Talk:Royal Tunbridge Wells

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 This article falls within the scope of WikiProject UK geography, a user-group dedicated to building a comprehensive and quality guide to places in the United Kingdom on Wikipedia. If you wish to participate, share ideas or merely get tips you can join us at the project page where there are resources, to do lists and guidelines on how to write about settlements.
United Kingdom Portal
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the assessment scale. (Assessment comments)
Mid This article has been rated as mid-importance within the UK geography WikiProject.
Kent Portal
This article is within the scope of the Kent WikiProject, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of topics related to the county of Kent in South East England.
If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the assessment scale.See comments
High This article is on a subject of high-importance for Kent-related articles.

Article Grading:
The following comments were left by the quality and importance raters: (edit · refresh)

This article needs a good deal of work to bring it up to standard.

  • It is top-heavy with lists -particularly the two lists of people and the External links - see below
  • the introductory paragraph should be just that - a summary of the article. Anything to do with the borough (eg population) should be kept for that article. Town twinning is not for here either - a Culture section might be the answer
  • the history of Tunbridge Wells does not properly begin in 1606, and there was some while before anyone lived here (see later on in the article). The site itself should be considered - eg stone quarrying went on here in Roman times
  • the town name deserves a special para (Toponymy?)
  • there must be a Geography section - where the site of the town is considered, and the underlying geology = the springs.
  • too much of the article reads like a tourist pamphlet - "the Pantiles can be found ..." "grand Georgian hotels". And there is always the assumption that "prim middle classes" and the "bastion of the middle classes and comfortable bourgeois" are what is the perception of the town. Readers of the article may be from anywhere, and just because in the past the media might have put that about, it means nothing if you are not "English". The "Staying and Eating in Tunbridge Wells" makes the point far better than I can - we are not the tourist industry.
  • it is the norm for schools to refer to the List of schools in Kent and this para to be used for extra comments - no list
  • and the same goes for people lists which should be combined and moved to a standard List of people from Tunbridge Wells (compare List of people from Dover, since there are 74 names here.
  • also far too many External links - some are not referred to in the text and many are tourist-based; three are photographs of the town

Peter Shearan (talk) 17:47, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Kent tasks:

The population figure of 100,000 sounds very excessive... as far as I can remember, it's closer to 60,000. Does anyone know of a good UK database for population statistics?

Also, the section of famous inhabitants seems to me a very silly idea, unless it's limited to famous people of the past. If anything it makes the town look more irrelevant than it actually is - no page on any large city would list present-day celebrity residents. Palefire 03:33, Dec 25, 2004 (UTC)

In terms of population, I think that must be for the whole district covered by the Borough Council. This is a very confusing statistic when compared to the Sevenoaks page, for instance, that quotes its population as 18,000, which could only cover the very centre of the town itself - with suburbs taken into account, these towns are similar sizes. Some standardisation is needed.

Shoppers are best advised to choose which part of the town they are most interested in (the old Pantiles and "Village" area to the south of the town, or the newer area around the Victoria Shopping Centre) before they go, as each area is separated and is thus not easy to walk between. This is subjective, I find the walk between these two areas very pleasant and takes all of 10 minutes. MilkmanDan 12:00, May 17, 2005 (UTC)

Not sure if MilkmanDan's comments above are potentially misleading. Whilst I agree that it can take 10 minutes to walk between the new (clone town) part of Tunbridge Wells and the older High Street/Chapel Place/Pantiles end of town, the comment makes it sound like there's nothing in between. The route between the two areas, Mount Pleasant Road is still a major shopping area leading to the town' railway station which is in the middle of the two areas. There is not really any physical distinction between the areas (other than a hill), it is more of a linear town from Royal Victoria Place all the way down the hill to the Pantiles. The two areas are not seperated. --JezzBrookes 12:20, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Population figures amended to allow for difference between town and borough. Source cited.--Silver149 08:57, 10 July 2005 (UTC)


Contents

[edit] Social deprivation in T Wells

I do not want to diminish the primary thrust of MJD's comments regarding bourgeois T Wells vs social deprivation in certain parts - High Brooms springs to mind. However I would like to see evidence of high truancy, drug taking and crime rates compared with other areas even in Kent before the statements are made so categorically. My understanding is that truancy rates vary from virtually zero at the top end to ca 2.5 times the national average at T Well's "sink" school. Drug dealing is anecdotaly alleged to be the highest in the south east between London and the coast but I understand the police and social services to claim there is no greater problem here than in any otehr comparable town. The same is true for crime. See http://www.tunbridgewells.gov.uk/MASmedia_SB/viewSite?requestType=viewPage&siteId=232&pageId=4407 for more information. --Silver149 5 July 2005 08:38 (UTC)


[edit] Inappropriate spelling changes

The most recent mod has changed a few words from British to American spelling. Since this is an article about a British town, they should have been left as-is.

As per {{User-AmE-0}}. Image:Anglo-indian.jpg Deano 10:28, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Naming

Since the town is commonly known as Tunbridge Wells, should that not be this article's name under the WP naming conventions (use common name)? -- Necrothesp 13:21, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

It's known as Royal Tunbridge Wells almost as much as it's known as Tunbridge Wells, so it's about six (or maybe five) of one half a dozen of the other.--ElvisThePrince 11:58, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

The statement "To this day, Royal Tunbridge Wells is one of only two towns in England to be granted [the title Royal], the other being Royal Leamington Spa." is surely wrong. Lyme Regis? Bognor Regis? Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead?

Ingoring for the mkinuite the fact that Bognor at the very least decided to call themselves Regis, neithier Bognor nor Lyme are Royal Bognor, etc., finally there are actualy quite a few Royal Borough's quite apart from Windsor and Maidenhead but they are not Royal Towns but quite clearly Royal Borough's.
List of UK place names with royal patronage has more details.--ElvisThePrince 11:51, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
I think it should be named Tunbridge Wells. I'd never even heard of "Royal Tunbridge Wells" until I got redirected to this page! -- Thanks, Arriva436shout! 22:12, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Suspected Advertising

I can't see how singling "Pomeroi" out (and providing a link to its website as a reference!) or indeed naming certain other shops over others can be seen as anything but advertising... 192.93.164.20 15:20, 17 May 2007 (UTC) I agree-Can we keep the advertising on a leash please-lets just stick to facts and fiqures,not personal opinions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bladerunner63 (talk • contribs) 19:21, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Parks

I have added a section on parks, with each park being given its own sub-heading. This is with the intension of developing each parks content, so the sections get bigger. At the moment they look a little short and therefore maybe not suited to subheadings, but eventually i intend to add more so bullet points (or similar would be unsuitable). I also intend to develop an independent article on Dunorlan Park as I is of such historical importance and such a popular location in the town. It would be good to develop more in the Commons and Wellington Rocks too. McKDandy 19:36, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Crime

Are the crime rate figures for the district as whole, not for the town? These figures diffe, and are given in a different format - although for another year? Peter Shearan (talk) 07:45, 17 February 2008 (UTC)