Talk:Providence, Rhode Island

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Providence, Rhode Island (reviewed version) has been listed as a good article under the good-article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a review.

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Providence, Rhode Island has had a peer review by Wikipedia editors which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article.

	To-do list for Providence, Rhode Island:	edit  · history  · watch  · refresh
Expand Cityscape x Neighborhoods (but also under demographics?)x Education x Economy x Major industrial players Government x Add something on crime (could also include information on the Providence mob) References GTech, G-Tech Building x Hurricane Barrier System x

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A state capitol photo is available for license; contact the photographer via email. 18.26.0.18 05:52, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I can and will be taking some pictures of Providence soon-ish (within the next month). I'll make them available free of charge once they're done. gomer43 - February 24, 2005

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Should there be a section on the revitalization in recent years? The page could also use a list of movies shot or set in providence.

Contents 1 Peer review 2 Hurricane barrier 3 Images 4 Confusing racial makeup 5 New images 6 Bank of America building 7 Waterplace Park pictures 8 A rather bold edit to cityscape 9 history section too long 10 poverty-stricken Providence 11 GA hold 12 Why "Providence" goes here and not to disambig 13 Metro. Population

[edit] Peer review

It seems to me that an article on Providence that doesn't at least touch on its history with the Mob is woefully incomplete -- or is my perspective skewed from growing up in an Italian family? :-) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by SarekOfVulcan (talk • contribs).

• In that case, could you be able to add it and note the source so that I could work with it further? Right now, it seems that no one else is working on the article except for me :-( Pentawing 06:07, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
  • I don't know if I have enough knowledge of the subject to do it. This looks like a decent article, though: http://www.crimelibrary.com/gangsters_outlaws/family_epics/providence_mob/2.html--SarekOfVulcan 07:46, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

• Note: The website is at http://www.crimelibrary.com/gangsters_outlaws/family_epics/providence_mob/1.html Pentawing 22:20, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I have written a History of Providence, and put it on the internet as two Adobe Acrobat documents. When I attempted to put links to it on the Wikipedia page, they were immediately deleted by your peer editor, citing rules and regulations. However, the full-length history which I have authored is objective, researched from primary sources, and relevant, and links to it do belong on this page. Because of its length, it is in two parts:

-- The city of Providence in colonial times, from the Kouroo Contexture: http://www.kouroo.info/RI/ColonialProvidence.pdf

-- The city of Providence, Rhode Island under the federal union, from the Kouroo Contexture: http://www.kouroo.info/RI/ProvidenceRI.pdf

Austin Meredith, "Stack of the Artist of Kouroo" Project

Articles that aren't peer-reviewed in general won't be linked to or cited because they constitute original research; however, since you have many sources in these, it would be very useful to write some of these things into the History of Providence page with proper primary citation.--Loodog 02:32, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hurricane barrier

My recollection is that Providence was subjected to several hurricane-induced floods before its hurricane barrier went up. I also seem to recall someting about the barrier being of engineering significane - first of its kind, or largest of its kind, or something, though I could be wrong on this. Adding something about the barrier might be worthwhile. Badger151 20:09, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I was told today by an engineer, in reference to a Pro Jo article about the vulnerability to hurricanes, that the system of levees or barriers here is exactly the same type used in New Orleans, and that the same thing would happen here. I tried to convince him that intelligent people like us can't be doomed to make the same mistakes, despite the seemingly daunting opposition and collusion of government and media, but I'm not really convinced myself. Even this article seems like it was taken off the copy for a tourist brochure.

The major difference between Providence and New Orleans is that Providence is above sea level. Even if the Hurricane Barrier failed, we couldn't be nearly as bad off.66.240.10.170 23:08, 20 February 2006 (UTC)loodog

Ummm, how bad could it be? 12 feet of water in downtown PVD - Hurricane Carol and 13 feet of water in downtown PVD - New England Hurricane of 1938. That is definitely nearly as bad. The barriers have been up since the 1960s; at least, I remember them always being there, driving to Providence, having been born in 1962. If they weren't there Providence would be flooded again. The Narragansett Bay acts as a funnel for the storm bore. --McTrixie/Mr Accountable 16:48, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Images

I would like to put up renderings of the what the completed construction in DownCity Providence will look like. What is the policy on which pictures I can use.

• First, you must have a login account (from what I know, people contributing anonymously through an IP address are forbidden from uploading files). Second, the image you upload must be of your own creation (this places such images under GFDL, which is preferred). Otherwise, you must state that the image is indeed copyrighted and what its source is (images that are untagged and unsourced images are immediately marked for deletion). Hope this helps. Pentawing^Talk 20:05, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Would it matter if I got permission from the creator to use it? 66.240.10.170 00:51, 21 February 2006 (UTC)loodog
  • Are there any rules prohibiting my using a screen shot from Family Guy featuring the Providence skyline in the "Culture" section? 66.240.10.170 23:06, 20 February 2006 (UTC)loodog
    • I'll address the above two inquiries - refer to Wikipedia:Image use policy and Wikipedia:Image copyright tags. The information is all there. Pentawing^Talk 07:59, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Confusing racial makeup

"The racial makeup of the city was 54.53% Caucasian, 14.54% African American, 1.14% Native American, 6.01% Asian, 0.16% Pacific Islander, 17.55% from other races, and 6.08% from two or more races. 30.03% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race."

I don't know what to make of that last statistic.

• Assumption 1: white, black, native american, asian, pacific islander, other races, and two or more races are mutually exclusive categories, since, if we made a person both black and white, (s)he'd be put into the "multiple races" category.

• Assumption 2: hispanic/latino is a racial classification

Operating on these two assumptions, any person being hispanic/latino must come from "other races" or "two or more races", except this only allows 17.55 + 6.08 = 23.64% of the population to be hispanic/latino.

And we can't get the other 6% from the other categories, since that would put them in the "two or more races" group.

Whatever this statistic is supposed to mean, it needs to be reworded.Loodog 21:34, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

The demographics information were placed there by a bot (automated script). Hence, this wording has appeared in every other U.S. municipality article. If you can find a better way of rewording it without completely destroying the section, go ahead. Pentawing^Talk 03:17, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

The issue appears to be your second assumption. The United States Census Bureau does not consider Hispanic/Latino to be a race. See Race (United States Census). —MementoVivere (talk • contribs) 05:03, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New images

I was in Providence and took a number of new pictures, a few appear on this page. Anyone not liking the layout feel free to play around with the format, as I am a terrible novice in "wikicode".Loodog 23:47, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I think we need another shot of downtown, but one that includes the textron building, that whole side should be shown.

Done, see economy section.--Loodog 03:57, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

We definitly need that shot of downtown with the textron side of the high rise buildings... I have some if someone will post them for me... let me know.. my username is BlueFitted.

Yeah, I just don't know how to contact users on this thing.Loodog 20:14, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bank of America building

After adding the bit of trivia about the "Bank of America" building being known as the Superman building, I released there's a lot about this particular building that is largely superfluous information in an article about Providence. I'd like to split off the Bank of America building info into its own article. Does anyone have (or is aware of) an image we can use for this purpose?Loodog 20:17, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Look at the Wikimedia Commons (commons.wikimedia.org) under "Providence, Rhode Island". There are two pictures that are of use. Pentawing^Talk 23:46, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

DoneLoodog 03:57, 6 June 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Waterplace Park pictures

There are currently two different pictures of Waterplace Park in the article:

The first is in the "Geography and climate" section and the second is in that section's "Climate" subsection. Why two, and why in that section of the article? DMacks 17:14, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

My problem with the first was that it was too small, you really can't see anything. I uploaded another pic, but couldn't really justify removing the first from the page. As for the location in the article, damned if I know. I believe they were both either originally in "Cityscape" or "Culture".Loodog 04:00, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A rather bold edit to cityscape

I've made a large edit to the cityscape section, one that I think gives a better impression of the Providence cityscape. Discuss any objections here: --Loodog 17:17, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] history section too long

As much as I hate to concede it, the history section is obviously too long. How about taking current projects and splitting them off into a separate page?--Loodog 20:34, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. The usual method is to move the current version into its own sub-article and leave a summarized version within the main city article. Pentawing^Talk 00:12, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] poverty-stricken Providence

Someone has changed this:

"The city is located in Providence County and is the second-largest city in New England. Providence is nicknamed the "Beehive of Industry" and, since the 1990s, "The Renaissance City," which is a dubious and sometimes tongue-in-cheek claim given that Providence has one of the highest percentages of people living in poverty of any city in the United States. In fact, Providence is one of the "10 poorest cities in the country" - sharing company with Brownsville and Laredo, TX, New Orleans, LA, AClarke, GA, Hartford, CT, Newark, NJ, Syracuse, NY, San Bernardino, CA and Miami, FL [1]. Providence also has a very high crime rate and many run-down neighborhoods."

I've reverted much of it for the following reasons:

• I looked at the other cities mentioned, only one has this piece of information (that it's one of ten poorest cities) in the introduction, and with the exception of Miami the others don't mention poverty at all except in the standard demographics section. However, I considered it fair game to leave in a quick note to contrast the word "Renaissance", since "Renaissance" is up front in the intro too.

Yes, I agree the contrast is important and it is an interesting factoid distinguishing Providence from other cities. User 71.235.84.59

Is the contrast necessary though? "Renaissance" doesn't necessarily mean "High Income" or "Wealthy". Compared to 20 or 30 years ago, isn't the "Renaissance" moniker appropriate? Shaft0rz 22:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

• Mentioning that it's poor and then spending an extra sentence to write that it is one of the ten poorest is redundant.

• Offer me documentation saying that Providence has a high crime rate and I'll believe it. Single digit murders a year hardly qualifies. Run-down neighborhoods would need citation to say, though even the article on Miami has no note of it.

--Loodog 18:05, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Also, user 71.235.84.59 was the one who put this piece of information in the Syracuse article anyway.--Loodog 18:13, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] GA hold

On hold for 7 days, please fix the following: wikilink only full dates, not partial, refs go after punctuation not before it, make refs consitent format pref using cite fmt, get rid of weasel words. Rlevse 19:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Ref locations fixed. Not sure what the date issue is. I see some years linked...are they not supposed to be? All but one are in a listing of censuses, and it seems reasonable to me to link them there (cross-ref what else is happening then). All cites are now with {{cite}} templates, though some could use some additional data. DMacks 20:14, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Deweaseled.--Loodog 20:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

• Better, but: Fix the external jump at "Providence has 25 official neighborhoods. Profiles can be found at", make it a footnote. Need more refs. Example, the entire history section only has 2, I know there are more than that. Footnote format is not consistent (some have retieve dates/publishers, some don't). For dates, you link January 17 and January 17, 2007 but not 2007. You can also ISO format them like this (view in edit mode) 2007-01-17 and the user's view prefs will format them to the way they selected on their account prefs.Rlevse 19:10, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

External jump fixed, but I'm not sure what to do about history. Everything not footnoted is taken from http://www.providenceri.com/history/centuries1.html. How do I cite that?--Loodog 23:01, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Make the web site a footnote. Repeat its use if you need to. Climate, weather, demographics, etc have no refs too. Need lots more refs. Rlevse 13:33, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Demographics are automatically filled in for all locations, it has a ^GR2 reference. Is this not sufficient? E.g. Cleveland has been a featured article with only GR2 as a reference for demographics; neither does it have references for most of its climate prose. Boston, San Jose, San Francisco have also been featured articles and similarly lack references in climate and demographics.--Loodog 02:39, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

GR2 merely takes you to a wiki article, that is not a ref. San Francisco became a FA in 2006 had has LOTS of refs in climate and demographics, the others became FAs in 2005 and the standards for GA and FA are higher now. The 2005 FAs could even be delisted for not being kept up. Maybe I'll go do that. Your infrastructure section is devoid of refs too. A good rule of thumb is at least one ref per paragraph, especially if it is more than a couple of sentences.Rlevse 13:41, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

• Refs go AFTER punctuation. Do you know how to reuse a ref so it appears once in the footnotes? Refs 2-7 are exactly the same.Rlevse 13:09, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Merged. DMacks 19:35, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

The "url" field of {{cite}} templates should just be the URL; the title goes in the "title" field. Leave it to the magic of the templates to handle the formatting...that's why we have them. DMacks 19:39, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm now going to pass this for GA. Suggestions for further improvement, esp if you want FA: more cites are needed-there are still strings of paragraphs without them; be consistent in format of refs-I fixed some for you, ex: web refs should have title, url, accessdate, and publisher at a minimum. I added publisher to ref 38 "Lifespan" as a sample for you. I think the prose of the article is fairly good. Rlevse 12:34, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why "Providence" goes here and not to disambig

Providence used to go directly to the disambig page, but we changed it to go directly to this page. Reasons:

• google search reveals majority of results to the city.

• All other places have populations of less than 4400 and have only automated default pages, except for Providence County which one would never search for with just the word "Providence".

• Most alternative articles linked to in the disambig page only contain the word "Providence" in their titles and are not identical. You would never look up Providence College with the word Providence any more than you would look for NYU by searching for New York. Of those with names that actually match, we have 2 obscure movies, a defunct TV show, an unknown band, song, and the name of a fictitious place in comic books.

In the interests of saving the most people the most additional clicks, we agreed to send Providence here with a disambig at top rather than the opposite.--Loodog 06:17, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

It is very common to refer to Divine Providence as simply Providence. I would venture to guess that Divine Providence is at least as likely to be the intended target as Providence, Rhode Island. In fact, that's why I attempted to redirect it to the disambig page—I was seeking the theological entry, not the geographical entry. Also, since there are so many other cities with the same name, it seems reasonable to go directly to the disambig page. Someone might be looking for Providence College but might not remember whether it is a college or a university and simply type providence hoping to get a disambig page from which to see all the options. (I frequently do this when I don't remember an exact name or title.) In addition to the reasons mentioned already, I would suggest that for consistency's sake we redirect to the typical Wikipedia-preferred location. Overall, it's significantly easier and less confusing to start from a disambig page and move to an article page than to go the other direction. --Emote 06:14, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Boston has twice as many things to redirect to, including Boston University, Boston College, and 13 other cities, yet "Boston" takes you straight to the city because it's the overwhelmingly what people are headed toward. A google search reveals that people seeking "Divine Providence" with "Providence" won't find it (not until looking through more than 10 pages of results).--Loodog 12:49, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Emote that Providence should go directly to a disambig page. Having it link with a small New England city suffers from a very American-centric worldview. Few people outside of the US, I think, would be searching for the city when entering Providence in the English Wikipedia. The word is incredibly common as a noun in its own right. Keen Machine 14:21, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

US centric? There are ten cities with this name, all of which are in the United States, only one of which has a population over 4400. I will concede that the Divine Providence sense of the word would see more frequency than these small towns, but a google search reveals that the first page is about that small New England city. In fact, you have to go to halfway down the second page to find an article on "Divine Providence". search for Divine Providence, it returns it immediately. You can call google US centered if you want but its results are based on relevance to the user, reinforced by information about its users actions.--Loodog 15:40, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Metro. Population

List of United States urban areas lists providence as the 34th biggest in America, with a population of 1,174,548. The Providence article lists itself as 35, with a population of 1,622,520. I'm sure they're statistics from different years, so it would be nice to know when at list one of them is from. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Phantombantam (talk • contribs) 18:04, 22 March 2007 (UTC).

There is no contradiction. 34th is for urban area; 35th is for metro area. Urban is more a measure of contiguous urbanization, metro extends distances to effective commuting distances.--Loodog 19:49, 22 March 2007 (UTC)