as you made the other moves back in 2012. Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:26, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Which moves did I make in 2012 which are relevant to this discussion? I've taken a look and can't see what I did. SilkTork (talk) 15:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

• @SilkTork: You moved a number of district articles in March 2012 from "Foo (district)" to "Foo District" and "Foo (borough)" to "Borough of Foo". Although those often involved those that aren't unitary authorities, Darlington is a borough with unitary status, just like Medway. Although Medway Council doesn't include "Borough" in the name, Medway still says that its a borough. Crouch, Swale (talk) 13:09, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Yes, I remember doing that. That was a change from parenthetical disambiguation to natural disambiguation per WP:NATURALDIS, as we'd prefer a natural name to one that uses brackets. Where a district or borough didn't need disambiguating I left it at (or moved it to) Foo. Does Medway need disambiguating? No, because it is deemed to be the primary topic. If it was decided that Medway wasn't the primary topic we'd probably look to disambiguation by comma as Medway, Kent rather than Borough of Medway, as that would be in keeping with convention and guidelines, and would be more understandable to the general reader. SilkTork (talk) 19:29, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Is you're suggestion for using Medway, Kent instead because unlike the others, "Borough of Medway" doesn't appear to be in common use enough to satisfy WP:NATURALDIS? Crouch, Swale (talk) 20:17, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

• Is there an error here: "The district is often called "Borough of Medway" [5] (click on "Try a wider place search") " - The place searched for was "Medwa" rather than "Medway". Was that intentional - and if so, why? A "Medway" search gives this result. SilkTork (talk) 16:05, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

  Yes that was intentional, otherwise you don't get the DAB page, instead just the service station[6]. Crouch, Swale (talk) 13:09, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Though I am unclear on the intention, and what we are to read from the results. Putting in "Medwa" gives a list of results which don't include "Medway", even though "Medway" is a viable result. If I do a search for "Medw" I get offered "Medway" among the results: [7]. What difference is there in significance between doing a search for "Medwa" and "Medw"? And what importance are we supposed to derive from anything on what appears to be a user generated site that has no official function or status? My understanding is that it is a voluntary repository of photographs, such as our Commons. SilkTork (talk) 19:29, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

This is because there are 2 different search inferences, the one on the top right which gives you a "choose location" for Medwa [8] and the one on the top left (titled "Search") which gives you this with the button "Try a wider place search", which if you click on, you get offered "Borough of Medway". Those searches are from the Ordnance Survey, thus a reliable source, rather than user generated (which the rest of the site is). Crouch, Swale (talk) 20:17, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Ah, I see what is happening. The site is not organised or updated by Ordnance Survey, it is done by the users. But the site is sponsored by OS, who allow it to use their maps. You might find it more useful to go direct to the official and updated OS website and do your searches there. You will find no results for "Borough of Medway", but you will find results for "Medway" and "Medway Towns". SilkTork (talk) 11:44, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Medway (district) would be an option but that's not conventional. Crouch, Swale (talk) 19:11, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Verifiability and WP:RF are more important than conventions. Medway (district) would seem to be a good compromise. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 21:05, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes, its not ideal but if Medway is indeed an exception in that unlike the others, it is not commonly known as "Borough of Medway" then Medway (district) (or Medway (borough)) would be viable. Crouch, Swale (talk) 21:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. Personally I think Medway as a name for the place is a bad choice, and I never liked it when I lived there. It is so obviously not a place name. Strood, Rochester, Gillingham, Chatham, and Rainham are all proper place names with history and tradition, but Medway is so clearly a name of a route or a river. As it's a made up place name I personally don't give a fig what it's called. However, we generally go by the most common name, but given the place's history, and that there is a river called Medway, trying to work out the most common name would be difficult. You'd have to restrict searches to the past few years, and even then traces of the place's old name of Medway Towns would still likely crop up. But "Borough of Medway" is not a feasible choice as that no longer exists. It may still come up in searches as it was only dissolved fairly recently, but if a modern document or source is using "Borough of Medway" they are more likely referring to the old borough rather than the current state of affairs. A search for "Borough of Medway" on Google News will give few results (I got five), while "Medway" will produce over 100,000, and they appear to almost all be about the place rather than the river. SilkTork (talk) 16:26, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.