Talk:Banff National Park

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Banff National Park is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you can update or improve it, please do.

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Banff National Park appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on October 15, 2006.

Banff National Park has had a peer review by Wikipedia editors which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

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An event mentioned in this article is a June 23 selected anniversary.

Contents 1 Suggestions 2 Looking good 3 Nevermind 4 Minor last-minute clean-up 5 Resource exploitation and orgins of park 6 vandilism 7 Snow Dome: Hydrological apex?

[edit] Suggestions

• The geography section discusses mainly non natural features and that belongs more in a tourism section. Geography needs to emphasize the mountains, glaciers, rivers and how that these things were formed, with ages of the rocks and and maybe even broken down with a geology subheading. Mention the tallest mountains, lowest altitude, and the largest river.
• Try to get rid of all the redlined links with subarticles. I can help with the glaciers and a few things.
• Work to eliminate the singular sentences and turn them into paragraphs instead.
• There should be a small section on management of the park...the budget, fire/natural resource management.

Just trying to be helpful.--MONGO 07:36, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Also we can expand the discussions of the animal species in the park, a list of threatened and or endangered species, and any natural resource programs going on there.--MONGO 08:28, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. I'm not sure that I agree about the "geography" section, though. I'll think about it, but the separate "geology" section does all that. Somewhere, near the beginning of the article, it's important to explain the geography (what's where, the different sections of the park) to help orient the reader with later discussions. I completely agree on all the other points made. -Aude (talk contribs) 12:45, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

What the geography section does right now is to break the park into three regions, for further discussion. This is ths same way my Gem Trek hiking maps are done (#3 - Icefields Parkway, #4 - Lake Louise, #5 - Banff townsite area). Within that framework, perhaps I can integrate the geology and geography sections more. -Aude (talk contribs) 13:01, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

I see, that works too of course. I'll try and help out with some stubs to fill in the relined links. I started Peyto Glacier so far and will work on others over the next ciouple of weeks.--MONGO 18:40, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Looking good

Maybe a little more expansion on Park Management...there is a section here that has more information:[1]. Maybe some mention of forest fires, if there are many. I think after that, run it through spellcheck, make sure the references all work and then send it to peer review.--MONGO 03:34, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the encouragement. Park management (including prescribed burns) and human impact need to be addressed more. There's been plenty of controversy in recent years involving the business community, environmental groups, and Parks Canada. I should have time to work on this over the weekend. --Aude (talk contribs) 20:20, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nevermind

I found the info I was looking for. I have to say the article's organization is tough to follow. Kevlar67 16:20, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

PS I fixed the bit on internment. Kevlar67 16:29, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

World Heritage Site designation is mentioned, though maybe it can use more discussion including about threats to revoke it in the 1990s, and be discussed in a different section. Do you have any suggestions on organizing the sections?

Also two questions:

1. Internment - Third Geneva Convention seems to cover prisoners of war. It was enacted in the 1920s, whereas the World War I internment camps were prior to that. Was there something in the early Geneva Conventions that covered prisoners of war?
2. 1988 Olympics - What events were held in Banff? In my recolition, some events were held nearby in Canmore and Nakiska (Kannanaskis), but none actually in Banff. If that's indeed the case, it still is worth mentioning that some of the 1988 events were held nearby.

Aside from that, keep looking through the article, make edits, suggestions, ... Thanks. --Aude (talk contribs) 16:41, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

• POWs - Actually, I think it was the Hague Conventions that covered POWs (before Geneva III) but I can't seem to get any firm info on that.
• Olypmics - you are right, I was thinking of Canmore, etc.

Will add more comments if I can link of any later. Kevlar67 21:43, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Minor last-minute clean-up

I did a basic copy edit on the first third of the article, through the History section. There are a couple of things I saw but didn't fix: under Prison and Work Camps two successive sentences read as follows:

"During World War I, immigrants from Austria, Hungary, Germany, and Ukraine were sent to Banff to work in internment camps. The camp was located at Castle Mountain, and was moved to Cave and Basin during winter." [my emphasis]

Either there was one camp or there was more than one camp. The sentences clash on that point. I'm here to polish form, not mess with content, so could someone with the requisite knowledge fix it? Also, there are several instances where the name of a piece of legislation is italicized. Is this the proper style in Canada? It's not consistent throughout the article, anyway, because there are at least two non-italicized references to the National Parks Act. I'm a little too weary to do the research on this point. Rivertorch 06:04, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the copyedits. Look good. I'd say "camps" is correct, as there was one main camp along with smaller camps in Banff. I have fixed the wording to reflect this better. As for legislation, I really don't know if there is a standard. In Canada, which is a featured article, the names of legislation are wikified and not in italics. I will try doing the same here, though will need to create stubs for these items of legislation. --Aude (talk) 13:50, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Resource exploitation and orgins of park

Much more should be made of the origins of the park - openly modelled on Yellowstone - which from the first included provisions for the extraction of timber and mineral resources within the park boundaries. The Hot Springs were one asset that was to be protected by a national park, but the lesson of Yellowstone was that a park could also "protect" valuable resources. In addition to Bankhead and Anthracite, there were several other small mining towns in the park area in the early days, including Silver City and (if memory serves) Coppermine. From day one the park was an uneasy compromise between competing interests for supporters of a resort, of resource exploitation and of wilderness preservation. Two other points, much more could be said of the issue of forest fires in the park and surroundings - forest fires were a regular and devasting occurrence (often caused or exacerbated by human activity) in the area, particularly in the early years. And more could be said of the uses of the region by native people before Europeans arrived - if I remember correctly, the hot springs were known to the aboriginal peoples of the region and used by them as a recreation ground. An intersting irony of the Park is that, although it is often assumed or said that the Park is an attempt to preserve nature in its pristine state, there is considerable evidence that even before Eurpoeans arrived the area had already been altered by humans and diverted from the pristine. Pinkville 02:53, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't have a huge amount of time right now to work on this article, to expand on these aspects. For now, Jasper National Park and other articles are in rather poor condition and are higher on my to-do list. But do intend to come back to it at some point, maybe write up an expanded subarticle on history of the park and other aspects. When I do, I try to dig up more information on the points you make. Thanks for bringing them up. --Aude (talk) 20:42, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

You bet. i know there are some books that provide the information I'm referring to - but i conducted my own research about 8 years ago and i can't recall any titles or names. But I'll see what I can find and add what I can as well. Pinkville 00:20, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] vandilism

There has been some vandalizarion to the page and I am unaware of the correct information. The name of the Prime Minister has been changed. So other information has been added.User:Jbebeau 05:39, 21 November 2006

some1 vandilised and i cant fix it, help please.Sometimes1must 22:53, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Fixed it. - User: Anon 07:25, 16 October 2006

[edit] Snow Dome: Hydrological apex?

There are at least two claims to be the hydrological apex of North America: Snow Dome and Triple Divide Peak in Montana. Both peaks drain into three bodies of water, but they can't both claim to be the hydrological apex - either only one of them is the true hydrological apex, or both of them should be considered to be a hydrological apex. See the talk page for Snow Dome for a more detailed version of this question. I can't answer the question authoritatively enough to warrant editing any of these pages, but hopefully asking the question on this higher-profile page will catch the attention of someone who can.

Note that there may be other mountains making the same claim. For example, there may be a point that drains into the Pacific Ocean and the Gulfs of Mexico and California, and another that drains into the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, and the Pacific Ocean.

sMacJ 20:08, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Three rivers drain from the Snow Dome

• Columbia River - which drains into the Pacific Ocean
• Athabasca River - drains in to the Arctic Ocean
• North Saskatchewan River, which ultimately feeds via Lake Winnipeg into the Hudson Bay, which in turn connects to the Atlantic Ocean via Hudson Strait

Triple Divide Peak forms the boundary between the Missouri River basin (ultimately feeds into the Gulf of Mexico), and the Saskatchewan River (to the Hudson Bay). The Triple Divide Peak articles says the Hudson Bay feeds into the Arctic Ocean, which is also partly true (Foxe Channel). It appears that water flows out of the Hudson, into the Atlantic. [2] Nonetheless, I can try to clarify the wording in this article to say that its a hydrological apex, which separates these watersheds. --Aude (talk) 20:27, 17 October 2006 (UTC)