Template talk:Infobox London place

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Contents 1 Usage notes 1.1 Lat/lon 1.2 London Assembly 2 Discussion 2.1 The Flag 2.2 Isn't this one infobox too many? 2.3 Map 2.4 Unexpected results 2.5 position 2.6 Flag again 2.7 Map dot 2.8 Dialling Code 3 Map image

[edit] Usage notes

{{infobox London place 
| Place=             Bethnal Green
| Latitude=          51.5275   *optional*
| Longitude=         -0.066    *optional*
| GridReference=     TQ345825
| Borough=           [[London Borough of Tower Hamlets|Tower Hamlets]]
| Traditional=       [[Middlesex]]
| PostTown=          LONDON
| PostCode=          [[London E2|E2]]
| DiallingCode=      020       *defaults to 020*
| Constituency=      [[Bethnal Green and Bow (UK Parliament constituency)|Bethnal Green and Bow]]
| GLA=               [[City and East (London Assembly constituency)|City and East London]] *optional*
}}

[edit] Lat/lon

When entering the new fields for latitude and longitude, make sure you enter the digital coordinates (in the form "X.xxx") - NOT the traditional analogue ones (i.e. X°xx'xxxx W). These co-ordinates can be easily found by clicking on the existing OS Grid Reference link and scrolling to the bottom of the resultant page. Entering these correctly will automatically create the relvant map.

[edit] London Assembly

This is automatically populated where a single borough is entered in the borough field. In places that straddle borough boundaries the {{{GLA}}} data will be used instead.

[edit] Discussion

[edit] The Flag

This flag also appears on template:London and it isn't doing any harm there either. No claim is being made it is the flag of Greater London - its just being used as a symbol for the capital.

User:Mucky Duck: But it is not an appropriate symbol for the capital. It would be like using, for example, a French flag as a symbol for Europe.

Much like:

And that image appears 15 miles to the west of the City at the Greater London boundary with Buckinghamshire.

User:Mucky Duck: Well, quite. And thus it's completely inappropriate there too. I believe it should be removed from both.

Many thanks for making the change. I raised this issue on Image_talk:City_of_London_flag.gif but hadn't at that time realised why the flag was appearing on a number of places in Greater London. Having now taken the time to track down the template I see it's because of all the hard work that's been done (by Mrsteviec?) in standardising a template for places in Greater London. The GLC crest looks more appropriate for the places I was looking at. Adrian Robson 09:22, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Other than the word LONDON with the "ON" coloured in red the GLA have no plans for a new flag, crest or symbol for London. The 2012 logo will probably get a fair bit of mileage in the next couple of years and the anti-terrorism "ONELONDON" logo campain has recenlty been launched [1]. From the Mayor/GLA's POV launching any more symbols would dilute these messages but I don't think any of these really suit our purposes so the GLC arms seems to be the best London-wide symbol. Mrsteviec 09:43, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Sorry to come in rather late, but I'm not all that convinced. I think the City of London flag image is more recognisable and is more appropriate — simply because it does tend to be used (inappropriately or not) for a wider area, whereas the GLC crest both isn't all that recognisable (I didn't recognise it just not, for example) nor is it all that appropriate (Ilford is a part of Greater London, but was never in London County Council jurisdiction. My vote would be to restore the City of London flag. — OwenBlacker 18:33, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree but I can also understand the (somewhat pedantic) view that the City of London flag does not represent Greater London. The GLC crest was used throughout Greater London until 1986 so it would have included Ilford. [2]

The choice is therefore between the City of London flag which is current, recognisable but some people say it can only ever represent the City of London or we have the GLC crest which is obsolete, not very recognisable but definitely represents all of Greater London. Despite neither being perfect I am happy with either option. Mrsteviec 18:51, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

Can I cast my vote against including the City of London flag on places like Croydon? The fact that one or another single reader recognises the symbol can't be offered as evidence in its support. More important is whether the symbol actually represents the place described. As mentioned above, you wouldn't use the French flag to symbolise Europe, or come to that the Welsh flag or the Cornish flag to represent the United Kingdom.

There's one other factor that I think should be taken into account. The role of an encyclopaedia is to explain clearly and to eliminate misconceptions. Like the misconception that England is the same thing as Britain (held widely outside the UK), many are unaware that the City of London is something different from what is generally just referred to as London (and why should they be aware if they live in Kansas or Kowloon?) But an encyclopaedia shouldn't provide support for such misconceptions; for example, by putting the City of London flag on places at the extremity of a quite different geographical entity, Greater London. Adrian Robson 13:35, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

After looking at Template talk:Infobox England place - which says "For places within the London region, use Template:Infobox London place", it smacked me in the face that London is in England, and this template is really just a sub-template of the England one. To me, there seems something intrinsically wrong with using a defunct Coat of Arms in this template, so why don't we just use the Cross of St. George? After all, a London place is an England place. DJR (talk) 13:58, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Which reminds me, it looks like the symbol is not as defunct as we initially imagined. [3] I wonder for what other purposes the GLA use it. I know the Fire Brigade still use it. Mrsteviec 09:21, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

It has been brought to my attention that the GLC logo used is a fair use image and WP:FU explicitly states that fair use images should not be used in templates, or indeed anywhere outside the main namespace. Therefore,{{Infobox London place}} and the London stub template (and any other offenders) need to have their images changed... the question is what should replace them. For what it's worth, I'd suggest the St George's Cross for the Infobox. DJR (T) 21:35, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Isn't this one infobox too many?

I know some people spend hours and days creating infoboxes, and I appreciate the work they put into it and I find most of them useful. However, this one is one too many, I think. It appears on almost every London-related page which isn't about a whole borough, and 90% of the information is of course the same on each page. There is no need to tell people that London Fire Brigade is responsible for the fire fighting, that BBC London is the BBC region, and that the nation is England for Kingston upon Thames, New Malden, Westminster, Soho, Charing Cross, Southwark, Kensington, Ilford, Hounslow, Turnpike Lane, Acton, Addington, Addiscombe and 450 more places. I think the average user of Wikipedia would much rather see a picture from the place than this enormous infobox. Thomas Blomberg 21:41, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Its standard infobox size chosen so text will render without wrapping. Mrsteviec 05:36, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Map

Adding the map is a nice idea but shouldn't data in the articles have been populated first? Otherwise everywhere is located somewhere in Surrey until the data is in place. Mrsteviec 12:24, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unexpected results

I've added East Ham, Barking, Dagenham and Chadwell Heath which should go progressively eastwards on the map. However, the results are unexpected and they are clearly not in the right place. Am I inputting the right data? Mrsteviec 15:04, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Your longitudinal figure for East Ham did not match the figure on the link page, but the others all seemed okay. Of course everything is based on the assumption that the linked page is in fact correct... DJR (talk) 15:18, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I've double checked with data from http://www.streetmap.co.uk which is slightly different from the link page (but only by a miniscule amount and gives broadly similar results) so it looks like the image overlay isn't working. Mrsteviec 15:26, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Seems quite strange to me... I've used it at Stratford, London, Knightsbridge, Charing Cross, Chelsea, Holborn and they all seem to be perfect... East Ham looks correct now as well. Very strange. DJR (talk) 15:39, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

There seems to be an imaginary line just east of Stratford and West Ham and after that they do not work. East Ham, Manor Park, Barking and Ilford should all appear just either side of the River Roding which is shown on that map but they are miles off. Mrsteviec 15:44, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I have a feeling it does not work properly for places east of the Greenwich Meridian. Mrsteviec 15:51, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I've left a message with User:ChrisO to help resolve this issue (he introduced the mapping on the WikiProject). I must say my geography to the north and east of London leaves a lot to be desired, but hopefully Chris will know how to resolve the issue. DJR (talk) 15:55, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Problem solved! A simple spelling error in the field name meant that the longitude was automatically set at 0. I've corrected it for a few places - you might want to check any other you've done. DJR (talk) 16:04, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] position

Presumably we've got a bit of a catch-22 on the position - places in West London would want a position-right, while those in the East would want a position left. Perhaps it would be better to leave "Position" as an optional field - the default is left in any case and this can then be overrulled by adding right. DJR (talk) 17:12, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes I agree. Another option is to remove the text label as its fairly obvious what it is supposed to be. Mrsteviec

[edit] Flag again

I'm reverting to the City of London flag that was used on this template before the GLC arms were used. There is no "confusion", just pedantic argument. This is a perfectly valid symbol for London and appears all over, not just in the square mile. Mrsteviec 16:24, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't really think it is fair to call it "pedantic argument". The whole point in the City of London flag is that it represents the City - no more, no less. I've been in London all my life and have not seen it anywhere outside the City. Using it to represent all of London is like using the St. George's Cross to represent all of the UK. It is your POV that it is a "perfectly valid symbol for London", and as far as I'm concerned it is not. Using an England flag just eliminates this problem once and for all - all of London is in England, and {{Infobox London place}} is just a subsidiary of {{Infobox England place}}. DJR (T) 16:35, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Only yesterday I saw it on Tower Bridge and neither end of that is in the City of London. It is on proud display on the river piers as far west as the Greater London boundary, on signs at West Ham Park and Hampstead Heath. It is displayed on the Greater London boundary with Buckinghamshire on the bridge over the River Colne and on numerous Coal post markers in the Outer London boroughs. On Wikipedia it forms part of the tag on the talk page of almost every article about London:

This article is part of WikiProject London, an attempt to expand, improve and standardise the content and structure of articles related to London. If you would like to participate, you can improve the article attached to this page or sign up and contribute in a wider array of articles.

If it is so unique to the City, why is it displayed so widely? Mrsteviec 17:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

"If it is so unique to the City". It's the flag of the City of London! There's no ifs and buts about how unique it is to the City! It can be used wherever anyone wants to use it, but as a symbol it represents the City, not the region/county. Coal post markers historically link back to the City and the Corporation of London, as do river piers. The Tower of London is generally considered to be a part of the City, regardless of its technical boundaries. Bar your Buckinghamshire example, which is just wierd, all the examples you have stated, the flag is symbolising the City, not the region. "Why is it displayed so widely?" The City and the Corporation used to control an awful lot of things, and references to these historical entities continue to this day. The flag of the City of London is used to represent the City of London and its historical significance. There is a City of London coat of arms in my old school, as it is owned by the Skinners' Company. Its usage is to represent the City - much like how an English flag flying in the Scotland represents the England, but just because it is flying does not mean it can be used to represent the UK as a whole. DJR (T) 17:30, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

You have proved my point entirely. The scope and significance of the symbol goes far beyond the City boundaries. Mrsteviec 17:36, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Much like the Union Flag. It still represents its domain. DJR (T) 21:57, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps you should try to give a more convincing argument or gain talk page consensus instead of reverting over and over again. The City of London flag is most often seen in the City and Greater London area. It is symbolic of London. There is no inference here that it is somewhow tied to one set of boundaries or another; only you have made that unbreakable connection. Furthermore,

The Tower of London is generally considered to be a part of the City, regardless of its technical boundaries. So now you decide what is in the City and what is not to suit your own argument? I don't know anyone who considers the bridge to be in the City, however, it can still have the City flag on it if it likes. Why? Because it is in London. It, and the flag, are symbolic of London.

The City and the Corporation used to control an awful lot of things, and references to these historical entities continue to this day. Many came much more recently than that with the last tranche of responsibilities after 1986 and even in the period 1965-1986 its involvement in the Greater London area was considerable. It is an integrated part of London in this respect and not tied to its boundaries. Where the flag is evident, say on a social housing block in south London, the flag represents London, not just the square mile.

Bar your Buckinghamshire example, which is just wierd. How is this an argument? Its not 'wierd'. There are countless similar examples. Its just more proof that the flag symbol is evident throughout Greater London and is part of the experience of living here. Mrsteviec 06:15, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

With all due respect, you continue to completely ignore the point I am trying to make. The examples you state don't represent London, they represent the City of London. It really is as simple as that. "it can still have the City flag on it if it likes. Why? Because it is in London. It, and the flag, are symbolic of London" - this just re-states my point - anywhere can use the City of London flag, but it is not used to represent London. It is used to represent a historic link to the City of London.

You yourself have given the excellent example of social housing blocks - all over South London (and probably elsewhere) there are social housing blocks bearing the CoL flag because they were funded by the Corporation of London. The flag is representing the City. Every time you say something like "Where the flag is evident, say on a social housing block in south London, the flag represents London, not just the square mile", it is no more convincing an argument as mine as it is simply your POV. "Its just more proof that the flag symbol is evident throughout Greater London and is part of the experience of living here" - part of the experience of living here is to be able to know why a symbol is being used. The CoL flag is always representing a link to the City (I don't know the details of your Buckinghamshire example but it will certainly be the case again).

Finally, while I don't particularly like you saying"perhaps you should try to give a more convincing argument or gain talk page consensus instead of reverting over and over again", I am more concerned with you not practicing what you preach. I'm sure you know what I mean, but I can give examples if you so wish. This is not a dig, but simply bringing an issue to your attention. DJR (T) 07:46, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Don't worry, I'm not offended. I'm not suggesting any moral high ground or that you are any better or worse than I at auto-reverting. I'm just trying to avoid a tedious revert war by this discussion. However, you continue to revert the article while that discussion is in progress. Mrsteviec 07:58, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm completely with Mrsteviec on this. The flag is generally seen as a symbol of London, to my experience, not just of the Square Mile. — OwenBlacker 10:08, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Could I make a radical suggestion? This debate is about which flag or crest to use for an area which doesn't have a flag or crest. My suggestion is that if it doesn't have a flag or crest, in the interests of accuracy we don't include a flag or crest on the template.

At the risk of boring those who've already read all the earlier discussion, I'd like to repeat what I said last September:

"The role of an encyclopaedia is to explain clearly and to eliminate misconceptions. Like the misconception that England is the same thing as Britain (held widely outside the UK), many are unaware that the City of London is something different from what is generally just referred to as London (and why should they be aware if they live in Kansas or Kowloon?) But an encyclopaedia shouldn't provide support for such misconceptions; for example, by putting the City of London flag on places at the extremity of a quite different geographical entity, Greater London."

So I'd propose that if there's no official flag available, we don't include a flag. Adrian Robson 10:44, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

That argument is not sound. Being at the edge of an entity does not make a place any less a part of it. The debate is about a symbol to represent London, and this flag is already widely used for that purpose. Mrsteviec 12:21, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Adrian Robson is absolutely right. The role of an encyclopaedia is to eliminate misconceptions, and this is a fine example. This flag is not widely used to represent London - it is widely used to represent the City of London. Just because the flag is found around London does not mean it represents London - non-local flags are found all over the world. There is no flag that represents London. The fact that this debate is taking place is testimony to that end. The template does not gain anything by having the flag at the bottom, and all it does is aid misconceptions and provokes disagreement. Question? What is wrong with a St. George's Cross? Does anyone disagree that it does not represent London as much as it represents all the other places in which it is used? Mrsteviec himself said "Being at the edge of an entity does not make a place any less a part of it". It is a simple, effective solution that will end this argument once and for all. DJR (T) 16:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd rather see something that's specific to each area. For example, for Croydon the borough coat of arms [4] might be more apposite than a flag for the City of London, which is some miles away. Bromley too has a coat of arms [5]. I don't know if the template can be made sufficiently flexible to accommodate different coats of arms. But since they actually apply to the individual places, they might be more appropriate. What do you think? Adrian Robson 16:54, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

LOL. A debate of four participants, two each of opposing opinions, isn't testimony to anything. Using the generic English symbol is a lost opportunity to tie together all the London place articles visually. The image is not somehow "non-local" outside the City boundaries but within Greater London. It only becomes "non-local" elsewhere. Mrsteviec 18:49, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I thought about that - it'd be pretty easy to use a switch to make them come up automatically. However, all the coats of arms appear to be fair-use images, which means the WP:FU "no copyrighted images outside the main namespace" dictum still applies. I have seen examples of coats of arms that are public, however... Wikipedia:Userboxes/Location/United Kingdom specifically. The userboxes that still boasts coats of arms have free-to-use images. I'd like to use your solution myself, but in order to do so we need to assertain a free-to-use rationale for each of the coats of arms. DJR (T) 17:12, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Basically, something like User talk:Djr_xi/London place infobox, with "Borough" being the operative field. Feel free to experiment. If the coats of arms were over 50 years old, they'd all be public. Unfortunately, I don't think any are. DJR (T) 18:06, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

The borough coat of arms is an option I'd considered myself, but it has the copyright issue and the problem of places in more than one borough. Mrsteviec 18:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

A third option would be to replace the contentious image altogether and add a link to the main London article. This would also add value as this is not currently linked from the infobox. Mrsteviec 19:02, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Seems a fair enough compromise. DJR (T) 21:05, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think that's a good idea. Adrian Robson 09:02, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Map dot

I've noticed complaints about the location of the dot on the map at Charing Cross and Brentford. I've also noticed that depending on browser (IE6, IE7, Firefox) and skin (Monobook, Cologne Blue) the dot does seem to move around just a little bit. While it is only supposed to be giving general indication, it does seem to be upsetting some people. Not sure what best to do from here. I doubt there is anything that can be done to force the image to render the same on each system. Would a label help? Approximate position in Greater London Tinkering with the co-ords does not help as it may fix the location for one set-up but break it for another. Any suggestions? Mrsteviec 14:52, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I know what you mean - Charing Cross in particular is quite a major issue as pretty much every single article about a London place links to it as the central point in London, so I can imagine people will be unhappy about Charing Cross suddenly being on the South Bank. I like your idea of some sort of disclaiming caption - I wonder if we could simply add a caption as an argument to the map - like you can do with any other picture (e.g. [[Image:Example_1|This is a caption]]). It isn't an ideal solution, but I agree that there don't seem to be many better options at present. DJR (T) 19:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dialling Code

Many of the London areas have had the local code entered, but it only displays as 020. I do not have a thorough understanding of the code for editing templates, but it looks as if some have been added to the template to be recognized. To do this for every London code would be unreasonable. Can it not be set up so that dialling code read as whatever has been entered for the specific area, but if this is blank that it default to 020? Kevin McE 16:40, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

That is how it should be at the moment - if nothing is entered then it automatically defaults to 020, but if anything is manually entered then this would be over-ridden. Could you give an example of a page where this problem has occurred? It may be that we simply need to add another code for the template to automatically recognise. DJR (T) 18:49, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

The location for which I noticed it was Chislehurst: 0208467 can be seen in the data on the edit screen, but it does not appear on article view Kevin McE 19:01, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

The reason is that "020 8467" is not an area code - it is just a part of the 020 telephone code. All the telephone codes used in London areas are already included in the template, and it will automatically link them if they are entered. In the case of 020 areas, the entire field can just be left out (as I have done on the Chislehurst page) and it will be entered automaticlly. DJR (T) 19:08, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that BT would give that answer, but the simple fact is that numbers beginning 0208467 are only found in and around Chislehurst, and the majority of phones in that area share those 7 opening digits, ergo it is the de facto code for Chislehurst. Kevin McE 19:12, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

While that may be true, it must be kept in mind what an STD code actually means. If 0208467 was indeed an STD code, then if you lived in Chislehurst and wanted to dial 020 8467 1234 then you would simply have to dial 1234. An area code is a number which can be excluded if dialling within that area. To dial any number in the 020 area from within the 020 area, you have to dial and 8-digit number. Thus, the STD code is 020. DJR (T) 23:34, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

That being the case, is it meaningful to have Dialling Code in an infobox for Chislehurst (or any other sub-district of London)? Kevin McE 18:46, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, because some parts of Greater London do not use the 020 code. Furthermore, the STD code is an important piece of information that is relevant to any place, so it is important that it is included. DJR (T) 20:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Map image

I've replaced the map with one with a less ugly colour scheme, but it's still not great. The roads in particular make no sense. If anyone can provide a better one, that would be great. --88.111.41.106 18:17, 18 November 2006 (UTC)