Talk:Rock Creek Park

Bunnyman

Once again we enter that prima grey area, the verifiability of a legend. I think that it can be verified that the legend exists. However, obviously it would be much harder to verify whether the legend has any factual basis; if this could be done, it would be more than a mere legend. So, what are legitimate verifiability standards for proving a legend exists as a legend, so that I can't just start a legend that says "My Town Hall is haunted!"

Montgomery County

This article only mentions the portion of Rock Creek Park in the District of Columbia. Only half of the park is in the District (the half under the management of the National Park Service). The other half of the park is in Montgomery County, Maryland under the management of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (MNCPPC). These portions of the park include Lake Needwood, Lake Frank, and Meadowside Nature Center. The Rock Creek Trail begins at Lake Needwood and follows along the creek all the way to the National Zoo. This is important information about the park, not included in the article.

151.200.22.73 06:27, 31 December 2006 (UTC)Ben

need new map

could we please have a better, more detailed map that shows the whole length of the park? (instead of what we have now, which is just a general map of the USA that shows approximately where DC is?) --thanks! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.244.30.65 (talk) 04:38, 7 February 2007 (UTC).

Change

It used to say: "majority of foreign embassies are located to the west, as well as in Georgetown."

This is NOT true. According to my calculations 115 of the 180 embassies in DC are actually located east of the park. Many of those being in the Kalorama neighborhood( east of rock creek).

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as stub, and the rating on other projects was brought up to Stub class. BetacommandBot 16:06, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Sitting president under direct fire

The article states that Lincoln was the second sitting president to come under direct enemy fire (during the Battle of Fort Stevens). Who was the first? I think that this may be incorrect. As far as I know Lincoln was the only sitting president to come uder direct enemy fire. 98.122.124.186 (talk) 17:56, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

no authoritative citations, but this article from the Carroll County Times may be of interest.

Comparative Size.

I don't know why anybody insists on comparing the largest park in DC to Central Park, which is only NYC's fifth-largest park. If you're going to compare the size of Rock Creek to Central Park, it's fair to also compare it to NYC's largest park. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.218.126.245 (talk) 01:38, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

It's not a size contest. It's a description comparing Rock Creek to the well known Central Park. Rock Creek is smaller than a *lot* of urban parks in the United States but this is not the place to list them. In fact there is an entirely separate article devoted to size rankings of urban parks, here. The original comparison was more apt and I will be changing it back. Thanks. JohnInDC (talk) 11:01, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

The article states that RCP is "more than twice the size of Central Park." That may not have been intended as a size contest, but it certainly sounds like one. It's also not very helpful - Central Park may be the most famous park in the world, but most readers haven't walked its metes and bounds and gained an intuitive feel for its size. For the vast majority of readers, stating the size in acres or "about 2.75 square miles" is a far more intuitive way to express the size of RCP. A comparison to Central Park comes across as boosterism and, yes, a size contest. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.207.242.4 (talk) 20:18, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Other Parks

People keep adding parks or other sections of DC not connected to Rock Creek in any way. Example: it listed Glover Archbold Park as part of RCP even though there is about a mile of developed city and the Naval Observatory between them. Or, Meridian Hill Park, which is just a random developed park to mark the middle line of the District and again has no connection to Rock Creek other than being run by the park service (which is every park/monument in DC).

In fact Glover-Archbold Park is administered as a part of Rock Creek Park. There are 98 separate tracts of land including traffic circles, triangles, parkways, etc. that are administered as part of Rock Creek Park by the NPS. Most of these are not contiguous with the main portion of Rock Creek Park. So, the question is whether this article is about the main park or about the NPS administrative units that make up Rock Creek Park. I don't believe that having physical separation is a valid criterion for determining what is and what is not part of the Rock Creek Park system.

Cleanup

I plan to clean up the article, time permitting, in the coming days. A lot of the references have gone dead, and they weren't really that well organized to begin with (some never purported to link to anything) and I hope to sort all that out. The "Administrative History" document, which I've re-located and linked in a few places already, is all by itself a sufficient source for nearly every fact in the article; but its kind of hard to peruse on line and finding the right page, and right URL, is a bit laborious. Other NPS pages are helpful too and I hope to sprinkle them in as appropriate. Anyhow, the main point of this note is to beg the indulgence of other editors in the short term as I pin down the references a bit better. I'm also hoping to figure out a way to artfully weave together the unfortunate double meaning of "Rock Creek Park" employed by the NPS - the term refers of course to the actual 1700+ acre urban park, but NPS also describes the 98 other often non-contiguous, unrelated properties under Rock Creek Park administration unit as "Rock Creek Park" as well and it's - well, confusing. Bear with me please - thanks! JohnInDC (talk) 02:41, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

IUCN designation removals

Please see Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Protected_areas#IUCN_designations_removed_from_11_articles. I do not believe the IUCN designations should have been removed from the 11 articles. --David Tornheim (talk) 09:47, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

Pathetically useless map

The map labeled "Map showing the location of Rock Creek Park" does not show the location of the park.

Or more accurately: It shows the park and many other things, but it neglects to label where the park is on the map.

Even if we assume it is one of the green areas on the map, there are many green areas, and it is totally unclear which one is Rock Creek Park.2601:200:C000:1A0:746F:5F97:36B5:809F (talk) 03:57, 25 May 2021 (UTC)

Lead does not accurately summarize the body

More than half of the introduction of this article is devoted to the question of the administrative purview of the unit of the NPS that oversees the park. Meanwhile, there is no summary of the largest section of the body (on multi-use trails), omission of the most interesting historical details, and limited geographic description. The administrative sentence should probably just be removed, and summaries of the rest of the body content included. I don't have time to do this right now but I hope to come back to it in the future -- with luck maybe someone else will get there first? 100.36.106.199 (talk) 13:23, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Thanks User:PRRfan, that looks much better. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 15:01, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Two random sentences in the history section

The history section currently contains four solid paragraphs about the founding of the park, its historical significance as one of the first national parks, and the creation of the parkway through the park, followed by these two one-sentence paragraphs (citations suppressed):

Stones from a renovation of the US Capitol were stored in the park in the 1970s and will be removed.
On May 22, 2002, the skeletal remains of Chandra Levy, a federal intern whose disappearance had attracted national media attention, were discovered in the park.

I removed the second sentence as being in no sense about the history of the park; it was restored with the edit summary it happened in the park, so it is part of the park's history. I think it should be clear on a moment's reflection that "it happened in the park" is not anywhere close to satisfying WP:DUE: the park is large and old, zillions of things have happened in the park (doubtless many of them having more significance than these). The history section should (per WP:DUE) be devoted to things that are important aspects of the history of the park, as represented by sources writing about the park -- not for random newsy events that happened to have the park as a backdrop. I propose removing these two sentences for failing this. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 15:09, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for proposing the removal; let's discuss. I hear your argument that Levy's skeleton winding up in the park is not part of the history of the park because it doesn't pertain to its physical or administrative development. But I would argue, and other WP articles on places bear out, that newsworthy events are also part of a place's history. PRRfan (talk) 17:20, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

To discuss requires actual engagement with the issue; what you have offered here is precisely what is disparaged by WP:OTHERCONTENT. I've raised a concrete policy-based objection to the content; "other articles on Wikipedia also violate our policies" is not a convincing rejoinder (even if you had produced an actual concrete example, rather than an assertion that examples exist). Also this was an amazingly tone-deaf edit summary, considering I initiated the discussion 3 days before making the edit; please do better. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 01:47, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

You are right that I should have read your message more carefully, and you are right that I was lazy in not citing evidence. Mea culpa! (Of course, I cannot resist noting that ending a Talk message with "I propose removing these two sentences for failing this", then removing one, is certainly a bold edit but doesn't quite constitute a discussion.)

Anyway, you object on the grounds that the Levy murder is not mentioned by reliable sources writing on the history of the park. But such are easily found. This official NPS history of the park ("An Urban Oasis: Rock Creek Park’s History and Management"), devotes part of Chapter 4 to the Levy case (indeed, one of four named sections is called "Chandra Levy"). Other histories also mention it. For example, Einberger's "A History of Rock Creek Park" cites the murder to begin a section called "Is Rock Creek Park the Most Dangerous Park in the United States?"; the author, a Park Ranger, writes: "Many U.S. citizens who were not born and raised in D.C. have heard of Rock Creek Park. They've heard of it thanks to the overdramatization of park violence by news outlets and popular culture. Most of this attention is due to the Chandra Levy murder..." So not only do official historians of the administrative development of the park count the Levy case as significant, but it also looms large in the popular conception of the park; it is hardly a stretch to imagine that some readers will visit the WP page to learn about the case, and will find it odd if it goes unmentioned. PRRfan (talk) 16:13, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

It occurs to me that perhaps a better way to include this significant event is to offer a bit of context. Perhaps: "By the late 1990s, a popular conception had arisen that the park was unsafe. This persisted despite crime data, provided by D.C. police and park officials, that showed that the park saw fewer crimes than surrounding neighborhoods. The misperception was fed by the 2002 discovery in the park of the skeletal remains of Chandra Levy, a federal intern whose disappearance had attracted national media attention." PRRfan (talk) 16:39, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Seeing no objection after a week, I've added that. PRRfan (talk) 01:16, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

That is certainly better. (I am less impressed with the synthetic way you've tried to rescue the capitol stones, but whatever.) 100.36.106.199 (talk) 15:00, 27 October 2023 (UTC)