Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/Archive 6

Archive 1

←

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

Archive 7

Archive 8

→

Archive 10

Districts

Are the guidelines on How to write about Districts in the pipeline anywhere, please? I am about to tackle some of the Yorkshire districts.

Articles state that District Councils are responsible for:

1. tax collection (Council Tax and Non-Domestic Rates)
2. Leisure Services
3. Refuse collection
4. Housing
5. Planning
6. Arts & Entertainment
7. Environmental Health

and also,

District councils are responsible for local planning and building control, local roads, council housing, environmental health, markets and fairs, refuse collection and recycling, cemeteries and crematoria, leisure services, parks, and tourism.

So, it would seem reasonable to use these functions as headings to describe the districts. Am I on right track?--Harkey Lodger (talk) 12:10, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Edits to "Constituent Countries" article

Although not directly under the remit of this project, I've noticed an anonymous IP editor make drastic alterations to the United Kingdom section of Constituent countries today. Large amounts of content have been deleted (though a number of reversions have happened) and replaced with an extremely short (and referenced!) section stating "The term constituent country is sometimes wrongly used to refer to the four parts that make up the United Kingdom. However as the parts are not countries but merely sub divisions with no political meaning, they cannot correctly be referred to as constituent countries." diffs here. I think this project could have a useful opinion about this.  DDStretch  (talk) 16:08, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Maps for the constituent countries

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• File:Uk map northern ireland green.png
• 

I have created the above maps. I hope you all don't mind that I was WP:BOLD and added them to the relative articles myself. I really don't want to create any edit wars I just want to see what others think and hopefully bring this to a nice consensus on what to use. I hate the idea that other countries seam to be more organized then us with these things, so I hope you think the new one looks professional... I'm actually kinda pleased :-) Please voice your opinion over at Talk:Scotland#Straw_Poll I know I'd personally love to hear your opinions! Thanks -- UKPhoenix79 (talk) 05:08, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok I have even made a different colour version! I'm kinda partial to the green version myself! -- UKPhoenix79 (talk) 04:31, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok I must be board because I just created Image:Uk map crown dependency.png for the Crown Dependency page. I noticed that it didn't have any useful images there. Don't know why I'm telling you since I don't even know if anyone reads this, but what the heck :-) -- UKPhoenix79 (talk) 04:48, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

They look good. GoodDay (talk) 21:57, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Yea someone commented! Thanks G'Day! -- UKPhoenix79 (talk) 03:17, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

When the discussion moved to Scotland, I took this WikiProject off my watchlist & sorta forgot about it. GoodDay (talk) 13:21, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Subdivisions with a history

When linking to subdivisions that have changed status during their existence, but are dealt with in a single article, the approach I have taken has been to use a link to the article (which will reflect current/last status) with a "piped" version of name at the time I am dealing with; rather than use a redirect of the name/status at the time in question. So when talking about Harrow Urban District in 1934, I use [[London Borough of Harrow|Harrow Urban District]]. Similarly, I use [[Highland (council area)|Highland region]] not Highland region when talking about the region in 1975. Is this an approach that has wider agreement? MRSC • Talk 15:26, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

It's an approach I've been using too. E.G. Hopwood, Greater Manchester was once within the [[Middleton, Greater Manchester|Middleton parish]] of Salfordshire. However, dare I say of course, where a specific article exists I link to that. E.G. Milnrow lay within the ancient parish of Rochdale (as opposed to Rochdale).

I can't see this being contentious. It would be nice to get the pre-74 Urban, Rural and Borough districts set up, together with extensive converage of former parishes, townships and hundreds, but I think we're quite some way off yet. --Jza84 |  Talk  13:29, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Infobox UK place

Hello team,

I've been contacted about User:Yorkshirian who has been replacing Template:Infobox UK place with Template:Infobox settlement for settlements in Yorkshire. Preliminary disscussion indicates that this is not the way forwards, but the replacement has continued.

Can we have some input on this from others? Central discussion is at Talk:Beverley under "Infobox change". --Jza84 |  Talk  18:02, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for raising this as I have just come over here to raise the point after been reverted again. To date the same has also occurred on Market Weighton and on Selby. Keith D (talk) 18:38, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

{{WPUKgeo}}

Anyone object to reverting the template back to November 2007 when the todo parameter was deleted? Please speak up now at Template talk:WPUKgeo#To do list broken, as who knows how many uses of the template were broken back then (todo was deleted without an edit summary or comment on the talk page). --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 21:59, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

UK or constituent country, in infobox? - eg Exmoor

The latest version of the infobox has "Country: UK; Part: England", as does North York Moors. This could set a precedent for changing vast numbers of infoboxes to similarly complex "country" designations. Does the project have a policy as to which country should be used? This infobox previously said "England". PamD (talk) 23:17, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Certainly the flags should go per WP:MOSFLAG whatever the outcome. However, I myself would be inclined to state both UK and England. Both are verifiable and it'd be inline with our other templates. --Jza84 |  Talk  00:06, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Unsure about the use of Part as a heading - I would be inclined to go without the UK and just have country as England. Keith D (talk) 10:57, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Something wrong

...with the main project page. The Participants list and Assessment table have merged into one. I can't work out where the problem lies. --Jza84 |  Talk  14:23, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

If you go back to the date at which the new project design was used, the problem is there, too, and I don't recall it being there before (though I may just not have noticed it) (it is Jza84's edit of 18:10, November 2, 2007.) So, if it has only just appeared, and yet it is now there when we look at one of the first versions of this page, I think this indicates that the problem lies in one of the transcluded pages (of which there are many around about that point.)  DDStretch  (talk) 14:54, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Fixed that now - looks like the end of table marker had been removed from participants list. Keith D (talk) 15:08, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Keith D! --Jza84 |  Talk  18:09, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Wales

Just wondered what others thought of the new coloured infoboxes proposed at Talk:Wales. It's not for me (I might as well say here, as you'll find out there!), but I would welcome wider input at that talk page. --Jza84 |  Talk  02:04, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I thought that it was decided a long time ago that country boxes should have a standard view to make it easier on the readers and to dissuade people from turning articles on Wikipedia into a version of MySpace? -- UKPhoenix79 (talk) 05:59, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Quite! The discussion continues, I think, at Template_talk:Infobox Country. There are also other proposals being made at Talk:Wales. --Jza84 |  Talk  12:23, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Police coverage

Would it be a good idea to have a field in the infobox, saying which police force covers that area? For example South Yorkshire Police covers Sheffield? Calvin (talk) 12:19, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox UK place has this field automatically. Is that what you mean though? Simillarly, police can/should/could be mentioned in prose under Public services per WP:UKCITIES. --Jza84 |  Talk  12:22, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

It would appear quite a number of UK places don't actually have that in their article. I'm unsure, but I'll have a look at it. Calvin (talk) 14:26, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

It can be turned off on an individual article with the hide_services parameter so may be that has been used in the cases you have spotted. Keith D (talk) 15:39, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Calvin, could you let us know which articles are missing this info? This would help alot. --Jza84 |  Talk  19:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Navenby

Incase anybody missed it, Navenby is up for FAC. --Jza84 |  Talk  01:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

TfD nomination of Template:Infobox Country styled

Template:Infobox Country styled has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. — --Jza84 |  Talk  09:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Notable People section–need for verification and extra checks

I recently was prompted to ask a question about the verification of entries to the Notable People section of various articles (the Warrington one to be specific). The editor who prompted me to ask the question had added a number of people to the section, but had not given any sources to verify their residence or connection with Warrington. When asked if he could do so, he replied that their names were linked to wikipedia articles and in those articles were references relevant to their connection with Warrington. In one case, it was argued that it was common knowledge and therefore didn't need to be added. I questioned all of them, stating that in order to achieve GA or FA status, my understanding was that verification by appropriate citations had to be given (they are often living people, and so fall under rules to do with notability and content as given in parts of WP:BLP.) The user wanted some pointer to where it stated this, and, not finding one easily, I asked this question in the Reilable Sources Talk page. The responses included one quite informative one, stating that it was probably best practice to always include an appropriate citation for each name in this section. (I can think of other reasons why it is best practice, too, to do with undetected changes in the pointed-to articles leaving an addition inadequately referenced or even unreferenced.) However, this editor did raise the issue of the notability of people who are being added to this section, stating that they had to be really quite exceptional. I have replied saying that this doesn't appear to agree with the advice given in WP:USCITY or WP:UKCITIES. But given that GA and FA reviews are being more stringent now on reliable sources, etc, it may be an idea to discuss this a bit here and see if any changes are necessary to the guidelines in UKCITIES. My feeling is that we might be better off removing many entries from these sections as we see them if we cannot verify them ourselves. So, any comments?  DDStretch  (talk) 13:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm all for verifying each person in their own article and the settlement's. It can only provide a stronger, more verifiable Wikipedia, surely? --Jza84 |  Talk  13:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I've always felt uncomfortable about the Notable people section, but I certainly agree that it doesn't matter whether or not the claim is referenced in that person's own article, it needs to be referenced in the settlement's article. I despair when I look at some of these lists though, like the Chester one, for instance. And I've removed Ian Curtis from the Stretford article more than once, but he keeps creeping back in, apparently because he was born in a maternity unit in Old Trafford. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 14:06, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Don't like Notable people sections either! Agreed that, wherever possible, we should start citing entrants, particularly to help achieve GA & FA status. As an addition to this topic, I've come across 'dubious notability' examples in the past, linked from articles on towns/cities to their own Wikipedia articles (ofvarying quality and probably created by themselves/friends), which are possibly just promotional and not notable at all. Snowy 1973 (talk) 14:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with all of you, and, in fact, I tend to view the Notable People sections now almost as trivia sections. I certainly think we should be quite stringent with them: in the case of people already living, we can call upon WP:Notability (People) to guide us in determining which entries should stay or not. Finally, having them as a list is probably not ideal: the ones that are left might be better organized into paragraphs rather than a list.  DDStretch  (talk) 15:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I've been thinking about this over the afternoon (amongst having a wiki-dual elsewhere!), and tend to quite like these sections, where done "properly". Certainly in some of the articles I've been closely involved with (like Neilston and Oldham) I think they work well. I won't fight to the death over them, but do think they have a place. --Jza84 |  Talk  15:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If they are done well, they could be useful, and the two cases you gave are examples of them done well. I note that the Oldham one points to a "List" article, and that both of them are written in paragraph style, rather than list style.  DDStretch  (talk) 15:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The following extract is from the guidelines on verifiability given in Wikipedia:Reliable sources:

"Editors must take particular care when writing biographical material about living persons, for legal reasons and in order to be fair. Remove unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material immediately if it is about a living person, and do not move it to the talk page. This applies to any material related to living persons on any page in any namespace, not just article space."

What I take from this is that good practice may be to remove at once any additions to the Notable People sections if verification by means of a suitable citation has not been included at the time it was entered. Now, I know I don't always do that, and others surely don't, but perhaps we should?  DDStretch  (talk) 09:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

My two pen'orth. It is good manners to request a citation before removing an edit and to allow reasonable time for the citation to be provided. Removal "at once" is only justified in the case of contentious material about living people. I can't see why an association with a particular area should be contentious, but I suppose there must be examples. Where the association of a person with a locality is reasonably well known, I would not add a citation to the locality, unless another editor requested it. Similarly, I would not add a citation on the location page if the association is already on the biography page, unless requested by another editor. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 10:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The quote refers to "contentious material" which most entries in this type of section do not fall into. If the item is wikilinked then the reference should be in the linked article and if you want the reference in this section then transfer it across rather than delete the entry. I personally would leave the referencing to the linked page, rather than have references on each item on the location article. Keith D (talk) 11:21, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok. I think the quote may be in danger of being misunderstood. The wording in the quote could be a little ambiguous. It could either mean: (a) that all unsourced material should be removed, and, in addition, all poorly sourced material which is contentious should be removed; or (b) that all contentious material that is either unsourced or poorly sourced should be removed immediately. I think b contains a strange redundancy, as unsourced material is clearly poorly sourced, and so if this meaning were intended, the quote would have been better worded at this point as "Remove all poorly sourced contentious material immediately". Although it may well be polite to ask for a citation, in the case of long-standing names that have no citations, it may be difficult to do this. Finally, I think the way GA and FA reviews are now conducted would mean that failing to add citations in the location page, even if they are present on the biography page, would mean making more work for any editor who wanted to submit the article for GA or FA status. I reassert that I consider, and the advice about best practice that I received seems to suggest that one should do this.  DDStretch  (talk) 11:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The way that GA and especially FA work these days, anything unsourced is "likely to be challenged", whether it's contentious or not. Doubly so if it's information about a living person. Reliable references have to be in the article, no matter whether they also exist in that person's article or not, which they too often don't anyway. When an article is nominated for review, it's that article that gets reviewed, not any other articles it's wikilinked to. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 13:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd have to agree too. There's no harm "doubling up" citation from the wikilinked biography article into the settlement article - it should only take a moment. Citation usually helps establish the link with settlement anyway, that is to say, whether the person was born, raised, resident, passed through, owned property, had ancestry in that place. --Jza84 |  Talk  13:26, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

So, would it be an idea to (re-)affirm this in the guidelines at all by making explicit mention of the need for citations in the Notable People part of them?  DDStretch  (talk) 14:01, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That sounds fine to me. Would that be an amendment for WP:UKCITIES then? No problem if so. Perhaps we might want to include an example section (though not from Oldham or Neilston!!!) --Jza84 |  Talk  14:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) I posted a question on Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#Possible ambiguity in the guidelines in section 1.5.1 to attempt to clarify the issue. The response from someone who knows about these guidelines (User:Blueboar) contains the following key sentence: "If it is not contentious, but is simply unsourced, other sections of BLP tell us to remove it from the article... but there is no harm done by moving it to the talk page for further discussion (which might result in someone finding a source)." Earliier, using the WP:BLP guidelines he confirmed that if the entry is contentious, it should simply be deleted. So, this means that an unsourced entry in a Notable Persons section should be removed. If it is contentious, that is it–it is simply deleted entirely. However, if it is not contentious, it could be moved to the article's talk page with a request that a source be found for it (in which case, it could be moved back onto the actual article page.) However, an unsourced uncontentious entry need not necessarily be moved to the talk page–it could still be simply deleted. I do think this needs to be spelt out in the guidelines (and I meant in WP:UKCITIES.)  DDStretch  (talk) 17:23, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think I'd need to see a truth table to fully understand that. ;-) --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 18:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

8-) Ok. How about this?

1. Is the material unsourced?
   Yes: Delete it from the article. Go to step 2.
   No: Leave it in the article. Go to step 3.
2. Is the material contentious?
   Yes: Go to step 3.
   No: If you want to, place it on the talk page and ask for verification by means of a suitable citation, which, if forthcoming, means the material can then be re-added to the article. Go to step 3.
3. Finish.

 DDStretch  (talk) 18:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think there's consensus to make the change. :) --Jza84 |  Talk  19:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

There seems to be a missing bit in the steps here. The guidelines at WP:BLP are for living people so the first question has to be is the person living? If they are not then I would suggest just tagging with fact tag. Keith D (talk) 19:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Whilst technically this is true, I think we can sensibly argue that a uniform approach based on consistency would be advised, because of the requirements that the article will have when it faces a GA and/or FA review, and the difficulties that can happen if one attempts to verify facts long after the event of them being added by other editors. Furthermore, the edit screen one faces when adding material does remind one that "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable"; the best way of showing that they are verifiable is to verify them at the point of entry: if they couldn't be verified at that point, then what are people doing entering them in the first place, given the failings of human memory, and the ability we all have to delude ourselves that certain things are facts when they are not? Finally, the addition of numerous fact tags can be quite intrusive to a person just reading the article: moving the contentious material to the talk page to ask for verification (which is what the current proposal would advise one could do) would not delete it, but would be a much more visible, yet not intrusive, step for editors rather than for casual readers and would flag up to them that verification was being asked for.  DDStretch  (talk) 23:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

My own view, for what it's worth, is that we ought to be much tougher with these lists of Notable people, living or dead. If plausible references aren't provided than they ought to be deleted on sight. And we ought to be clearer about what notability means. I mentioned the example of Ian Curtis earlier. Sure, he was born in the Memorial Hospital in Stretford, but his family lived in Macclesfield, which is where he was taken after his mother was released from hospital. Does that make him a notable person for the purposes of the Stretford article? I don't think so. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 23:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Look at Blackley for instance. Apparently some footballers once lived there/still live there. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 23:28, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't think notability is a big issue as far as the location articles are concerned. If the person has a Wikipedia article, then (IMO), that is the place to question whether they are notable. If there isn't an article, then the location entry should assert notability with a citation. If either is lacking, it would be polite to request that they be supplied and allow sufficient time for them to be added. Summary deletion of material may well be off putting to new and inexperienced editors. Once again (IMO) summary deletion is only justified for offensive material about living people. I can't see the point of arbitrary rules about how long a person needs to have "lived" in a particular place. William Laud was the vicar of West Tilbury. He probably didn't "live" there or even spend a night there; he may not even have visited it; none the less, he is a notable person associated with it. As far as providing citations at the time of entry is concerned, every sentence contains one or more facts or assertions that could be challenged. For example, today's featured article has no citation to support the assertion in the first line that Dawson Creek is a small city or that it is in British Columbia. We must keep a sense of proportion. If there is a link to an existing article, I wouldn't bother with a citation unless challenged. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 06:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you may have not read Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#Possible ambiguity in the guidelines in section 1.5.1 this question and responses in the discussion page for the guidelines on reliable sources. To summarize the response by a person who is well-versed in the guidelines and their application: "If it is not contentious, but is simply unsourced, other sections of BLP tell us to remove it from the article... but there is no harm done by moving it to the talk page for further discussion (which might result in someone finding a source)." In case you think this just refers to articles about the person, the guidelines which I asked for clarification about clearly state that it applies to all articles:

"Editors must take particular care when writing biographical material about living persons, for legal reasons and in order to be fair. Remove unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material immediately if it is about a living person, and do not move it to the talk page. This applies to any material related to living persons on any page in any namespace, not just article space."

(Note the last sentence.) As Malleus, myself, and others have pointed out, the requirements of reviewers of articles submitted for GA and FA status effectively mean that all such unsourced facts will be challenged and, if not addressed, will almost certainly make the submissions unsuccessful. Since it is far more easy to add verification at the point of entry, this means that there are many good reasons to add the verification at that time. This is because no editor should be adding material that is not capable of being verified, and hence best practice means that they should check this by actually having the actual source to hand when adding the material. It consequently takes little effort to add the reference at that time. Finally, the response suggested that the unsourced material should not be simply deleted from the system all together: there is the option of moving it to the talk page and asking for verification. If it isn't forthcoming after a while, then it can be deleted from there, but if it is forthcoming, it can be added back into the article. I think this is a good compromise between those who want to delete it entirely and those who do not.  DDStretch  (talk) 08:30, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with DDStretch that any unsourced notable residents should be removed. Rjm at sleepers has a point that it seems overly cautious, but it's better to be safe than sorry when dealing with BLP issues. Regarding other issues raised here, in my opinion it's reasonable to regard any person with a Wikipedia article as "notable", and the need to clarify how exactly each person is related to a settlement is a reason why prose is preferable a list in notable people sections. The "Grammar and layout checklist" on WP:UKCITIES did actually already mention that each notable resident should have a citation. Epbr123 (talk) 09:11, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

My point about notability may have been misunderstood. I meant whether a (notable) person has a notable association with a place. For instance, J. K. Rowling is undoubtedly a notable person, but is it notable that she once spent a few nights in a hotel in Didsbury, as was at one time in that article? Is it notable that Ian Curtis's mum gave birth to him in a hospital in Stretford? I don't think so. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 09:55, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

That would be a matter for talk page discussion. I can imagine some disagreeing with you over Ian Curtis. Epbr123 (talk) 10:08, 17 April 2008 (UTC) There are probably too many variables for us to form a guideline over this. It will depend on the settlement and the person. For example, the Queen spending a few nights in a hotel in Didsbury would possibly be more worthy of a mention than Joe Brown (climber) growing up in Manchester. Epbr123 (talk) 10:29, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Some time ago someone added H G Wells to Stoke-on-Trent on the grounds that he had stayed there for a few months and that he had written about Burslem in his book "The New Machiavelli". I don't think that would count. In that case, the idea of restricting the entries to people born in the area was briefly discussed until it was realised that the only maternity hospital in the area (University Hospital of North Staffordshire) would mean that no one could be said to have been a notable person from Newcastle-under-Lyme, as everyone notable from there would be said to have come from Stoke-on-Trent, which I know would be highly resented by people for whom such matters are important. Additionally, births that happen whilst people are just temporarily staying in a place should not be obliged to be included in the place in which the actual birth occurred. I think the inherent vagueness means that people who may fall into a grey area just have to be discussed before adding them to any section, and they should be viewed as potentially contentious (and removed) if they are not. This would add weight to the idea that unsourced additions should be removed, to be on the safe side.  DDStretch  (talk) 10:40, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

I had a look at the article on Tommy Steele. If I followed the advice to remove any unsourced material, very little would be left. I would (quite rightly) be reverted very quickly and I would probably be accused of vandalism. The edits we are talking about (ie those that do not contain anything offensive) were probably added in good faith. If you disagree with them, discuss it on the talk page. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 13:34, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

It is quite possible that very little should be left, in so far as none of what is there is verified and is therefore of unknown reliability. The fact that you would be reverted and accused of vandalism very quickly just means that there is not enough appreciation of what is required to get an article into a good enough shape to get it through a GA (or FA) review. If you (a) explained your edits to the article on its talk page, (b) moved the unsourced material from the article page to the talk page with (c) an invitation for people to supply the appropriate citations, and (d) thereby allowed time for the moved material to be verified, the accusation of vandalism would be more easily seen to be unfounded. It would also help to show editors that higher standards are now being enforced (they have always been expected) in order to improve the quality of articles on wikipedia. DDStretch  (talk) 17:22, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Districts of Preston

Having been impressed by the Districts of Sheffield artice, I have created Districts of Preston, and will try to expand this as and when I can. doktorb _words^deeds 09:10, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Infoboxes on articles about historic or otherwise notable buildings

People might be interested in a discussion currently taking place on WT:CHES#Little Moreton Hall about an HTM: comment that was placed on the article requesting that no infoboxes be placed in it. Since the editor who added this comment has added it to many more articles this evening, I think the issue possibly has a greater need for discussion from any relevant standpoint.  DDStretch  (talk) 22:53, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Ivybridge

Ivybridge is up for GAC. I think it would benefit from a bit of input and TLC from some of our team as a means to get this through. It hits all the major elements of WP:UKCITIES, but (in my humble opinion) is lacking some depth. --Jza84 |  Talk  00:27, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

That article needs quite a bit of work yet, I think. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 02:01, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:Cornwall

You are invited to discuss recent revisions to Template:Cornwall at the template talk page. Cheers, --Jza84 |  Talk  11:20, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Worcester

There is a requested move at Talk:Worcester#Requested move (again). The same pair of US-based editors have come complaining about the same thing as they did last year, which was closed as no consensus. Would interested project members care to comment? Thanks, --RFBailey (talk) 22:24, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Castleton

Currently, Castleton is an article about a village in Derbyshire, however, this appears to be arbitary; there are several Castletons in the UK and abroad, and wondered how folks felt about making Castleton a disambiguation page, with the current article moved to Castleton, Derbyshire? --Jza84 |  Talk  16:35, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes,please. As per Castleton, North Yorkshire etc.Thanks--Harkey Lodger (talk) 16:46, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. This was the first Castleton to get an article, but there are many other places of the same name of similar importance. Warofdreams talk 02:09, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Local Government District template

I was working on a Local Government District when I realised that the infobox was not a template. Looking around, I discovered that no districts use a template, although most seem to use a standard pink! format.

For example West Dorset, East Dorset, West Devon, Mid Devon, Sedgemoor, West Somerset, Rother etc.

Is there a standardised template? If not, should we develop one? MortimerCat (talk) 16:13, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

The Template:Infobox Settlement can be used. See Metropolitan Borough of Oldham for an example of a metropolitan district. The examples you have given are all non-metropolitan but I don't think it will cause a problem.

Or maybe Template:Infobox UK District is more useful? We have so many it gets confusing which to use!

Looking at the UK District one now it says use settlement instead so I guess that would be best. ^┌_Joshii^┐_└^chat_┘ 16:30, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Since the template has been superseded, perhaps it should be deleted? Nev1 (talk) 16:33, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

When someone changes all these articles over to the new one it should be. Lots still use it though. ^┌_Joshii^┐_└^chat_┘ 16:38, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Metropolitan boroughs use Template:Infobox settlement, perhaps this would be appropriate for non-metropolitan boroughs? Manchester and Trafford are good examples of how it would look and its use, I think the fields would still apply. Nev1 (talk) 16:27, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Castleton

Hello there! Would you be able to delete the Castleton page, so that I (or even yourself) could move Castleton in its place? There was a breif discussion this should be so at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_UK_geography#Castleton. Hope you can help, --Jza84 |  Talk  10:53, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

' Doing...'BG7 11:22, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

 Done I have also deleted the talk page redirect from the page move to Derbyshire. Keith D (talk) 11:42, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Cheers. It's a  Done from me aswell, as I have used AWB to change all the links. We can delete that aswell if we wnat!

Wow! That was quick! Thanks! --Jza84 |  Talk  11:43, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I've disambig'd a few. Mr Stephen (talk) 12:02, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Frodsham content

It would be good to have other views about this article from any position, and specifically about the claim that Frodsham is the only place with that name in the British Isles. The problem began when an editor edited out "British Isles" from a sentence in the article for some reason, thereby making a verified claim from Frank Latham's book "Frodsham" incorrect. I replaced it with more targetted verification, and in the attempt to deny inclusion of that sentence which includes "British Isles", the question of the unique nature of the name arose. The full debate can be seen on User talk:Bardcom#Uses of British Isles, with the more specific name issue transferred to Talk:Frodsham. More views on Talk:Frodsham#Other possible uses of "Frodsham" would be good.  DDStretch  (talk) 21:40, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

City status in the United Kingdom FAR

City status in the United Kingdom has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here.--Peter Andersen (talk) 16:41, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Template:United Kingdom cities

Can we get some input on the fairly newly created Template:United Kingdom cities. There is a small disagreement about the images that are displayed within it. A transclusion appears on the United Kingdom article. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:21, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Headings used in disambiguation pages

In Chester (disambiguation), the heading for Chester (district) was England, whereas I think it should be United Kingdom. Actually, I added the rest making up the complete name in parentheses, which was overkill. An editor reverted a change I made to make it England again, stating that the guidelines used in this project were used to justify the change. Now, I know that England is a preferred name to be used in the lead section in WP:UKCITIES, but I don't recall any guidelines stating that England should be used in this context. What do people think about this? I don't have strong feelings either way, but thought that since "United States of America" was used, we might as well use at least "United Kingdom", given that "England" is often erroneously used to descrfibe all of England, Scotland, Wales (and probably Northern Ireland too) by various groups of people.  DDStretch  (talk) 22:57, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I would go with the individual countries and avoid UK on dab pages apart from in a heading which groups together a list of places from different countries of the UK, though I would still use the country on each item under the heading. Keith D (talk) 23:28, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

That seems sensible to me too. I suppose (if it's a big concern) we ought to look for examples and see what seems to be the norm. --Jza84 |  Talk  23:30, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Okey Dokey. But am I right in thinking it isn't anything that is in this projects's guidelines?  DDStretch  (talk) 23:42, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

It's not something I've come across before as a guideline, no. Must be an obscure, and old one if it is. --Jza84 |  Talk  00:00, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I've not seen it anywhere. I;ve just done a quick look at some dab pages, chosen as they occurred to me, but with a preference for cities. They run as follows:

United Kingdom: Worcester (disambiguation), London (disambiguation), Lincoln (disambiguation), Lancaster (disambiguation), Boston (disambiguation), Oxford (disambiguation), Exeter (disambiguation), Salisbury (disambiguation).

England (or Scotland, etc as appropriate): Chester (disambiguation), Gloucester (disambiguation), Leeds (disambiguation), Bath (disambiguation), Cambridge (disambiguation), Bradford (disambiguation).

Neither: Edinburgh (disambiguation), Shrewsbury (disambiguation), Birmingham (disambiguation), Manchester (disambiguation), Hereford (disambiguation), Sheffield (disambiguation), Plymouth (disambiguation), Portsmouth (disambiguation).

So, it seems to be running roughly equal. Note that I didn't do any random selection, so the real proportions are not guaranteed to be even close to the ones shown. The question now is whether there is any great need for standardisation. and I guess the answer may well be "no".  DDStretch  (talk) 00:15, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

It's not a concern for me too, but I can see some of the more conservative consistency advocates might want to see something in the future. I guess it's their responsibility to seek change though. --Jza84 |  Talk  00:26, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Comments on discussion at Talk:Yorkshire, please.

I am raising this matter again (Vernacular cultural regions) as the original issue has again become topical. Please can editors look at the Talk:Yorkshire page and comment on the current discussion there.--Harkey Lodger (talk) 15:02, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Core cities' coats of arms

Could someone upload the coats of arms of the eight Core Cities to Commons and place the images in the right categories? Thanks. --200.117.223.103 (talk) 19:44, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

East Kilbride

The East Kilbride article is a real mess at the moment, and would benefit from a little TLC. Anybody willing to help out? --Jza84 |  Talk  20:18, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

It is, isn't it? That first sentence alone is giving me nightmares. I think we may need to sandbox it and start afresh - I'm willing to create a sandbox page and draw up a structure. Hassocks5489 (tickets please!) 21:59, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

That would be great! This is an article that I just don't know where to start with! --Jza84 |  Talk  22:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Right, I'll put my "Crawley article makeover" hat back on and get underway. Here's the sandbox page. I won't be able to do much work tomorrow as I'm out all evening, but Wednesday onwards looks good... Hassocks5489 (tickets please!) 22:31, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

One slight problem: the General Register Office for Scotland website has not yet published in a permanent format the census stats for ethnicity and religion for the local council areas; so the South Lanarkshire figures are only accessible via a complicated series of csv tables. I think all the data is there, though... Hassocks5489 (tickets please!) 12:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the problem lies with statistics for areas below local council level. According to this, these will be available "in due course" (!), but for now certain stats at the East Kilbride level will have to be left blank. Hassocks5489 (tickets please!) 12:38, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Polebrook

Would someone take pity on poor Polebrook? Apparently it is a rare item, a 6000 year old Greek town in the middle of Northants. I doubt that's true, but it's been in WP since July 2006. Mr Stephen (talk) 23:11, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Numerous small categories of "People from..." being created for small places within Cheshire

An editor is creating numerous small categories for small villages and places within Cheshire. See editors action of around May 22, 2008 for examples. I do not think this is at all helpful, as some of the categories contain just one entry, and I would like a wider input to discuss this matter. Any opinions?  DDStretch  (talk) 09:16, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

If one considers just the entries for Cheshire (there are more) and excludes from that list new categories for the various districts (which will be abolished next year anyway), the categories created appear to be:

1. Category:People from Great Sankey‎
2. Category:People from Elton, Cheshire‎
3. Category:People from Davenham‎
4. Category:People from Burton and Ness‎
5. Category:People from Helsby‎
6. Category:People from Antrobus‎
7. Category:People from Alderley Edge‎
8. Category:People from Ashley, Cheshire‎
9. Category:People from Sandbach‎
10. Category:People from Adlington‎
11. Category:People from Mobberley‎
12. Category:People from Middlewich‎
13. Category:People from Knutsford‎
14. Category:People from Anderton with Marbury‎
15. Category:People from Hartford, Cheshire‎
16. Category:People from Neston‎
17. Category:People from Cuddington‎
18. Category:People from Northwich‎
19. Category:People from Disley‎
20. Category:People from Haslington‎
21. Category:People from Nantwich‎
22. Category:People from Frodsham‎
23. Category:People from Malpas‎
24. Category:People from Chorlton, Chester‎
25. Category:People from Broxton‎
26. Category:People from Bollington‎
27. Category:People from Daresbury‎
28. Category:People from Anderton‎
29. Category:People from Culcheth‎
30. Category:People from Grappenhall and Thelwall

many of which are small villages with very small numbers of entries unlikely to grow in number.  DDStretch  (talk) 09:49, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree that this is rather excessive; some of these are administrative areas rather than settlements. IMO the smallest settlement for a "People from..." category should be a "large" village; otherwise it should be "People from Cheshire" (or soon "East" and "West" Cheshire). Peter I. Vardy (talk) 10:24, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

My take on this is that we should adopt a "top down" approach: i.e., initially, only a "People from Cheshire" category would have been created and populated. Once a reasonable number of people from a district were present, a sub-category could then be split off from this parent category. Within that, once a reasonable number of people from a town or village were present, then a sub-sub category could be considered. I do not think having just one person (entry) constitutes a reasonable size to justify creating a new category. However, there should be room for flexibility, but this needs to be discussed prior to creation of a category so it can be decided on a case-by-case basis. For example, significant settlements may have a category created even if at the time of creation, there weren't many entries. I don't think many of the above categories would fall into that group, though. Note that I've only included the Cheshire categories created: there are quite a few other categories of small places, containing just one or two entries, that have also been recently created in the same way.  DDStretch  (talk) 10:31, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I admire the good-faith work the user has put into this, but this is a clear case of overcategorization. Epbr123 (talk) 10:38, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for reminding me that I also ought to stress that I think the categories were created in good faith, but it was a mistake, and overcategorization, as you say.  DDStretch  (talk) 11:22, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. --Jza84 |  Talk  12:03, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I must say I disagree with most of these comments. A category such as people from Cheshire, having a large number of entries would be most unhelpful for someone looking for people from a small village or parish. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 12:19, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

The village or parish article itself would be the best place to display this info. Epbr123 (talk) 12:24, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Remember that my "top down" approach would allow district-level categories to be split off from the county ones when the numbers justified this. I also suggested that a further sub-category level could be created if needed. The key issue is that these should be done when they are required in terms of demonstrable overly-large categories, and not just on some idea, promise, or idea that they might become overly large. I think only creating categories when they are needed is a good policy to adopt.  DDStretch  (talk) 12:37, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

It may well be that "the best place to display this info" is the parish or village article, but it is not always the case that the information is there. Even district level categories are of little value for the casual user if they are too large. Surely categories are intended to help users find information. The issue should be whether they are useful for that purpose not whether the number of entries exceeds some artificial target - ie create categories where they are useful rather than when they are needed to reduce the size of an existing category. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 14:04, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Page move

Hi. I'm not certain where this project discusses page moves, deletions etc., so I thought I'd post a note here. At Talk:Newmarket (disambiguation), I've proposed two page moves:

• Rename: Newmarket → Newmarket, Suffolk
• Rename: Newmarket (disambiguation) → Newmarket

I've specified the reasons on the discussion page. Feel free to announce/move this message to a more relevant project if need be. Thanks. (I've also posted this at Wikipedia talk:UK Wikipedians' notice board.) Mindmatrix 21:46, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Categories 'National Trust properties in Yorkshire' and 'English Heritage sites in Yorkshire'

Category:English Heritage sites in Yorkshire and Category:National Trust properties in Yorkshire have appeared in the last month. EHsiY has been populated at the expense of the mother category. NTpiY has taken its members from the mother and depopulated Category:National Trust properties in North Yorkshire and Category:National Trust properties in West Yorkshire. Is the UKGEO project happy with this categorisation? My understanding of WP:Place#Counties_of_Britain is that we use the modern administrative counties throughout. So, the two 'Yorkshire' categories shouldn't exist, rather we should stick with Category:National Trust properties in West Yorkshire (etc). Comments? Mr Stephen (talk) 10:15, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Usually for Yorkshire there is the category "X in Yorkshire", for small categories this may be populated as such, but the more normal situation is for it to just contain the four sub-categories of "X in the East Riding of Yorkshire", "X in North Yorkshire", "X in South Yorkshire" and "X in West Yorkshire". Keith D (talk) 10:58, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

That could be a problematic approach - parts of Lancashire, Greater Manchester and Cumbria were also part of "Yorkshire" until boundary reformation. Of course there is an obvious logic behind it, but that "N/E/S/W Yorks" are somehow "subdivisions" of Yorkshire is erroneous. The whole point of WP:PLACE is that using modern counties is... "consistent with most local and national government literature, some private sector literature, will be familiar to most readers and writers, and indeed the approach will apply even if boundaries change again. It is also easy for people to find out where a particular village is, as maps with administrative boundaries are freely available online." - it's meant to be an aid to our readers. --Jza84 |  Talk  16:28, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Meetup/London 10

Happening this sunday.Geni 20:50, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Revisionist Welsh county geo-cats

It has just come to my attention that User Owain has created a series of inappropriate geo-cats for some of the pre-1974 counties in Wales, viz Geography of Brecknockshire, Geography of Montgomeryshire, Geography of Radnorshire (all placed as sub-cats of Geography of Powys), together with Geography of Glamorgan. In the case of the Brecknock/Montgomery/Radnor cats, he systematically removed places from the Powys geo-cats and placed them in his new categories. This is not the first instance of Owain changing article categories to suit his belief in the continuing existence of the pre-1974 counties, as some of you will already be aware. I've reverted the edits and emptied the cats for deletion. I hope that the community supports this and will help monitor the situation. Enaidmawr (talk) 23:40, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Reliability of 2001 census data

Hi, can anyone help. On Somerset a discrepancy between referenced statistics for population in the 2001 census has been identified - it may be a difference in "rounding". If you compare ref 75 (ONS) & ref 80 (Vision of Britain) for BANES you will see the difference - the same applies to ref 76 (ONS) & ref 81 (Vision of Britain) for North Somerset. I would welcome comments on which is the more reliable and how to resolve this one? The discussion is probably best held on Talk:Somerset.— Rod ^talk 07:57, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, for Kingston upon Hull there was a discrepancy (of 6) between these two sources.--Harkey (talk) 09:48, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Straw poll

There is a discussion and straw poll on the United Kingdom article's talk page at Talk:United Kingdom#Straw Poll about whether Eng,Scot,Wal,NI are countries or constituent countries. Anybody is welcome to provide input as this has been a long running dispute. ^┌_Joshii^┐_└^chat_┘ 19:32, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Greater Merseyside

Resolved

I'm thinking of prodding Greater Merseyside for deletion. Anybody have any thoughts or concerns? The article is completely unsourced. --Jza84 |  Talk  01:44, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Go for it. I think the article is a work of fiction. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 01:49, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

It's a term that has some unofficial use, but really, any notable uses could be amalgamated into the main Merseyside article IMO. Of course, we've just been through a debate at Talk:Greater Liverpool, which had simillar editorial origins. --Jza84 |  Talk  01:53, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Since been merged and rewritten with the Liverpool City Region article. --Jza84 |  Talk  22:49, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

...and category

Can we have a bit of input at the Category talk:Greater Liverpool page? Simillar situation to the above. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:33, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Articles flagged for cleanup

Currently, 1628 articles assigned to this project, or 13.8%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 18 June 2008.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. --B. Wolterding (talk) 12:09, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Articles about districts with city status

I'm sure this topic has been discussed before (probably many times) but I want to raise it again. It is the titling of any article about a local government district that has city status. The convention is that such an article be called "City of Preston" (for example), whereas an article about the urban area that most people would call the "city" is called "Preston". As Preston only recently became a city, I can describe this succinctly by saying "City of Preston" would (if it existed) be about the former Borough of Preston whereas "Preston" would be about the former town of Preston. (The former Borough is substantially larger than the former town and includes a large rural area.)

I understand that "City of Preston" is technically correct, but it's also confusing, both to our readers and to editors (who might tempted to rename the article or to edit or link to the wrong one).

(By the way, is there a technically correct way to refer to the former town of Preston to distinguish it from the former Borough without referring to its former status? Is it still, technically, a town?)

I'd like to invite discussion of a new naming convention. I can think of lots of alternatives, all, in my view, better than "City of Preston". In descending order of my preference, they are:

1. Preston district [or maybe Preston District]
2. Preston (district)
3. District of Preston
4. City of Preston district
5. City of Preston (district)

Note that I am talking about the name of the article. I've no objection to the phrase "City of Preston" being used within the article text (with suitable explanation) or as the title of an Infobox. "Preston" is just an example. It would apply to each district with city status that is distinct from a "town" of the same name.

Ordnance Survey maps get round this problem by calling everything a "district" regardless of whether it has city status or borough status or neither. Thus "PRESTON DISTRICT" is what appears on Ordnance Survey maps.--Dr Greg (talk) 17:02, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, City Status is not quite as simple as it may first seem.

Whilst Preston holds City Status, that status was awarded to "the Town of Preston", NOT the borough. Having said that, a local government district (and the council of that district) can call themselves whatever they want. Hence, Preston City Council govern more than the settlement that has that status, but that's OK as they can call themselves anything they want.

The holding of city status by the settlement rather than the same-named district is not unique - Newport's City Status was awarded to "the Town of Newport within the County Borough of Newport", whilst Wolverhampton's is to "the Town of Wolverhampton" which leads to the inevitable conclusion that the City is larger than the district.

Looking at some other cities, all those that were cities prior to 1974 (and where the local government unit still exists) have the City Status granted to the Boroughs, so the local government district City of Leeds holds the status rather than Leeds. Just to confuse things completely, Cardiff and Swansea's City Status is held by "The County of Cardiff" and "The County of Swansea" respectively.

Whilst the status quo isn't perfect by any means, it's probably the best that is achievable.

As to your other point, I always use the form Bradford is a city whilst City of Bradford is a City - the capitalisation showing the difference between an "official" city and a "colloquial" city. Fingerpuppet (talk) 17:52, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

There was a long-running problem with Chester (both the central core settlement) and the local government area (Chester (district)) that led to many people adding stuff to the wrong article when the local government area was called "City of Chester". This was explained when an email exchange with local government officials confirmed that "City of Chester" was used locally to refer to the central core settlement, whereas "Chester District" was the name of the local government area. So, we abandoned the previous naming and made it compliant with local usage, with "City of Chester" now being a redirect pointing to the central core settlement. I think sometimes, conventions adopted on wikipedia do not make sense in specific cases, and one should be prepared to go with local usage. Of course, if a more regular disambiguation-type clarification was adopted, with, say "Chester (city)" being the name of the area which had city status, the type of problem we encountered would not have happened, but there you go. This will change next year when the reorganisation of Cheshire takes place.  DDStretch  (talk) 22:09, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

This is a problem and has been floating around for some time and I think Dr Greg is right to raise it. Salford and Leeds being "cities" has caused conflict on occation (City status being held by the City of Salford "borough" for example). Although we can't call places like Salford and Bradford "towns" (it just wouldn't last with the ips, not to mention it'd be a bit of WP:OR) I'm coming round to the idea that we should say things like:

• Chester is the county town of Cheshire.
• Salford lies at the heart of the City of Salford - a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester.
• Bradford is the administrative centre and urban core of the City of Bradford - a local government district in West Yorkshire.

This approach avoids the issue of "city" where the settlement isn't coterminate with the borough.

On a related topic, it should also be pointed out that all metropolitan districts with city status have full Borough status in the United Kingdom. For example, in the London Gazette for 1 April 1974 you will find the following:

THE QUEEN has been pleased by Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the Realm, bearing date the 1st day of April 1974 to ordain that the Borough of Manchester shall have the status of a City, and that the Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the City of Manchester shall be entitled to the style of Lord Mayor and Deputy Lord Mayor of Manchester.

It seems that city status is (at least for met. districts) an add-on to borough status. The borough charter (which the council applies for) preserves the mayoralty and any other ceremonial functions. City status is done by the exercise of royal prerogative and does not remove mayorality or ceremonial status.

Not sure about shire districts or places in the UK outside of England though. Confusing. --Jza84 |  Talk  02:00, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I think your suggestions make good sense. As a note, it appears that all the district-level areas within Cheshire have borough status, but the Chester one (which seems to hold the city status) calls itself Chester District. I think the local usage of the county town being called "City of Chester" is probably a continuation of its pre-1974 status, and I think many people in places like Malpas and Farndon might think it unusual if it was insisted that they were in the City of Chester.  DDStretch  (talk) 08:44, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

It isn't quite true that city status is an add-on to borough status for MBCs - there is one place in a Metropolitan County where the city status is NOT held by the borough, but by the settlement: Wolverhampton.

...the Town of Wolverhampton shall have the status of a City.

Sunderland (where the status is held by the borough) is the only other place within a Metropolitan County that has gained city status post-1974. Every city status holder in 1974 that ended up within a Metropolitan County had the city status re-granted to the new Metropolitan Borough. Fortunately, it's not an issue in this case as the settlement is larger than the district so there's only one article.

The whole thing is a complete mess, and the understanding of it is still a work in progress. There's work underway to correct List of cities in the United Kingdom which currently incorrectly identifies some districts (such as Preston) as holding the status rather than the settlement. Then there's the case of Brighton & Hove which is possibly the most confusing of all. Fingerpuppet (talk) 13:33, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. That's interesting. I was led to believe that Inverness was the only city in the UK that doesn't have statutory boundaries. Does the City of Preston (town) have statutory boundaries (like say, by way of a civil parish)? This is, as you say, a real mess right now. --Jza84 |  Talk  14:17, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Brighton and Hove is a real mess, as Fingerpuppet suggests: the quoted wording for them ("the Towns of Brighton and Hove shall have the status of a City") is not as clear as it could be– one interpretation could be that there is an implicit "each" after the "shall", and it sshould really have mentioned not the towns, but the district, which would have removed some of the ambiguity. What goes on in the offices that draws up these charters to make the wording so poor?  DDStretch  (talk) 14:28, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

You could make a case for suggesting (and indeed I would agree with that suggestion) that none of the cities where that status is granted to the settlement have statutory boundaries in terms of local government units - be it boroughs, districts or civil parishes. It should be remembered that there are parts of the country that are unparished! The nearest thing to them would be the definition of the settlement itself - i.e. the Urban Sub-Division (within conurbations) or the relevant Urban Area.

My interpretation of the "Brighton & Hove Conundrum" is that they clearly mean the district. It would be extremely interesting to see what would happen if the local government unit was spilt in future. Fingerpuppet (talk) 14:52, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

OK, it seems there are two issues where I thought there was one. There is the question of whether or not any district with the same name as a city is entitled to (or indeed does) call itself "City". Most of the responses so far seem to be about that.

But there is also the question of whether we should rename "City of X" articles to have a less ambiguous title (i.e. remove confusion between "City" and "city".) Is there any support for adopting any of the suggested renames I gave above? (Ignore the name "Preston" and replace it by any city of your choice.) I stress I am specifically talking about the title of an article as opposed to text describing a city or City within an article.

By the way, DDStretch's example of "Chester (city)" doesn't help at all! That's just as ambiguous as "City of Chester". :-) --Dr Greg (talk) 17:14, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Argh! Yes, you are right. My suggestion doesn't help at all. Sorry. I should have written either Chester District (which is the solution adopted in the Chester case) or Chester (district). If they are boroughs, then how about substituting "borough" for "district", or using the form "Borough of X"? The wording of Jza84's text could then be altered in places: "Salford lies at the heart of the Salford Borough - a metropolitan borough with city status in Greater Manchester" or "Bradford is the administrative centre and urban core of the Bradford District - a local government district with city status in West Yorkshire." various redirections, etc could be used where appropriate.  DDStretch  (talk) 17:28, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the trouble with that is the legal status - the City of Salford is the full formal title. Calling it a borough could been seen as a retrograde step for the city. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:30, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Ah yes, If there is a name with legal status of the form "city of X", then that clearly should be what the article is called. In the other cases, where a legal name cannot be found, or just appears to be or even is "X", which could cause confusion, then we need to consider how to proceed, and I would argue that one of the alternatives I gave above, if the component parts of it can be verified ("district", "borough"), then the article should be called "X (Y)" if possible, where "Y" is the component part of either "district" or "borough". The use of "City of X" makes it appear that this is some kind of official name, which it may not be, and it may cause oter problems (as in the case of "Chester", above.)  DDStretch  (talk) 12:13, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Just to throw something else into the mix - although the City of Bradford has borough status:

THE QUEEN has been pleased by Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the Realm, bearing date the 1st day of April 1974 to ordain that the Borough of Bradford shall have the status of a City, and that the Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the City of Bradford shall be entitled .to the style of Lord Mayor and Deputy Lord Mayor of Bradford.

.... the City council "styles" its territory as the "City of Bradford metropolitan district", without "Borough". Contrawise, Oldham Metropolitan Bouncil Council have just dropped "MB" for simply "Oldham Council" and "Borough of Oldham" (as part of a rebranding excercise intended to improve borough-wide unity. However I don't think that effects the way we do things here however. --Jza84 |  Talk  12:21, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion suggests to me that "City of X (district)" would be appropriate. "City of X" is the official name (in those cases where it is), and "(district)" is a disambiguator to distinguish from "(city)" (lower case). Isn't it always correct to describe as "district" regardless of borough and/or city status? Note also that, in most cases, the articles aren't just about the political entity of the relevant council, they are also about the geographical area covered by it, which can be described as a "district" in that sense.

In those cases where there is an official title other than "City of X", I'm quite happy to use that official title. My main concern is that any use of the word "City" needs disambiguation whenever there is any scope for confusion between "City" and "city". (As an aside, the City and District of St Albans already includes appropriate disambiguation in its official title!)--Dr Greg (talk) 12:42, 27 June 2008 (UTC)