Talk:Silver Spring, Maryland

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Silver Spring, Maryland is part of WikiProject Maryland, a WikiProject related to the U.S. state of Maryland.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the Project's quality scale.
(If you rated the article please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses.)
High This article has been rated as high-importance on the importance scale.

We Should get some pictures showing downtown Silver Spring. :-)

Nicely done! We love our Silver Spring!

Contents

[edit] "Third-largest community?"

When the entire portion of Montgomery County, Maryland using Silver Spring addresses is taken into account, the population can swell to over 250,000 people, comparable to mid-sized American cities such as Buffalo, New York and St. Paul, Minnesota. In the Washington-Baltimore region, Silver Spring is the third-largest community, behind the cities of Baltimore, Maryland and Washington, D.C., and ahead of Arlington, Virginia and Alexandria, Virginia.

This is kind of an odd statement. If by "community" you mean CDP, than there are quite a few larger CDPs in the CSMA (starting with Columbia, of all places.) If it means "postal designation," then the Alexandria PD is certainly larger than Silver Spring, as it includes most of southern Fairfax County (22 zips, total.) Why the "larger-than-thou" factoid? --Browncat 05:53, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Alexandria has a set and rigid boundary and thus has a set population that is easily accounted for. Same for Washington DC and Baltimore. It would be "cheating" to include addresses outside of Alexandria proper in this count especially because that would require counting people in an entirely different municipality (Fairfax County in this case). I've never heard of anyone who claimed to live in Alexandria, but actually lived in Fairfax County.

This is not true. I live well into Fairfax County and have an Alexandria mailing address and zip code. And I am not the farthest out to say the least. —Xanderer 13:36, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I Don't know if it's still true, but the post office in downtown Wheaton was considered to be a Silver Spring branch.

All in all this means that if Silver Spring were incorporated to include all the people who claim to have Silver Spring addresses, it would be the third largest city behind Baltimore and Washington, DC. In fact, there's no need to even include all of those people to become the third largest city in the DC/Baltimore metro area since it would only require 130,000 of the almost 250,000 who have Silver Spring addresses (it would require 187,000 to beat out Arlington, which is a county, not a city). As it is now, Silver Spring is the largest community outside of DC and Baltimore.

First of all, I know plenty of people--starting with my sister and her husband's family--who are residents of Alexandria, Fairfax but refer to themselves as Alexandrians. Local newscasters refer to the "Alexandria part of Fairfax." There was even a John Kelly column about "The Alexandrification of Northern Virginia" a few days ago. I mean: "community" is a pretty ambiguous term, isn't it? So I think it's just as legitimate to include Hybla Valley or Belle View or Lincolnia in a definition of the Alexandria "community" as it is to include Wheaton in the Silver Spring "community."
I sense you're trying to say something about how large Silver Spring is for an entirely-unincorporated place. That is, after all, what makes SS unique. But "community" is not an official designation, and your claim, as written, is also true of Alexandria, Arlington, Rockville, Fairfax, and probably a few other places. (And yes, I'm only picking at the claim because the article specifically mentions Arlington and Alexandria.) --Browncat 07:24, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Transportation

A "transportation" section is due for Silver Spring. I personally know Silver Spring because of its easy access to the redline of the Washington metro.

[edit] Goldie Hawn

A native/resident of Silver Spring? As I recall she actually grew up in Takoma Park. --Spyneyes 03:05, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

I also recall that she grew up in Takoma Park. Although she did go to Montgomery Blair Highschool. Remove? Move to the Takoma Park page? There is not yet a famous resident list for Takoma Park squirrelist 20:45, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
I propose this list be "firmed up" with citations. I'm nearly certain Goldie Hawn is from Takoma Park, and several others on this list are dubious as well. (Sylvester Stallone anyone?) —xanderer 21:33, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notable residents section of article

If the list continues to grow (for example, I think Jack Abramoff should be added), it will overshadow the rest of the article. Then it should go somewhere else - I've seen separate articles titled "List of ....", for example. (The other option would be to create a category.) John Broughton 12:51, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Local school's article ("Thornton Friends School") nominated for deletion

FYI, the article, Thornton Friends School, has been nominated for deletion due to possible lack of notability; see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Thornton Friends School for the discussion. As an alternative to full deletion or retention, it's been suggested that the article might be somehow merged into this article or some other local article. --A. B. 20:08, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Silver Spring's Turf

This article should mentioned the area in downtown Silver Spring that was covered with artificial grass. It had became a popular gathering place and was the location of some outdoor events. It was decided to remove the turf and build a skating rink in it's place. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.164.202.130 (talk • contribs)

[edit] Crime section

There should be a section on crime, as a new resident here I am shocked at the number of stabbings and shootings. One of each happened in front of my place this week (within a 100 yards of my front door). I'll do a bit of research and put in some stats if no one objects. 209.190.248.102 07:10, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Sure, if you can find some numbers, that'd be great. My only concern is that given the personal experience you've had, there might be some conflict of interest in you writing the section, so just watch out for that. Thanks for your contributions! – DroEsperanto(talk|contribs) 19:43, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Silver Spring online news sites

Question for the group: Is The Silver Spring Penguin suitable for inclusion in the external links section per WP:EL? Silverspring and I have had some back and forth about this, and it's a bit of a stalemate. I contend it's a blog (i.e. it goes off), while they contend it's a legitimate online news site. Thoughts? SchuminWeb (Talk) 23:58, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree with user Silverspring that the Silver Spring Scene, Silver Spring Penguin, and Just Up The Pike etc are news sources. I'm not sure how you define "legitimate" but what you probably consider "official" news sources like the Washington Post and Gazette have time after time taken original reportings from these sites and made articles out them. These aren't personal blogs but sites that report very mircolevel news about Silver Spring. Question for you, even if these "blogs" "go off" are you willing to discredit the Gazette and Washington Post since they contain bias opinionated articles and editorials? What makes these sites "illegitimate" if they write exclusive news content that the big boys copy? 69.251.249.6 (talk) 06:16, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] RFC for Silver Spring Online News

Does The Silver Spring Penguin go against WP:EL as a blog, or is it a legitimate news site? 23:48, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes. As so do the others, they are what is a newly formed market of microlevel news sources. Please explain your stance, I have above. 69.251.249.6 (talk)
No, it seems to be a valid local journalism site that is merely published electronically rather than requiring the traditional (and highly capital-intensive) printing press and paper-based distribution of news. Seems to be a pretty solid example of the recent phenomenon of citizen journalism. N2e (talk) 16:06, 3 June 2008 (UTC)