Talk:Bergen

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Bergen is a former featured article candidate. Please view the links under Article milestones below to see why the nomination failed. For older candidates, please check the archive.
September 30, 2006 Featured article candidate Not promoted
To-do list for Bergen: edit · history · watch · refresh
  • Expand the following sections:
    • Economy
  • Add more references
  • Add better references for the following sentences:
    • "In the 15th century the city was several times attacked by the Victual Brothers, and in 1429 they succeeded in burning the royal castle and much of the city."
    • "For a period of time there were umbrella vending machines in the city, but these did not turn out to be a success."
    • "The city is home of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, which was founded in 1765 and is one of the world's oldest orchestral institutions."

Contents

[edit] Leading business school

It's even debatable whether NHH is a "business school" in the strict sense of the word. Compared to similar programs around the world, its curriculum places more emphasis on economics than traditional management topics, and it's no accident that it styles itself "Norwegian School of Business and Economics." Second, contending that it is the leading business school invites unnecessary contention. The Norwegian School of Management - among others - would claim they are the leading school, and we'd have a pissing match on our hands. I have no axe to grind on this - didn't attend either of the schools and have friends from each. --Leifern 12:14, 2005 Mar 18 (UTC)

I agree that it can't be written here that NHH is the leading business school in Norway, but the NOKUT report on the quality insurance system of The Norwegian School of Management, BI, was pointing on severe academic lacks. The reasons it was not a bigger issue in the media, was that the committee was criticizing it academic lack because of a assumed comming university application, and not just the quality insurance system. Ingjald

[edit] Judgemental view on the people of Bergen

To write that the people of Bergen are snobbish and look down on the people from the surrounding countryside is an opinion and not in any way objective. The person to have written this has clearly manifested a personal view in a dictionary. I personally find the opinions to be incorrect.--Martin253 15:03, 7 August 2005 (UTC+2)

Absolutely. Citizens of Bergen are quite aware of their close ties with the surrounding region. To say that there is a haughtyness towards the strils (people from the coastal region surrounding Bergen) is just plain wrong. I'm deleting this sentence. Kvaks 14:26, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
I agree that to write "that the people of Bergen are snobbish and look down..." is not correct or a good formulation, and should not be included here, but the term "stril" is a important term in and around Bergen. That is have been used as a negativ term by the towns people could be mentioned, but then it should be mentioned that the people from the surroundings sees it as a honorific. The term also have a important place in Norwegian history. In 1765 there where a uprising called "strileopprøret" or the strile uprising, where the fishermens/farmers revolted against high taxes and poor treatment from the danish officials, especially "stiftsamtmannen" and "byfogden". Ingjald

[edit] Photos

I've replaced the recently deleted image "View of Bergen from Fløyen" with one I found on Commons. I believe it was shot from Fløyen but I'm not sure, so it would be nice if someone could check.

Do we need more images of Bergen? I might be able to provide a few more GFDL'd ones.--GrafZahl 08:29, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

It certainly looks like it was taken from Fløyen. I can't imagine where else it could have been taken from. Gazza1685 21:47, 30 September 2005 (UTC)


Yepp, it´s taken from Fløyen.
Three points about the pictures on this page: Firstly; there is no picture of the most famous buildings in Bergen: "Bryggen"! -well, not of the "old" UNESCO World Heritage Site anyway, (only of the "new" non-UNESCO Site). Should´t there be one?
Secondly: I have looked at the articles of some of the old Italian towns..they can be very beautiful..using old very decorative pictures of the town. Can we not do the same for Bergen? I´m thinking, of course, especially on the Scholeus print (from 1590) -that was the first view of any Norwegian town. Very decorative & and informative. (And we don´t have to worry too much about copyright violations! :-D ).
Thirdly: The one thing visitors to Bergen seems to comment on is the "old quarters of white, wooden houses surround the centre, notably Nordnes, Marken and Sandviken." Should there perhaps be an illustration of such a quarter? Huldra 13:35, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I've uploaded a few Norway pictures to commons. I'll upload a few more next week. No Bryggen pictures, though, but I think we might have a "white wooden houses" picture. --GrafZahl 09:40, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
I've included a "white wooden houses" picture in the article. --GrafZahl 10:32, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

==Weather== + - Bergen is renowned for its plentiful rainfall. In average, it rains two out of three days. Yearly average rainfall is 2250 mm (88 inches). Its longest period of uninterrupted rain in recent years was from January 3, 1990 to March 26, 1990. For some years there were vending machines for umbrellas on some streets. However, it did not turn out to be a success.
..................................................................................................
An anon. editor removed the above on 23 sept. I understand it is bad practise to remove a significant part of an article without discussion and without noting it on the "talk-pages". I therefore copy the text in here, so people can decide if the info. should be removed or not, Huldra 13:35, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I think a reader can expect at least some minimal info about the weather, perhaps with a link to the Norway article. According to that article, the 2250 mm are not only rainfall, but total precipitation. The "paraplyautomat" information seems to be accurate, at least Google returns the following image: http://www.charite.de/international/cooperation/image/ausland/norwegen/bild47.jpg. Does anyone have a source for the long rain period? --GrafZahl 09:40, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
Since nobody seemed to object, I've re-added the weather section with some slight changes. I've left out the long rain period info since I couldn't find any evidence supporting it. --GrafZahl 10:32, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Alignment of the section edit tags

Most of the section edit tags are bundled together at a random paragraph approximately 2/3 down the article, at least in my browser. Is this a common problem, is it perhaps caused by collecting many pictures in one section, and does anybody know how to fix it? I tried by putting the images in a table but it didn't help. --Eddi (Talk) 23:23, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I say we remove some of the images. Some of them are good, but there some I fin unecessary and uncontributing. The view of Vågen and the old stock exchange building should go! NuclearFunk 18:28, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Removing images doesn't solve the problem. I tried it with no success. --Eddi (Talk) 21:45, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] "The busy shopping street Strandgaten"

I´m sorry but it doesnt look very busy to me. Otherwise the article is ok.


[edit] Bergen metropolitan area

Hi!

I think its about time, without wanting to sound arrogant, that a few things are being clearified here: First of all I would like to quote the definition of what a metropolitan area is (the def. you will find here in W.): " A metropolitan area is a large population center consisting of a large city and its adjacent zone of influence, or of several neighboring cities or towns and adjoining areas, with one or more large cities serving as its hub or hubs".

This definition should make a lot of the questions and arguments posted below fullly superfluous. According to the definition a metropolitan area doesn´t even have to involve only one city but can consist of several. Often it is one city plus its adjacent zone of influence being interdependent on each other; work related commuting, making up one housing/residential zone; sharing residential development plans; sharing public transportation networks etc. The latter metro form is the case with Bergen where neighbouring islands and peninsulas are dominated & stronlgly influenced by Bergen city.


If you look at the biggest Metropolitan area on this planet (might very well be even bigger ones somewhere else in the Universe, haha! :-j ); the Tokyo Metropolitan area consists of several cites; e.g. Yokohama which on its own is bigger than big cities like Berlin or Rome. If you live in the Metro area of Tokyo doesn´t mean that you necessarily live in Tokyo; most of the 35 million! in that metro area don´t! Many might only very seldomly or even hardly ever go to Tokyo proper because they live 1.5 hours away…

I think a lot of people simply struggle to understand the major difference between a city proper and a metro area. Conurbation is yet again a third urban concept; where maximum distance between houses of no more than 50 metres comes into use, but this statistical meassure is however not used when defining a metro area; please go to the definition again if confused.

I mentioned Berlin. Without question it is the biggest city in Germany with about 3.5 million people. The metro area includes another million and thus Berlin metro has about 4.5 million people. Most of the metro population is residing in Berlin proper. Berlin is “isolated” from other large cities and it has included most of its suburbs into the city municipality.

Bergen is also “isolated” from other cities; thus residential developments popping up on Bergens outskirts pop up exactly there for one reason and one reason only; the city of which they are neighbours to offering them jobs and needed services etc. If Bergen wasn´t located where it actually is, people wouldn´t live in ten thousands on Askøy; on Sotra( mainly Fjell/Straume) or in Knarvik etc. People move out of Bergen to live there in new suburban communities; countryside transformed due to Bergens need for expantion. New people move in to Bergen from other areas of Norway or from abroad. This "formula" is not idiosyncratic to Bergen it is the formula more or less every growing city "follows". The island or peninsula communities; all connected with bridges today, would be like most islands along Norways unbelieavably long coast; more or less desolate if Bergen had not been their neighbour. Without question these areas are part of Bergen metro! I agere that a few of the ones added are a bit far off; but excluding the ones that are "questionable" only drops the number with 2 or 3 thousand. By the way; Voss is NOT a part of Bergen metro so I don´t now why somebody even mentioned that town… And YES! Bergen makes up most of the population of Hordaland county!

Essen in Central West Germany is a city of about 600.000; big but much smaller than Berlin obviously. However the Essen metro area is by far the biggest in Germany with about 8-9 million people. Nobody claims that 8 million people live in Essen but Essen is the centre in a continuos urban region; the Essen metro area; about the same size as Paris. Many of these 8-9 million people propbably don´t even know the name of the main street in Essen; since they live in Dortmund or somewhere else in the area. However when flying over this area you quickly understand why this massive metro area is the undisputed urban supercentre of Germany; double the size of Berlin or as big as Sydney and Melbourne combined… Actually the state where Essen metro is located, North-Rhein Westphalia, has about 20 million people; equal to the total population of Australia in a geographical area no bigger than the size of New York metro. Sooner or later the whole area will become like NY or Tokyo; one massive metro area becoming one of the five largest urban zones on the planet. However it will never become one city named Essen, or Cologne or Düsseldorf; the cities stay but merge still keeping their centres but not their solitude! :-j

To the arrogant person who says "end of discussion" and claims Bergen is Bergenhus. That is ridiculous and you are as lost as one can become. I also come from Bergen and know that e.g. Osterøy is not Bergen and outside of the city; offcourse it is! Nobody claims otherwise! However it is part of the metro zone if you like it or not! You evidently do not have a clue to what a metro area is. I have lived in Cologne, Germany; the fourth biggest city in Germany. The city centre has only about 50.000 people but still counts as a million city and rightfully so: However most of Colognes population of more than 1 million lives in suburbia. Find yourself a new subject because here you are completely lost... Furthermore the number 211.000 thousand deals with the Bergen conurbation or "tettsted" in Norwegian. Conurbation and metro area is not one concept, but two describing urbanity from different scales. Due to Bergens untypical geopgraphy for a city the conurbation is much lower in number than the metro area because there are large mountains and water everywhere in the way of the 50 metre mark in all directions. Arna which counts about 15.000 is not part of Bergen conurbation although it takes only 6 minutes with the train to the very city centre. Are you also going to say Arna is not "Bergen" or part of metro Bergen? Again - you don´t know what you are talking about.

You are right about one thing: Internationally it is common to separate between city proper and city plus suburbs. But who decides for each city which suburbs to include or leave out? The city itself off curse aming it an unobjective meassure. It is not an objective meassure that gives us a good basis for comparison. Without suburbs Seoul is the biggest city in the world. Why? Because it has included almost all of its suburbs into the city proper.

If you think Bergen is the only city that has included many suburbs in its city proper or municipality; you again have no clue. In every city of any size only a small portion of the population lives in the city centre or city proper. Bangalore in India has more than 5 milion people but its city centre is not much bigger than that of Kristiansand...

Oslo has 545.000 inhabitants. Cologne Gernmany 1.050.000. If Oslo included suburbs the same way as Cologne, which it should because 545.000 makes the city seem smaller than it actually is. Oslo would have about 1.3 million people. It takes 7 minutes to drive on the motorway from downtown Oslo to where I live. Still I live in another municipality. What does this say? That Norwegian cities are not aggressive in including suburbs; quite on the contrary! If Straume was a suburb of Cologne they would have included it in the city municipality.

If you look at the article on metropolitan area, it is obvious that it's a loose concept. To quote it, "In practice the parameters of metropolitan areas, in both official and unofficial usage, are not consistent. Sometimes they are little different from an urban area, and in other cases they cover broad regions that have little relation to the traditional concept of a city as a single urban settlement". Searching for Commuter belt actually redirects you to the metropolitan area article, which shows that commuting usually is an important factor when it comes to what should be counted as metropolitan area. In French, the term is Aire urbaine, and includes "communes in the peri-urban ring (outside of the urban core) in which at least 40% of the resident population in employment works in the communes of the urban core or in the other communes of the peri-urban ring". I guess this in the case of Bergen at most includes Fjell, Os and Askøy. However, the article on Agglomeration also mentions that close ties by commerce could suffice. But - and this is my point in this post, which I'd like an answer to - is it at encyclopedia level to use the concept of metropolitan area at all as long as there's no tradition for using it in Norway, and no clear definition of what it's supposed to include? When it comes to Essen, you are mixing the Essen urban area with what's most often called the Ruhr conurbation, Ruhrgebiet or the Ruhr area. Pardon me if I'm mistaken, but I've never before seen all of it referred to as Essen, Greater Essen or the Essen urban area. See also the List of metropolitan areas by population. You also say there's been a claim that Bergen is Bergenhus, but that apparently was a discussion about the city centre, not the city, and definitely not the metropolitan area. I agree with your views on Oslo, but I think Bergen is a whole different story. Compared to cities elsewhere, I'd say Bergen (and Trondheim) are quite aggressive in including suburbs into the city proper. Another point for the article is that - for readability and simplicity - there should be a limited number of figures listed. Also, they shouldn't be written in bold characters, as that's not the norm anywhere else. I'll not edit the article unless I get some support here for my views, however. Narssarssuaq 19:59, 23 August 2006 (UTC)


The population of Bergen metropolitan area is 369,099[citation needed] as of January 1st, 2006 according to Statistics Norway, with a current annual growth of close to 5.000, making it the urban area in Norway with the strongest growth after the metropolitan area of the capital Oslo.


I think the number "369,099" is impossible. Popullation of whole Hordaland fylke is 453,574. The sum of top nine kommune in Hordaland is 369,105 (as of April 2006). However, the top nine kommne are Askøy, Fjell, Stord, Os, Voss, Lindås, Kvinnherad and Bømlo. It is hard to include these kommunes in "metropolitan" area of Bergen except Askøy. --Isorhiza 03:27, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you are right,but your argument doesn't really prove anything, as it still leaves, according to your numbers, 453,573 - 369,105 = 84,468 to be accounted for. Add Bergen and Askøy, and you get a potential 84,468 + 21,522 + 242,854 = 348,844. Then add 2*5,000 to this 2004 number, and you get appx 359,000 which isn't too far off the mark. But of course, most of the small municipalities included in this number are a long way from Bergen, so the real number for the population of the metropolitan area is likely to be far smaller than 369,099. In my opinion, all of the Bergen metropolitan area lies in the Bergen municipality. --Kvaks 08:39, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
I got a similar number "347,957" (as of 1/4/2006) by adding up all the kommunes which shares border with Bergen: Bergen 242,854 + Askøy 22,593 + Os 15,337 + Osterøy 7,187 + Fusa 3,745 + Samnanger 2,336 + Meland 5,937 + Lindås 13,371 + Vaksdal 4,104 + Sund 5,606 + Fjell 20,498 + Austevoll 4,389. I would like to withdraw the word "impossible", but still am interested in reference for the number "369,099". I feel a little uncomfortable to count Lindås, Os and Fjell in Metropolitan area of Bergen. Bergen map, Map of Hordaland with red color at highly populated area --Isorhiza 09:40, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
The link http://www.ssb.no/emner/02/02/folkendrkom/tabell03.html with the number 369 099 refers to "economic regions", and has nothing to do with metropolitan areas. It is very obvious for someone from Bergen that for example Masfjorden, Fedje, Osterøy and Autstrheim are outside the city - end of discussion. According to the same Statistics Norway, the population of the Bergen metropolitan area is actually 209,000 (Statistisk årbok, 2005). I think that two numbers should be included: the population with and without suburbs, as this is the conventional way of expressing the number of inhabitants internationally. The population of the municipality is by convention used as the number including suburbs in Norway, and so should be included on the page. The population not counting suburbs is easiest approximated by using the number of people in the city centre, or Bergenhus bydel. It may seem like a quite low number when regarding the size (and the self-imposed image) of the city, but remember that suburbia is huge in Bergen compared to cities elsewhere in the world. (It is strange that the centre isn't expanded by buildings of typical "city centre quality", as apartments seem exceedingly expensive/sought-after in such buildings and such areas. I guess everyone has forgotten how to build like that).
I agree with all you said, except the bit about approximating the population of the "city" by using the number of people in Bergenhus. The city spreads beyond Bergenhus on all sides. Bergenhus should not be seen as "the real city" - it is merely one part of the city (bydel) coinciding with the old city centre. You are not automatically in suburbia just because you've left Bergenhus. (Barend 17:35, 28 June 2006 (UTC)) (sorry, late addition of signature)
Agreed, but like I said it's probably easiest approximated that way. However, Årstad could be added as well, making the figure about 65,000, and parts of Laksevåg also don't feel suburban. If it's tough to find a non-disputed figure for the city centre, and also to find a spot-on definition of what should be counted as city centre, I guess it should be omitted from Wikipedia. By the way, the correct Statistisk årbok figure for the Bergen metropolitan area is 211,000, with a note saying that, as a rule, houses less than 50 metres away are counted. But as I already mentioned, I prefer the 242,000 figure, unless the definition used when counting 211,000 is some sort of international standard. Does anyone know any more about this? [Also, the first parts of the page right now has a lot of particular interest maritime information that should be put elsewhere, and I'm also not sure if the headline "Administration" should be above "Weather" (I guess this should read "Climate" instead, as that term refers to average, long-term weather) and "Culture and Sports". Moreover, I hope the page as time goes will be expanded somewhat, even though the information feels (or at least felt) well-balanced.]
It seems that internationally, the figure "without suburbs" usually refers to the population within the administrative area of the city, while the "with suburbs" figure usually is estimated from some criteria. In Bergen, the population of the administrative area (242,000) actually exceeds the officially estimated population of the city+suburbs (211,000). As these populations aren't too far apart, it should suffice to quote one population figure.

Including the whole county in the metropolitan region seems a little misleading to me, but OK...

[edit] Famous people from Bergen

Removed Anders Winsents, Øle Gunnar Gundersen, and Paal Myran-Haaland from the famous people from Bergen list. These are of the local band Lorraine. While they did warm up for A-ha recently, they don't yet have an enduring fame and notability which would justify putting it on this list. They're not listed on the Norwegian Wikipedia. Similarly removed Svein Hatløy, academic architect. Not all university/college professors should be listed here. Many other more notable and famous professors from Bergen are not listed here. Janbrogger 08:57, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Kurt Nilsen. Come on, how can anyone say that this is a famous person. Why? Because he was on a tv program for 10 year old girls? What about all the persons/bands that _is_ famous around the world. Examples: Immortal, I, Gorgoroth, Varg Vikernes with his band Burzum, Borknagar, Helheim, Aeternus, Deathcon. Should I go on? Ok I wil admit that not all the members are born in Bergen, not all of the bands was formed here ether. But they have or is using Bergen as their "Base". Remove those who don't belong on that list or make it 10 times as long just to include every person known outside our grand city.

[edit] Climate records is not correct

The article now claims that a temperature of 35.7 Celsius has been measured in Bergen, which is clearly wrong - this would have been a new national heat record. Official meteorological recordings are always done using strict criteria (2 m above ground, in a small white building etc). According to the book Norsk vær i 110 år by climatologist Bjørbæk, the highest recording in Bergen is 31.8, as was stated in the article before recent changes. And the cold record was different as well, around -17 Celsius. Precipitation/year is 2250 mm on average, measured at the official station at Florida, Bergen. Orcaborealis 11:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More violent climate

Should the article state that the climate is getting more violent, with more severe winds and precipitation? I'm also wondering if the Hatlestad Slide should be mentioned. More dangerous and severe climate, including floods, rising sea levels, and storms, is considered a problem by more and more residents of the city, and I find it sufficiently notable for the article. Perhaps it could be a sub-section of Climate? --Safe-Keeper 19:59, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Not a whole subsection, but maybe a sentence who says how Bergen is influenced by the climate changes. It also seems reasonable to mention the Hatlestad slide. Rettetast 20:20, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
The slide, the rise in sea level threatening Bryggen (the wharfs on the Unesco list) and the increased precipitation in autumn and winter in this wet city is significant. The climatologist are not predicting more storms any longer, but some storms might be more violent. The Hatlestad slide, as I recall, happened as a result of large amounts of precipitation in a short time span, which will probably occur more often in the future. Orcaborealis 21:05, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Added rise in sea levels, increase in precipitation, and threat of flooding. Lenght of addition warranted own sub-section. Also added 150px pic from Hatlestad Slide article. Feel free to shorten section and perhaps remove picture. I also feel the sub-section needs a better header. --Safe-Keeper 16:24, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Move article to Bergen?

Bergen, Norway → Bergen … Rationale: The previous Bergen page has now been moved to Bergen (disambiguation), leaving Bergen to redirect to Bergen, Norway. It would make sense to move this page to Bergen since it's by far the most popular use of the name. … Please share your opinion here (see also Talk:Bergen (disambiguation)). — Cordless Larry 15:25, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, please move the article. Inge 16:42, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Disagreed. The Belgian city Mons/Bergen has 91,221 inhabitants, or almost half the population of Bergen, Norway. 80.203.151.81 17:18, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Is Mons regularly referred to as Bergen? I've never heard it called that and if I hear Bergen I automatically think of Bergen, Norway. But that might just be me. Cordless Larry 17:34, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
The city is called Bergen in Flemish, that is by about 6 million Belgians, plus in Dutch and German. Still, this is the English Wikipedia - is it always called Mons in English? Narssarssuaq 11:42, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it's Mons in English. Cordless Larry 11:45, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
So now we have found that Mons isn't eligeble for the article title Bergen anyway? I don't think anyone is disputing the fact that there are other places named Bergen. What is said is that the by far most commonly known/looked for/linked to is the one in Norway. That's why the article should be moved there in stead of it just being a redirect to Bergen, Norway. Inge 22:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I don't think Mons is eligible to be the main Bergen article, no, but given the discussion above, there seems to be an argument for maintaining the status quo. I still favour the move though. We could do with more votes to establish a consensus. Cordless Larry 22:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Well, as long as Bergen is now simply a redirect page, leading to Bergen, Norway, I would say once that decision has been made, it is entirely pointless not to go all the way and move the article Bergen, Norway to Bergen.--Barend 22:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Can we try to have a proper vote then? I support the move. Cordless Larry 22:58, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I support the move. But I think we are being a tad too cautious now. This simple move really doesn't need all this red tape. Inge 23:03, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Problem is, it's not a simple move since the Bergen page that we want to move it to needs to be deleted first, as it exists as a redirect page. So we can't just perform the move ourselves. Cordless Larry 23:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Support, since Bergen in Norway has 900 links to it, significantly more than any other meaning of Bergen. -- Egil 12:37, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Mons/Bergen has only 169. Support. Narssarssuaq 15:25, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Support. --Leifern 15:26, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Support. --Serge 15:32, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Support. The Flemish town is - rightly or wrongly - primarily referred to as "Mons" in English, e.g. when referred to as the HQ of SHAPE. The Norwegian city is only known by one name, it is more populous, an important port, and pretty well known given its status as Norway's second largest city. But the article should definitely contain a disambig. link on top referring to either the disambig. page or to both this and the town in Belgium. Valentinian (talk) / (contribs) 15:48, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I think that that counts as consensus then. I've nominated Bergen for deletion, so that we can move this article into its place. Cordless Larry 14:42, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

The article's been moved. Now we just need to figure out how to move this talk page. Cordless Larry 17:56, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Fred Chess has kindly fixed this problem. Valentinian (talk) / (contribs) 11:19, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Metropolitan area population

Right now, the metropolitan area population is listed as 369,099. Earlier, the article said that this included the city proper and neighboring suburbs. However, the link reveals that - among others - the following communes are counted: Kvam, Fusa, Samnanger, Austevoll, Sund, Vaksdal, Modalen, Osterøy, Øygarden, Radøy, Austrheim, Fedje(!) and Masfjorden. These are, to put it very simple, not suburbs. I thus changed the article to say "city proper, suburbs and neighboring rural communities". This was, however, reverted by user Inge. Now you need to make up your mind: You either need to come up with a lower figure (something that has obviously been rejected), or you will have to accept the fact that rural communities are included - and in my opinion, excessively so for a metropolitan area. A point is also that the link lists "Economic regions" - all municipalities of Norway seem to be included somewhere, and these regions could just as well be "rural" as "metropolitan". For example, Nord-Gudbrandsdalen, Hadeland, Valdres etc. are listed - are these "metropolitan areas"? No. Narssarssuaq 11:48, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The number and which municipalities to be included may be debatable so long as there isn't an official Norwegian or Bergen stance on that. If such an official stance exists we have to follow that. I haven't looked for one, but I suspect the number isn't taken out of thin air. I reverted because the general labelling of Bergen's neighbouring communities as rural is incorrect. Some of them might have rural traits and even Bergen municipality itself has an agricultural division. The neighbouring communities function very much as suburbs of Bergen, but the topography of the area makes comparisons to other metropolitan areas difficult. The text should definately reflect those special traits. But until a longer explanation on the rurality of neighbouring communities is in place, suburban is the most fitting label for them.Inge 21:05, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, but I think you're dead wrong. The municipalities I mentioned have a very small degree of commuting to Bergen. Calling for example Fedje and Austrheim suburbs to Bergen is stretching the concept to the ridiculous. Does anyone agree - or not? This seems like an attempt to boost the population figure with patriotric ends. Narssarssuaq 12:15, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I agree. Anyone who has been in Kvam, Fusa, Austevoll, Vaksdal, Sund or Modalen would laugh if you called them suburbs. Ahy1 15:42, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
For my own part patriotism is certainly not the motivation. I am not saying the earlier version is dead right and I am not saying the new version is dead wrong, but that the matter should be explained better and that the truth lies somewhere in between the two. Furthermore if no official information on the subject is to be found then the entire subject should be removed. Inge 21:25, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Well, as an inhabitant of Bergen (but than Inge is as well, aren't you Inge?:-): The only official number is the number of inhabitants of the kommune. And I'd say that is pretty much the metropolitan area. At no point is there continuous urban population from the city center and across the kommune-border. The neighbouring kommunes are not suburbs by any reasonable definition of the word, in my opinion. Possibly parts of Fjell and Askøy. Obviously not Kvam or Fusa. It makes no sense to me to include neighbouring kommuner in a "metropolitan area" of Bergen. And the website which is linked to as a referance does not do that either! This reference is a misunderstanding. As Narssarssuaq pointed out, it divides the whole of Norway into economic regions. So Bergen is the economic center of the kommuner listed. But they do not correspond to a metropolitan area. I think the whole paragraph should be deleted.

--Barend 22:04, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I second the deletion of the paragraph as it stems from a misunderstanding. (Yes I do live in Bergen, but I am not a bergenser :) )Inge 12:58, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Attractions in list form

I think that it'd be an idea to do as the editors of Reykjavik have done, and put the attractions in list form. Ie:

  • Bryggen - The old wharf from the Hanseatic era.
  • Fløibanen -
  • Ulriksbanen - A funicular from the city to the top of Mt. Ulriken.
  • Håkonshallen -
  • Kjøttbasaren -
  • Strandgaten -

...and so on. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Safe-Keeper (talk • contribs)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Bk logo.jpg

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[edit] Crime and safety in Bergen

The article needs a section on Crime and the degree of safety, which should include crime rates, the recent attention Bergens Tidende has given the widespread and open sale of narcotics in Nygårdsparken, and whatever else is notable and important about crime in Bergen municipality. See crime sections of other cities' articles. --Safe-Keeper 02:36, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Find some better sources than near-tabloid newspapers, and go ahead and write. But I think "safety" shouldn't be an issue in the article, as it's a quite abstract concept trying, but most of the time failing miserably, to pinpoint the risk of walking the streets or whatever. Newspapers aim to give readers kicks of panic in order to sell more papers, and thus aren't good NPOV sources for this kind of thing. Go instead for the crime statistics, which show that crime is declining throughout Norway. Narssarssuaq 11:37, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Behind the name

bjørg (f), which translates to mountain

BJØRG Gender: Feminine Usage: Norwegian Derived from Old Norse björg meaning "protection, help".

English mountain Norwegian fjell Danish bjerg

English mountains German berge(pl) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.237.224.34 (talk) 09:24, 11 October 2007 (UTC)