Talk:Montlake, Seattle

Household income

I noticed some back and forth edit-warring on this page related to the issue of median household income. The difference of opinion seems to be whether the article should say Montlake has a "median household income close to $200,000" in the lead, or whether it should cite the 2013 figure of $93,805 elsewhere. One editor, using an IP address (so I can't tag them), said: "It seems a random person unhelpfully changed around, moved, etc. information that was fine as well as added data from 2013 which, because of Seattle’s very fast growth over the past decade, is no longer relevant. Not sure why so much editing is taking place, but it is now back to the correct way it’s been for a long time." (I believe this is also Max3218's view.)

That "random person" (SounderBruce) wasn't me, but I agree with them. I don't doubt that a 2013 median income figure is no longer accurate. But there's no indication whatsoever as to where this "close to $200,000" number comes from, other than that it has apparently been on this article "for a long time." But long-standing text in a Wikipedia article not a reliable source. It would be great to add a more recent statistic, but I had trouble finding one. So I put the $93k figure back, and added another somewhat higher figure from Movoto.com, as well as some context (how much this outpaces city/metro average income, as well as some "quality-of-life" indicators), with citations. That should allow readers to make their own judgments about what the income number means in relative terms to the metro area. And whenever an updated number is available, that can be added as a replacement. But we can't insist on using a totally uncited number over an actual, reliably sourced number, just because the cited source seems outdated. And in any event, we surely should not insist on putting an unsourced, vague number in the lead sentence! The word "affluent" there should be sufficient, and is probably more comprehensible to non-U.S. readers than a dollar amount anyway. --EightYearBreak (talk) 15:50, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

EightYearBreak, I have removed the Movoto source, as it is a self-described "online real estate brokerage firm" and does not cite its sources for data. It also seems to have copied parts of this Wikipedia article in its Montlake entry, another sign that it should be avoided. SounderBruce 22:51, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

SounderBruce, a residential neighborhood page is intended to help people understand where they live or where they’re moving. Citing only 2013 data is unhelpful as it does not provide an accurate picture of the economic position of the neighborhood (and, frankly, seattle at large). I appreciate you diligence in only wanting to use data from the most credible sources, but understand that in doing so you are diminishing the helpfulness of the page. It is a short neighborhood description page not, from example, a government report and so the focus is providing readers with the most relevant and helpful information (even if the source doesn’t meet the very highest of standards). Max3218 (talk) 04:01, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

Max3218, all articles must adhere to the Reliable sources guidelines. There are no exceptions. SounderBruce 04:12, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

Nearly decade old data in a fast changing area in not considered reliable. Max3218 (talk) 04:15, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

SounderBruce, you're probably right about Movoto. I wasn't sure whether it copied this page or vice versa, since that portion of this article is still "citation needed". I don't know that it's a super-reliable source, but I was having trouble finding anything more recent than 2013, so that was my rationale for using it. Any ideas? Presumably there's more recent Census/ACS data, but I don't know if that's broken down by neighborhood like this; I assume the City of Seattle document that's cited probably involved someone at the City figuring that out based on Census tracts or something like that.

Max3218, I disagree that "a residential neighborhood page is intended to help people understand where they live or where they’re moving." That may, in fact, be the purpose of something like that Movoto article, but Wikipedia has a broader mission (for example, I don't live in Montlake, nor do I have any reason to think I'll ever move there, but I was still at some point interested in learning about it). I absolutely agree that data from 2013 is almost (but not quite!) useless, though, and not particularly reliable for the state of the world now. But we do have to rely on reliable sources and do the best we can with them.

My view is that the City of Seattle document that cited Census data is a reliable source as far as it goes, though it's outdated; the Movoto data was somewhat useful but possibly not reliable enough (and it didn't give a date for the figure anyway); and the former version of this page, that simply said "close to $200,000" (without a source or a date!) was worse than useless, because we have no idea where it came from or why we can trust it. Outdated data is better than that, because at least the reader can understand its limitations. And by placing it in context with citywide numbers from the same time period, the reader has even more to go on. Just putting a number out there with no date, source, or context can make it seem authoritative when it is far from it.

Anyway, this could all be solved with a more recent reliable source. Maybe someone more resourceful than I was can find one. The edit-warring, though, seems beyond counter-productive at this point. We should leave the reliably sourced 2013 numbers unless and until we have a more recent one.--EightYearBreak (talk) 15:02, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

Northern Boundary of Montlake

A citation is needed for the northern boundary of Montlake. This article currently places Montlake as entirely south of the Cut.

But the Montlake Cut was dredged circa 1916 through the existing Montlake geography.

Plenty of references to "Montlake" currently exist north of the Cut: the UW Athletics metonym, Montlake Boulevard, UW Medical Center - Montlake, Montlake Tower, Montlake Landfill, etc.

The present day Montlake "neighborhood" (of homes) does end at the cut, but "Montlake" seems to extend to the (pre-Cut?) lowlands roughly bordered by NE Pacific Street, Montlake Blvd, and NE 45th Street.

"Montlake" landmarks such as Husky Stadium, the ASUW Shell House, and University of Washington Medical Center should likely be included in the Montlake wikipedia article.

PKAMB (talk) 10:08, 2 December 2021 (UTC)