Talk:Beacon Park/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Folklore1 (talk · contribs) 00:16, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

As I perform the review, I will be updating the following table. Please look for my questions, comments and recommendations below the table. Folklore1 (talk) 00:23, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
	1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	See notes below about corrections.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.	See notes about corrections to Lead section.
	2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	See notes about corrections to References.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).	See notes about corrections to References.
	2c. it contains no original research.
	3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	adequate coverage of subject
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	sufficiently focused
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	Consistently neutral.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	no recent edit wars
	6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	2 share-alike 3.0 , 2 public domain (expired copyright), 4 attribution 3.0 unported images
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	relevant images with suitable captions
	7. Overall assessment.

Lead section

The "Early history" and "19th century" sections present information that seems interesting and significant. They also comprise a significant portion of the article's text. Yet the only mention of this park's rich history in the lead is that it "was originally laid out in 1859". There should be at least a brief mention in the lead section of the park's original use prior to 1859. Folklore1 (talk) 01:21, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

We need a citation for "its current size of 81 acres". Folklore1 (talk) 01:04, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done Corrected to 69 acres with reference. Folklore1 (talk) 20:26, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Early history

"The area around Bishops Fish Pool in all directions was waterlogged marshland, this area south of Bird Street" is a bit awkward. Perhaps the comma should be replaced by a semicolon, or the sentence should be broken into two sentences at this point. Folklore1 (talk) 01:27, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I reorganized the sentence about "Bishops Fish Pool" so that it wouldn't need a semicolon or have to be broken into two pieces to clarify its meaning. I also reorganized the first sentence of this section to reduce the occurence of "The". Too many consecutive sentences starting with "The" makes for dull reading. Please take a close look at the changes I applied to verify that I haven't inappropriately changed its meaning. Otherwise, we can consider the correction needed in this section to be  Done Folklore1 (talk) 18:55, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

In the second paragraph of this section, I was puzzled by "Ownership of the birds passed to the corporation". What corporation? There was no previous mention of a corporation in the article. Bear in mind that I live in Baltimore and know little about the other side of the water, so I don't know of any special meaning "the corporation" might have on your side. Folklore1 (talk) 01:34, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done The change to "Lichfield Corporation" has solved the confusion. Folklore1 (talk) 01:53, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Should "Swan moggs" be "Swan Moggs"? Folklore1 (talk) 01:39, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, Swan Moggs. Folklore1 (talk) 18:43, 13 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

19th century

The meaning of "As the city water supply from Aldershawe was diminishing in the early 19th century money was spent" is unclear. Please insert a comma after "diminishing" or "century" to clarify. Folklore1 (talk) 01:45, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

The sentence beginning "The two streams across it" uses "and" twice. It would look more graceful if you replaced the first "and" with a semicolon. Folklore1 (talk) 01:51, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

There's another mention of the "Corporation" in this section, this time with an uppercase "C". So it would be really helpful to properly identify this entity in the previous section. Folklore1 (talk) 01:59, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

"SL Seckham" should be "S. L. Seckham" or "Samuel Liscomb Seckham" unless there's a good reason for the "SL". (If so, we need an explanation.) Folklore1 (talk) 02:21, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

I suggest changing "along the front of the house which linked the house" to "along the front of the house, linking it" for a little more variety in sentence structure, reducing the "which" count. This is purely optional, but I think it would give the article a more pleasing look. Folklore1 (talk) 02:27, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

20th century

In the first paragraph of this section, World War I is referred to as the "1st World War" and "First World War". A consistent label should be used for World War I. Folklore1 (talk) 12:35, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

The phrase, "parts of which were built from" should not follow "was built in 1930". This is awkward and confusing. Folklore1 (talk) 19:26, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

The revised sentence is still unclear. I suggest the following, although I am guessing about the intended meaning: "Some of the masonry from the demolished west range of the Friary was used in 1930 to build the timber framed public convenience at the northeast entrance." Does this do the job right? Folklore1 (talk) 19:06, 13 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

I noticed "Recreation Grounds" in the first paragraph and "recreation grounds" in the third paragraph of this section. Is "Recreation Grounds" a proper name or just a functional description? Folklore1 (talk) 19:37, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done Recreation Grounds. Folklore1 (talk) 02:12, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

The sentence beginning with "The timber framed public convenience" needs a citation. Folklore1 (talk) 01:31, 4 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

21st century

I suggest removing "and is" from the sentence: "The transformation started in 2010 and is due for completion by the end of 2011". This can be done by simply adding two commas. This is optional, but I think it will make the text a little smoother and more pleasant to read. Folklore1 (talk) 19:46, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done "and was completed in 2012" brings us up to date. Folklore1 (talk) 02:15, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

"new and improved" may look better with a comma instead of the "and". But I'm wondering, is it both "new" and "improved"? Maybe we need something else here to describe the improvements? Folklore1 (talk) 19:53, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done Okay, both new and improved. Folklore1 (talk) 19:15, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps "landscape to the gardens" should be "landscape in the gardens"? Folklore1 (talk) 19:56, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

Should "the space left" be "the remaining space"? With a quick read, I first thought this referred to some space on the left. Am I nitpicking a little too much here? Folklore1 (talk) 20:00, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

Monuments and sculpture

Placing three images together at the top of this section caused my browser to display the text in a tight, narrow gutter between the first two pictures. Later model computers and browsers may display this section more comfortably, but there are still plenty of folks like me working with old stuff. I suggest moving one of the images down a bit, possibly to the text describing it. Folklore1 (talk) 02:40, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

The first three sentences in this section begin with "The plaque". A little variety, in either the sentence structure or at least the first two words, would be welcome here. Folklore1 (talk) 20:05, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

I noticed only one comma in the sentence containing: "until, in 2010 during restoration works". It needs another somewhere to clarify what you want the sentence to tell us. Folklore1 (talk) 20:09, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

The sentence beginning with "The fountain was a gift" needs some punctuation, such as commas, or rearrangement to clarify its meaning. It should clearly distinguish between the contributions of the chancellor and the contributions of the fountain. Folklore1 (talk) 20:16, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

"King" occurs three times without the king's name attached. Perhaps this should be changed to "king"? Maybe one of the three uses of "King" should instead give the king's name? Folklore1 (talk) 20:21, 3 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

Does "with two bronze plaques either side" mean that there is a plaque attached to each side or located near each side? Folklore1 (talk) 00:12, 4 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

Recreational uses

In the second paragraph of this section, "young and older children's playground" is unclear. Does this mean there are two playgrounds? One for young children and another for older children? Or one playground for both age ranges? Also, it would help to be more specific than "young" and "older" children by mentioning the age ranges. Folklore1 (talk) 00:26, 4 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

Entertainment uses

"Some events" starts two consecutive sentences in this section. While this isn't a grammar error, it makes the paragraph a bit hard to read. Some of us tend to get the sentences confused when they start with identical words like this. I suggest altering the first occurrence of "Some events" be starting the sentence with something else. In the second occurrence, "Some events" is more important and should be left intact. Folklore1 (talk) 00:40, 4 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

I suggest taking the two sentences about "Cars in the Park" out of what is now the only paragraph in this section. Use them to create a second paragraph. Then rearrange the second sentence of the new paragraph from "The event, first held in 1997, showcases" to "First held in 1997, the event showcases". This radical suggestion is purely optional, but I think it would give the section a more pleasing read. Folklore1 (talk) 00:51, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

I applied a less radical reorganization of the second "Cars in the Park" sentence. If this looks alright, we can consider this section to be  Done Folklore1 (talk) 19:39, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

References

With Laithwaite's The History of the Lichfield Conduit Lands Trust, a specific page number (or numbers) would be helpful. Likewise, Upton's A History of Lichfield. Folklore1 (talk) 01:27, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Consider the page numbers an optional addition. Not required for GA status, but an improvement that you may want to put on your long-range to-do list. Folklore1 (talk) 19:42, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

The citation of "Lichfield District Council: Lichfield Historic Parks" links to a page full of unrelated articles. If the reference had included the title of the referenced article, author's name, and the date it was written, maybe I could have tracked down the original source and updated the link. Without those details, this reference is useless. Folklore1 (talk) 01:48, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done Link replaced. Folklore1 (talk) 19:56, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

The link cited by the "Public Monument & Sculpture Archive" is dead. However, the reference contained enough information for me to find the site where it was previously located. I was able to find a new reference there for the chancellor's fountain. Folklore1 (talk) 19:58, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

We still need a reference for the colonel's monument to replace the citation I marked with a dead link tag. Folklore1 (talk) 12:53, 4 April 2012 (UTC)  Done

"Visit Lichfield: Places to Visit" is a dead link. Other pages on the Visit Lichfield site do not have enough material to serve as an adequate reference. Folklore1 (talk) 01:43, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

 Done Link replaced. Folklore1 (talk) 19:57, 13 April 2012 (UTC)