Talk:Preston, Lancashire

Split

Following on from WP:UKDISTRICTS, preparing for a split, I moved City of Preston to City of Preston (Victoria) which leaves City of Preston (Lancashire) available for the district article. MRSC (talk) 19:31, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Article now created, but at City of Preston, Lancashire to follow standard UK disambiguation style. -- Dr Greg  talk  22:11, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Retitle & restructure

Hi guys,

Following on from the application of WP:UKDISTRICTS, I'd like to suggest (if not very highly recommend) that we make bold, but effective changes to where the Preston and City of Preston articles sit on Wikipedia. I'm specifically suggesting that Preston adopts the "Salford" structure (that was discussed and passed amicably with a strong consensus here).

I would like Preston to become a disambiguation page, and this article moved to Preston, Lancashire. I believe City of Preston, Lancashire should become City of Preston because the other two meanings are very obscure (a former Australian district and an American village), and this would be more in keeping with the format of other English city-districts. The dab page would look something like:

Preston may refer to:

• The City of Preston, a borough and non-metropolitan district of Lancashire, England.
  • Preston, Lancashire, or Preston proper, the principal urban settlement within the City of Preston
• The County Borough of Preston, a former local government district of the administrative county of Lancashire, England.

...etc...

The rationale for this has several dimensions: the primary definition of Preston is open to interpretation and this method clears up confusion immediately and gives readers more choice; the Salford (proper) and Salford (district) articles are both Good Articles and have since improved, not worsened (this is also true of Carlisle - please take a look); this would ameliorate confusion about city status; the disambiguation page would allow articles about other Prestons (names and towns etc) to have more neutral disambiguation; doubtless that erroneous links to Preston (proper) that ought to link to Preston (district) can be more readily identified and fixed; editors can more readily add material appropriate to the correct article.

There are few, if any drawbacks here (other than a possible resistance to change, that should be overcome with an open mind), so I hope support is forthcoming. --Jza84 |  Talk  02:08, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

--Notified WP:LANCS and WP:GM to attract views. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:25, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

This sounds like an excellent idea to me. Are there any local quirks that might cause complications? --Peter I. Vardy (talk) 09:16, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the support. I'm not aware of any quirks and can't forsee any in this instance. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:23, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Sounds pretty sensible to me. NtheP (talk) 17:06, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I would've liked to have seen a little more written support from more users but I guess we are where we are! I guess the next steps are to make this happen per WP:BOLD. --Jza84 |  Talk  11:34, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Go for it, if anyone objects after the event, we can worry about that then. NtheP (talk) 13:59, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Nice job, guys - way to consult with other Wikimedians - I only found out when it was shoved through tonight. City of Preston should correctly be a redirect; there is no fathomable argument that the current English one is a primary use, I'd say they're about equal. One was a major metropolitan district inside Melbourne extant for almost 70 years (with previous forms existing back about another 50) while the English one is only 8 years old. In size terms, one had 80,000 in a country of (at that time) 16 million; the English one has 132,000 in a country of ~60 million. In reliable source terms, the Melbourne one has entire books written about it (several, in fact). I suppose Hendon or East Ham would be "obscure" to an Australian, too - but that's why the encyclopaedia has a global perspective. Orderinchaos 15:09, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Woah! Hold on. No one has said anything about Melbourne obscure or that Hendon or East Ham are majorly important!... I think I can explain: When looking at the merits of the articles, Victoria's Preston appears to be a former district - abolished, dissolved, amalgamated, no longer present; Lancashire's City of Preston is a living and existing city. "Obscure" was probably the wrong choice of word (although I did say "quite obscure") and perhaps should've spoken of "living" place. I don't have a particular stake in Lancashire's Preston, but I am of the view that if one says they visited or are from the "City of Preston", then, there can only be one possibility (given Victoria's vanished 16 years ago). There are a possible range of views about age, but Lancashire's City of Preston has its origins in an ancient market town and the birth place of the industrial world; it also sits in what I think is one of England's larger metropolitan areas (a million or so inhabitants). Plus there's something of a convienience of how the move-around assists with a format used for the rest of England (no other "City of X" has further disambiguation); Victoria's City of Preston (which probably takes its name from Lancashire) also already has diambiguation added to its title and to get to the article, the exact same amount of page clicks/views stays the same whether "City of Preston" is a dab page or an article. Is there not merit in this or any scope for a compromise? Previously the "Preston" slot was taken up by the "obscure" English settlement, which was the other stimulant to this move around. --Jza84 |  Talk  15:28, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Re Hendon or East Ham, I was giving an example of suitably major outer London suburbs which would approximate to Preston's role in Melbourne. I apologise if I confused in doing so.

Part of the confusion might ride on the Australian interpretation of "local government area" (city, town, shire). We don't have incorporated cities; all cities are dependent for their existence on a Local Government Act in each state, and each state has their own separate system for them. In 1994, Victoria decided for some reason or other to abolish and recreate *all* of its - so Preston is now part of the larger City of Darebin. There's a fair bit of politics surrounding that. But there is still a Preston Library and a Preston Town Hall in that suburb. And the thing was in existence for 70 years. After failing to initially find Preston's library because of the one in Melbourne and the one in Ontario, Canada, I finally found it and on looking, found it only has a commemorative newspaper (not a book) written about it, and the title gives away a lot: "The birth of a city : a celebration of Preston, England's newest city from its early beginnings to the present day."

Re the convenience - you do realise all of Melbourne's current and former cities also have the same format, and likewise, this one's the only one that has a dab at its location? It was one of your guys, btw, that moved it to that location in August 2010. I didn't object because I could see there were clearly two (unlike the botched attempts to move City of Ipswich last year). I don't see why Melbourne has to do all the compromising and England gets to do the "we're the primary topic" when it clearly is *not* a primary topic. I'm not asserting Melbourne's is, either - despite the superior source coverage for it. Orderinchaos 15:38, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that english placenames have been exported to numerous english speaking countries around the world - and regardless of the lancasterian/mancunian sense of identity and self importance in the overall history of the UK or the former empire - there will always be the issue of primacy within a range of criteria that can wobble back and forth over the years within wikipedia (the talk page issues over some years between Perth Scotland and Perth Western Australia where Orderinchaos and I live for instance) - there surely should be a more neutral procedure to create a more encyclopediac balanced non bias towards places with same names - rather than the - we're more notable than you stuff that seems to end up on these sorts of talk pages... SatuSuro 15:40, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree totally, but using this very logic I'm still personally of the view that Lancashire's Preston is the natural topic that should sit at the "City of Preston" slot - mostly for reasons of Victoria's City of Preston being defunct (I presume that books and statistics are no longer going to be published about that area and that there is no official, .gov website that exists or is likely to exist), and that it is proper to speak of it in the past tense. It was for that reason that I spoke of it being (perhaps wrongly) "quite obscure", and that it not likely to reach a particular zenith or end point that speaks of its living culture, population growth, its living government and politics, statistics, etc etc (it's a presumption of course, but I imagine it has a high probability of being true).

That all said, I do value consensus, and did try to contact a couple of outside views (the real Anglocentricity I'm guilty of is that I devalued Victoria's cityhood and didn't think to post a note there - I hadn't realised that that article moved in August 2010). If you guys are strictly opposed to this move then I'll think it's a shame for WP, but will respect it. --Jza84 |  Talk  16:26, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Just a bit of a whinge, to add a bit of colour(?) to the discussion. (I have a vested interest as my own existence originated in Preston.) Lots of place names in the world (USA, Australia, etc) are copied from places originally in the UK. So IMHO, the bare title should be confined to the original settlement/town/city or whatever. The rest should be subservient (whoops), and be covered by additions to the title (eg Preston, X). It's nothing IMO to do with notability; it's a fact of history. What comes first is first, what comes later only relates to the first. So Preston is a primary title, and all copies of that name should add suffixes to the primary title, and not try to compete with it. As a parallel whinge, I am personally upset that Lancaster, the county town of Lancashire, has to be entitled "Lancaster, Lancashire". This is wrong. It should be entitled "Lancaster", and all other Lancasters should add something to their title to identify their difference. So "City of Preston" is "City of Preston", and that's that (and no "Lancashire" added to it). Hatnotes are there to sort out this sort of thing.--Peter I. Vardy (talk) 17:10, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Ahem, Peter, the City of Preston (Victoria) was created in 1926. The City of Preston, Lancashire, was created in 2002. As evidenced by a source in Preston's own library, which is titled, in part, "The birth of a city : a celebration of Preston, England's newest city" dated from 2002, and the text of the article. Your argument would be entirely valid in application to Preston however, assuming there weren't so many *other* Prestons that it's a genuinely ambiguous topic. And by the way, it's a fallacy to assume that places around the world were necessarily named after the town - the Melbourne one was actually named after a small village in Sussex! There's also a fair few Australian places with names seemingly related to English towns which were actually named after settlers' surnames. A good example is where I live, the City of Stirling, which despite being located in Perth (itself named after Perthshire, not Perth), is actually named for James Stirling, not the town of Stirling near Perth. And I maintain that that particular situation is ridiculous as you have a city of 1.5 million which once hosted the Commonwealth Games not being a primary topic to a Scottish city of about 80,000 (at least we agreed to disambiguate everything in that case). But I digress... Orderinchaos 18:22, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

I've been offline and couldn't respond until today. I'm content with what has happened, in the interest of consistency with other UK cities, although I have some sympathy with Peter I Vardy's view. I think when most people refer to Preston they mean the settlement not the district (in fact most probably think "City of Preston" refers to the settlement and a title such as "City of Preston district" would be clearer). However these arguments aren't local to Preston and probably apply to most other English cities; there needs to be some national consensus on how to name these things.

Now who is going to volunteer to edit all the pages that link to Preston?

P.S. Intentional links to a disambiguation page called "X" should be made via a redirect "X (disambiguation)" per WP:INTDABLINK.-- Dr Greg  talk  23:15, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

All of this waffle above really does prove it should not really end up on the respective talk pages of such unfortunate named places but at a third party page - like a project page or specifically created wikipedia page that simply ignore all the geo-centrisms and gives it a specifically neutral loading as it deserves - the arguments in the end become tedious and endless SatuSuro 23:32, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

WP:FIXDABLINKS

Hi, now that Preston is a disambig page, there's a HUGE number of incoming links that need to be fixed. I'm hoping those who pushed for this page move are willing to help with cleanup per WP:FIXDABLINKS. To put things in perspective, there are about 1,400 links that need fixing - no other disambig in EN wiki has more than 500 incoming links, so this is by far the worst. Anyone willing to join a dab-fixing task force? WP:AWB is a very helpful tool, as is navigation popups with the popupFixDabs flag set to true. --JaGa^talk 16:51, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Media in Preston

The following question was asked at User Talk:Dr Greg and has been moved here so that others may express their opinion on this topic

Hi there.

Please could I have some justification as to why the site I edit, Blog Preston, was not allowed to be added to the Media section of the Preston page?

Thanks, Andy Halls —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.61.255.83 (talk) 14:57, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

I already gave a reason in my edit summary: have you read WP:LINKSTOAVOID? There it says:

"one should generally avoid ... 14. Links to blogs, personal web pages and most fansites, except those written by a recognized authority. (This exception for blogs, etc, controlled by recognized authorities is meant to be very limited; as a minimum standard, recognized authorities always meet Wikipedia's notability criteria for people.)"

Now you have given me a second reason: you shouldn't be linking to your own website, you should wait until someone with no conflict of interest decides your site is notable enough for inclusion. The same page I quoted above also says:

"It is true that a link from Wikipedia to an external site may drive Web traffic to that site. But in line with Wikipedia policies, you should avoid linking to a site that you own, maintain, or represent—even if WP guidelines seem to imply that it may otherwise be linked. When in doubt, you may go to the talk page and let another editor decide. This suggestion is in line with WP's conflict-of-interest guidelines."

-- Dr Greg  talk  19:25, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

'Dr Greg', thanks for the response. I must ask, however, whether you bothered to click the link and access the site I linked to? You would then have discovered that despite its name being BLOG Preston, it is indeed a local news site.

While I understand the second point about linking to one's own site, the first point is completely ludicrous. Who are you to judge who is a 'recognized authority' as the rigid Wikipedia guidelines so put it?

Best wishes, Andy Halls —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.170.243.19 (talk) 23:15, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Blog Preston isn't a personal blog - it seems to be somewhere in between blog and newspaper website. Also it's verifiable[1][2] so may be appropriate to mention in the article. Peter E. James (talk) 23:22, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

I tend to agree. This website seems perfectly legitimate and indeed more informative than most, if not all, of the local newspapers. Andy Halls, or any link to him, does not appear anywhere. It seems to be have been very inappropriately named for wikipedia purposes? But Dr. Greg not usually msitaken about such things. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:34, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough. Peter E. James & Martinevans123 have made some good counterarguments, so if someone wants to add the site back, I won't revert it. It would be a good idea to include the references above to establish its notability. I was put off by the "blog" name. Sorry Andy! -- Dr Greg  talk  01:14, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

No problem. Thanks for taking the counterarguments into account. Apologies if I seemed blunt in my earlier posts. Best wishes, Andy Halls. (Ajhalls1 (talk) 09:55, 16 March 2011 (UTC))

October 2011 record high temperature

Several attempts have been made to update the climate figures to include the record high temperatures in October 2011. I have reverted these attempts so far. The problem is that the table becomes meaningless unless all the months are updated from the same source(s) to cover the same period. It's no use including the all-time record high temperature for October 2011 if all the other months are the highs up to 2005. If someone can find a source that covers all months up to 2011, I'll be happy for the data to be included.-- Dr Greg  talk  19:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure I agree with you here. At the very least, should there not be some footnote or reference to October 2011's record? Longwayround (talk) 09:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Looking now at the reference for the record high temperatures, I do not see how to obtain the cited data. I can download a lot of text files but I cannot find the relevant data within them. Longwayround (talk) 09:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I've now added the record Oct temperature in the text (but not the table). And I've questioned the table source with {{full}}. -- Dr Greg  talk  21:54, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Preston Passion

I propose that this paragraph is removed since it smacks of WP:RECENTISM. Normally I'd simply trim it but since there have been a couple of editors involved it probably merits prior discussion. In five year's time is anyone really going to care? If not it has no business being in there now. Crispmuncher (talk)

I think you are probably right. It belongs elsewhere in the article. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:18, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Good article yet?

Hi everyone, I was just wondering if we could come to some agreement on whether this article has reached the proposal for 'good' status? Thanks. (Preston North End Dan (talk) 22:24, 9 April 2012 (UTC))

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Preston, Lancashire/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Tim riley (talk · contribs) 17:07, 17 April 2012 (UTC) I'll start the review tomorrow. I'm impressed at first reading to find only one typo, which I think "Brredon Books" probably is. More tomorrow. Tim riley (talk) 17:07, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Second preliminary comment: there are five links to disambiguation pages that you need to link directly to the intended articles, viz Culloden, Kirkham, Edmund Calamy, Fort William and Paschal lamb. Tim riley (talk) 17:47, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I have read this article twice through with a critical eye and find very little indeed to quibble at. I don't think I shall have to linger long before passing it for GA. The images are good, but lack alt text, which I should like to see before cutting the ceremonial tape, though this is not a prerequisite of GA. Tim riley (talk) 14:57, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Alas, no response. Tim riley (talk) 14:48, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Request for second opinion

On inquiring into the strange silence I see that the nominator had been indefinitely blocked from editing. I think the article is of GA standard, and I am happy to make the few changes suggested above, but I should like another reviewer's comments first. Tim riley (talk) 08:32, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I suggest that you contact WP:WikiProject Lancashire and Cumbria to see if anyone is interested. If not then the decision is up to you. Jezhotwells (talk) 10:00, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

To be honest I don't think this is at GA standard yet. There are six citation needed tags present and they were there when the article was nominated. This is a sure sign that it was not well prepared before nomination. A link is also tagged as being dead. Other statements are lacking citations that should have them, in particular the History section. While the final decision is yours I think this currently fails on sourcing issues alone (Criteria 2 of WP:WIAGA). AIRcorn (talk) 10:37, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Another opinion

I have found refs for most of the bus-related citation needed tags, and have deleted a few words to resolve the other. I'm not sure where to look for the football-related one. Using the External Links toolbox option, there seem to be 7 dead links, and at least 2 other potential link problems. While I would normally request that these be resolved when conducting a review myself, I notice that this is not a requirement for GAN (See Wikipedia:What the Good article criteria are not mistakes to avoid in the Factually accurate and verifiable section.) Bob1960evens (talk) 12:04, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

It really depends on what the dead links are referencing. If they link is available in another form (newspaper, journal, book etc) then they are just convenience links and not required at all. However, if the link is a website and it falls under the "quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons" banner then it can fail criteria 2b. AIRcorn (talk) 09:38, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

I have fixed a number of bare urls, and some of the broken refs, but there seem to be several that point to newspapers where the link is no longer active, and there are insufficient details to know which edition of the paper contained the story. Bob1960evens (talk) 17:50, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Taking account of the views expressed above, I accept that a little more work is needed before the article is of GA standard. I am therefore minded to fail it this time round, on the basis that though on the whole it meets the standard for references there are enough exceptions to disqualify it. I'll leave this page open for a day or so for any further comments. Tim riley (talk) 19:49, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to see whether I can bring the article up to Good Article standard, it seems a shame to fail it, when it is apparently so close. Give me a couple of days. --Iantresman (talk) 14:11, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Fine Tim riley (talk) 14:43, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Having started on the "Early development" section, I found that the first paragraph on the Roman road was quite contrived (eg. use of the word "forded", now replaced). I suspect that this is either because the text has been closely copied, or not reworded as well as it could be.

The second paragraph in "Early development" begins discussion on Ripon, which has nothing to do with Preston. Sources [3][4] suggest that this is somewhat muddled.

Having spent over an hour on this now, I can now see that there is too much work to do to bring it up to Good Article status in a reasonable amount of time.

I recommend that the GA nomination fails, as I don't have the necessary time at the this stage to complete the work. --Iantresman (talk) 15:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Failing GAN

Thanks to all for contributions, above. I have failed the nomination. I think it is clear from the above what needs to be done before a second nomination in due course. Tim riley (talk) 09:15, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Impenetrable statement needs help

"In Ripon in AD 705 the lands near the River Ribble were set on a new foundation" This is impenetrable and impervious to editing for clarity. What does this statement have to do with Preston (which is on the Ribble)?--Wetman (talk) 21:13, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

May be a clue here: [5]? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:27, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm boldly removing that statement, leaving whoever inserted it the opportunity to rewrite it more clearly should they wish. Longwayround (talk) 18:52, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

That seems wise. I'm sure they could be mercilessly hunted down, via the article history, if need be. gulp. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:17, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Preston Guild

The familiar significance of "guild" is an association. The average reader fails to see how a guild could be "celebrated" at an interval. The link is a dead 404.--Wetman (talk) 21:20, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

The BBC doesn't seem to have a problem [6]? A link to the history: [7]? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:24, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

I fail to see how the article does not make the meaning of Preston Guild clear. Longwayround (talk) 18:55, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Some proposed changes

Hi, I'm from Preston City Council and we were wondering if you could please link our tourism website ( www.prestonguildcity.co.uk ) on the main Preston wiki page. It'd also be great if you could link the council website as well ( www.preston.gov.uk ). However, our main goal is to generate more visitors to the tourism website and therefore more visitors to Preston itself. This is the offical tourism website for Preston. Many thanks, Steffi 31.221.82.194 (talk) 13:59, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

I have added the City Council link, but the tourism link does not seem appropriate per WP:NOTADVERT. Cheers, Number 57 14:27, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Outdated population statistics.

Hello I would like to point out the outdated figures under population which should be updated I have been unable to edit myself and was wondering if you could help with this. 51.219.155.121 (talk) 00:04, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Is Preston a City or Just the District Area?

I hope you don't mind me asking this question or getting some discussion on what your thoughts are. Over on the Colchester page there has been debate on which area is classified as the city, e.g the borough. Similarly, Preston borough was granted city status in 2002. So, is Preston itself a city or just the wider district, or both? What is your take. Goom80 (talk) 02:57, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Merger proposal

Discussion begun at the Talk:City of Preston, Lancashire page on a potential merger with this article. Discuss there if you wish or here. DragonofBatley (talk) 12:23, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

collage

Could the collage be tweaked so that the vertical divides between the pics on lines 2 and 3 either coincide or are substantially offset? At present they are a "near miss" which looks odd. PamD 22:28, 9 December 2023 (UTC)