Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/National recreation area/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was promoted by PresN via FACBot (talk) 00:28, 21 May 2021 (UTC) [1].

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National recreation area

National recreation area (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

• Featured list candidates/National recreation area/archive1

Nominator(s): Reywas92^Talk 03:19, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Next in my series of protected places (after parks, monuments, memorials, and lakeshores and seashores) is recreation areas! I've only been to 5 of the 40 of these (and very near to another couple) but I sure hope to visit more! This was a fascinating bit of history as the concept of a place meant for recreation rather than conservation in a location that has been irreversibly changed by flooding really challenged and transformed the mission of the National Park Service. While they all combine recreation and preservation (with varying degrees of extractive uses), Congress got somewhat haphazard in designating these, and those managed by the Forest Service really differ in how much attention they get! I know the prose is longer than an average FL, but I think it's all interesting stuff that needs to be kept together. Looking forward to your comments. Reywas92^Talk 03:19, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Resolved comments from Fredlyfish4 (talk) 13:26, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

;Comments Good to see this article get some attention and come up to standards of other related ones in the US. Comments based on a quick look: You only have NPS visitation, understandable given how easily accessible it is. The USFS does periodic visitation studies and publishes those results here. You may or may not be able to get estimates for those sites as well, but worth looking into. If so, it would require moving year into the column with visitation like "1,267,900 (2019)" for Amistad, since USFS ones are all the same years. I hadn't seen this site, neat! Unfortunately are at the larger national forest level so there's not much on NRAs. Added for the four that do have reports broken out. Reywas92Talk 20:56, 19 February 2021 (UTC) Two of the photos a mostly just of one animal, Land Between the Lakes and Santa Monica Mountains. Would more of landscape photo be more appropriate for a recreation area, like the others? These were actually the only ones that caught my eye! (LBL had no landscapes at commons and SMM was lacking what I liked.) I thought a little diversity is nice since wildlife is part of their recreation and conservation but if there's another you like I'm not attached to these! (A lot of these NRAs generally had poor image selection, so many boring rivers and trees, so if anyone has a better one for Pine Ridge or White Rocks or whatever, please share. Even flickr wasn't of much use.) @Reywas92:, I found many more pictures (including landscapes) in an online CC search, in case any of these are of interest: Land Between the Lakes results and Santa Monica Lakes NRA results. (I ticked the first four license options.) MeegsC (talk) 08:47, 27 February 2021 (UTC) The area column for Whiskeytown is a little difficult to read. Maybe insert some breaks in there. Added It would be good to have alt text for all images. Shoot, forgot those, added. There is at least one instance of inline citation out of order (at top of area column) Fixed An excellent addition to this page would be a section with a list of former NRAs. I know it already exists on the NPS list page, but it would be very pertinent here. I am not sure if there are any others outside NPS. Cuyahoga Valley NP is the only one, mentioned in the history section and I don't think needs its own section. None of the other FLs have this, it's just the main List of areas. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 15:21, 7 February 2021 (UTC) Thanks so much Fredlyfish! Reywas92Talk 20:27, 7 February 2021 (UTC) Sorry, about that edit here. I made a few minor corrections to the article after a read through, but have a couple more point to resolve: The last sentence of the lead states that the BLM's one NRA is the largest at 1 million acres, but this seems to contradict with later statements that Lake Mead is the largest and Glen Canyon is also larger. Is this just an approximate area for the White Mountains? Either way, rephrase this. Golden Gate states that is the most visited NPS unit, but that isn't true every year and wasn't in 2020. I'd change it to something like "typically among top 5 most visited NPS units" or something similar. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 13:26, 2 March 2021 (UTC) Fredlyfish4 Thanks for the fixes you made, though I'm not sure where the 1100 alpine lakes in Sawtooth is from, my source says 300+. Maybe that includes areas outside the boundaries? Good catch, removed White Mountains from the lead. This is the area used both on the BLM website and in the authorizing legislation and I've not found anything more precise. Fixed Golden Gate, it's been alternating for the lead with Blue Ridge since 2013. Reywas92Talk 19:44, 2 March 2021 (UTC) Oh, I just realized that number is for all of Sawtooth National Forest. I'm quite certain the 300 lakes is incorrect. It sounds like a number just for the Sawtooth Range. Actually, they list nearly 400 lakes for the Sawtooth Wilderness alone, which is entirely within the SNRA. So, that wouldn't count the hundreds more lakes in the White Cloud and Boulder ranges, as well as those elsewhere. I do not know exactly what the number would be for the SNRA overall, so perhaps it is best to say "hundreds" of lakes. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 21:18, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

• Support Fredlyfish4 (talk) 21:20, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Resolved comments from ChrisTheDude (talk) 09:36, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

;Comments on the lead "They have diverse features without universal context" - really not sure what this means (the last three words in particular), can you clarify? This was used in a source to say they have different backgrounds and locations as the development and purpose of NRAs changed over time, but agree it's unclear, reworded. "which had the experience managing visitors in the outdoors" - I think this should be "which had experience of managing visitors in the outdoors" Changed to "experience in" "Of the NPS's 18 sites, 12 are based around large reservoirs emphasizing water recreation, and 5 are near urban areas and include both historic preservation and outdoor recreation" - that only adds up to 17, what's the other one? Delaware Water Gap, which was supposed to have a reservoir but it wasn't built. Didn't want to put too much detail about just that one in the lead (it's in the history) but could reword. Thanks, Reywas92Talk 20:56, 19 February 2021 (UTC) That's as much as I have time to look at right now, I'll pick up the rest later..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 20:07, 19 February 2021 (UTC) Further comments "due the inherent lack of a natural landscape" - word "to" missing Fixed "so long as they do not disrupt recreation" - think this should be "so long as they did not disrupt recreation" Fixed Two of the first three entries in the table (and a few later on) have sentence fragments at the end of the note which consist solely of a wikilink but with no context - what's that about? All the USFS ones give the national forest it's part of, and I didn't think it's necessary to repeat "It is within the..." every time. I added a note in the text above, or I could put them in parentheses. Personally I think it would be best to stick "Part of the....." in front of each one. It reads oddly (to me at least) when you have a note written in natural language like "Springer Mountain, the southern end of the Appalachian Trail, is the centerpiece of this portion of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Its forests protect streams of the Chattahoochee River watershed." and then you have the name of the forest stuck on the end not written in the same way...... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 09:21, 21 February 2021 (UTC) Done. Reywas92Talk 18:51, 21 February 2021 (UTC) Boston Harbor Islands note starts with a number written as a digit which looks odd, especially as the one below starts with a number written as a word Fixed Lake Mead note includes "Nine A portion is also part of...." - either the word Nine is a typo and shouldn't be there, or else "Nine A portion" is some really weird terminology with which I am unfamiliar Completed the sentence I left undone. Ref 2 has a title but nothing else (no publisher, etc) Removed since it just summarizes the table and wasn't necessary in the lead Ref 20 only has a title and also is a link to another WP article, which is not permitted as a ref It does have an external link, but I filled out the rest of the formatting. Thank you! Reywas92Talk 00:14, 21 February 2021 (UTC) Apologies, apparently I missed that the "2.2" at the end was linked to an external source, I thought it was all just one bluelink to the WP article on CFR36 -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 09:21, 21 February 2021 (UTC) Think that's it from me..... -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 21:59, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

• Support -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 08:33, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
• Support, overall a nice work. There is so much prose that this could in fact be a valid FA candidate as well, but FL works fine. A possible improvement would be a footnote in Visitors (2019), explaining why some cells are empty - there is a line above but one has to look for it. Up to you. --Tone 14:51, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Comments by Dudley

• "multiple-use management including both conservation and limited utilization of natural resources". I am not sure what "limited utilization of natural resources" means. Small scale mining but not large scale? This needs clarification.
  • Sort of, yeah. This is just the first paragraph and is discussed further later: it's often allowed provided it doesn't interfere with recreational qualities of the park. I'm not going to give details in the first paragraph because there aren't consistent rules for every area with different resources and many past activities have ended. For some examples, Flaming Gorge NRA's creation law said trona mining would be allowed provided it was underground. Mineral claims at Lake Mead and Gauley River have expired, but there was at least a 2009 proposal to drill in Spruce Knob-Seneca Rocks NRA; five of the NPS NRAs' enabling legislation specifically allowed for mineral leasing. Glen Canyon NRA is among those that allow grazing.
• "exemplary recreation sites". What does "exemplary" mean here?
  • I think definitions 1, 3, and 4 here would apply, do you have a better word?
• 13,200.11 km2. Rounding to two decimal places is excessive, especially as you only round to one in the sites. I suggest rounding to the nearest whole number.
  • Fixed the template.
• "the National Park Service sought to balance its conservation and recreation efforts with dams". I am not sure what this means.
  • Should I add "man-made" before "dams"? Which are by definition not conserving the natural landscape. I feel like this should be clear in context of the sentence with "flooded a scenic valley" where a dam was controversially not balanced with conservation and recreation.
• "Virgin National Park in the region" Which region?
  • Added Arizona and Nevada about the Boulder Canyon Project before that.
• "inherent lack of a natural landscape" What does this mean? Too much farmland?
  • "Lake Mead, to then be the world's largest reservoir"; changed to "a reservoir's inherent lack"
• "However, it contributed to the controversial proposals of Echo Park Dam and Bridge Canyon Dam in existing NPS areas that were canceled after considerable opposition from environmentalists." What contributed?
  • "This interagency partnership" of the previous sentence
• "square them with the broader picture of the agency" "broader aims"?
  • Changed
• "tour Fort Hancock and Sandy Hook Light, the country's oldest." Oldest what?
  • Lighthouse, added.
• "The 25 miles (40 km) of the Gauley River downstream of the Summersville Dam and 5 miles (8.0 km)" More inconsistency in rounding.
  • This was the default of the convert template but I've forced rounding.
• "of the Meadow River offer world-class whitewater rafting" "world-class" is touristic and unencyclopedic.
  • How about "premier", "superior", "adventurous", or just "technically difficult"?
• "The urban waterfront area includes for history buffs the penitentiary of Alcatraz Island, the Presidio of San Francisco, the Sutro Baths ruins, and Fort Point. Across the Golden Gate hikers can wander through wooded valleys and among coast redwoods of Muir Woods National Monument" "for history buffs" and "can wander" are unencyclopedic.
  • Modified. I got tired of saying "you can hike" in every item.
• "hikers look down from scenic overlooks on rim trails" More tourist hype.
  • Better than the boring and repetitive "There are scenic viewpoints" I've already used several times. Slightly modified, or suggestions?
• I suggest linking "mesa".
  • Done
• "244,814 acres (990.73 km2 (42,503 acres (172.0 km2) NPS, 202,311 acres (818.72 km2) USFS)" "1,000,000 acres (4,046.9 km2)" More inconsistent rounding. Rounding a million to one decimal place is absurd.
  • Changed template to -1 since it's the only one I couldn't find a precise number for. Reywas92^Talk 21:51, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
• This is an interesting article but some of the text is clumsy and unclear. Dudley Miles (talk) 19:08, 8 March 2021 (UTC)
  • @Dudley Miles: has the nominator addressed your concerns or are some still outstanding? --PresN 16:36, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

• There are still some comments which read to me as touristic and uncencyclopedic, such as "the rest are other exemplary recreation sites", "offer world-class whitewater rafting", "hikers can wander through wooded valleys", and "hikers can look down from scenic vistas on rim trails". I prefer not to vote either way on this one. Dudley Miles (talk) 11:16, 2 April 2021 (UTC)
  • "Exemplary" is not touristic, it means "worthy of imitation" "serving as an illustration or specimen" and "serving as a model or pattern", which ties the lead to the line in the Management section "The Forest Service manages its NRAs as "showcases" of its management standards so that their programs, services, and facilities should be better than and models for its other recreation sites" so yes, they are exemplary and this is not unencyclopedic. "World-class" as a simple adjective is not unencyclopedic, it's a factual term consistent with the source and used in [2][3][4], etc. and even if those are overall touristic, the more neutral [5] and [6] put it in the top in the world, so we need some adjective here. "Premier", "highly rated"? I excised "wander" and "look down" for you. Reywas92^Talk 17:10, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Comments from TRM

• "National recreation areas emphasize" use the abbreviation. Y
• "They are established by an act" vs "which was created by a 1936 agreement between" does this mean the first one (early ones) were not created by an act of Congress?
  • Correct, the history covers that the first several were agreements, but they have all since been formalized by Congress
• Second para of lead is unreferenced. If it's covered in the main article, why is the first para referenced?
  • Because the fact at the end of the first para is not repeated in the article.
• Link Hoover Dam for the many millions of non-US readers.
  • Y Sorry it's linked at the start of the history section and missed doing so there too
• "NRAs are managed by the National Park Service" NPS. Y
• "Of the NPS's 18 sites,..." what about the last one?
  • Delaware Water Gap, which was intended to be at a dam but it was never built. I wanted to keep the lead concise but added something for it if that works.
• "They are located in 26 states" The NRAs (the last "they" was the USFS's 22 sites).Y
• "NRAs of the Forest Service" USFS.Y
• "those of the National Park Service have" NPS.Y
• "Service have a total area of 3,714,735" -> "NPS total 3,714,735" Y
• "The Bureau of Land Management's one" BLM. Y
• That sentence is unref. Y
• "to then be the " don't follow this, are you saying it was to be the largest at the time once complete?
  • Yes, it was not built yet, it would be the largest once complete, and it no longer is today; maybe "to be the world's then-largest reservoir"?
• "sought to balance its conservation and recreation efforts with dams, and it could provide" doesn't scan for me.
  • "it" is the National Park Service in both uses, maybe "sought to better balance its conservation and recreation efforts with dams, and here it could..."?
• "pushed by" promoted? Y
• "while Albright reluctantly agreed to support the USBR with visitor services." unref. Y also Rothman ref.
• "a growing National Park Service" etc etc, if you have the abbreviation, use it. Y
• "His Mission 66 vision.." unref. Y also Rothman ref.
• Link Delaware River. Y
• "The National Park Service, in" overlinked. Y
• "manage the NRAs" the 41 NRAs.
• Hold on, the lead starts saying there are 40....
  • Yes, one is co-managed
• "the United States Army Corps of Engineers primarily" overlinked and use abbr. Y
• "and it is generally permitted in... " unref. Y
• Use full date format, it's not like there isn't enough space in the column. Y
• Image column shouldn't sort. Y
• Table sorts three ways for me.
  • Not sure what you mean by this
    • Click on a heading (e.g. Area) and it should sort two ways, i.e. largest to smallest or smallest to largest. There shouldn't be three ways of sorting a numerical column. The Rambling Man (Stay alert! Control the virus! Save lives!!!!) 07:10, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

  I clicked area and it sorted smallest to largest, then I clicked again and it was largest to smallest, and on third click it returned to default, which is alphabetized by name. Every column on every table does this and you can see it in the little arrow symbol. Reywas92^Talk 17:40, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

• "provides for excellent scuba diving" guide book tone. Y
• For blank attendance cells, put an en-dash or N/A or something, just don't leave blank.
  • I thought about that, but those imply to me that it's not applicable at all, not just that that particular data point isn't collected, so I marked them with asterisks
• No ref for Ed Jenkins entry. Y
• Second half of Gateway entry unref. Y Oops it's the same one as the first half
• "offer world-class whitewater rafting" guidebook.
  • I already covered this above, I'm not going to just say "offers whitewater rafting" because plenty of rivers do that but this is actually recognized as among the best, but suggestion for a better adjective is welcome
    • Well if multiple reviewers are concerned with tone then I'd suggest it's an issue. You could "quote" it, or describe who claims it to be "world-class" so we have attribution rather than such a claim in Wikipedia's voice. Or evidence that supports the claim, e.g. are there world level events held there regularly? The Rambling Man (Stay alert! Control the virus! Save lives!!!!) 07:10, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

  @The Rambling Man Made it a quotation. Reywas92^Talk 17:49, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

• "agatized" what's that? Y
• "and mountaineering[44]" period before ref. Y
• Why isn't Challis actually "Salmon–Challis" per the article? Y It's two forests administered together
• Ref 53 should be an en-dash not a spaced hyphen. Y Gotta blame Cornell and the ref autogenerator for that. I'm normally the one correcting others on this but I'm not sure when you're supposed to correct the source!
• Consistency with format, see ref 7 has NPS in italics, mostly other not in italics. Y
• Also check ref 67 v ref 68 (for example). Y
• Finally, why isn't the article at "National Recreation Area" per all the names of the NRAs themselves and the template at the bottom of the page and the categories etc?
  • Same as National monument (United States), List of national parks of the United States, etc it's a common noun when used as a general term, a proper noun when used as part of the name of a specific one. I know there is some inconsistency among which of many types of pages (and templates) in different countries have been moved to do this or not, but I do understand the argument to present it as a proper designation too.

Plenty to do here after a quick first pass. The Rambling Man (Stay alert! Control the virus! Save lives!!!!) 19:51, 2 May 2021 (UTC)

• Thank you for your useful comments! Reywas92^Talk 04:40, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

  @The Rambling Man Anything else? I didn't understand your comment on sorting three ways. Reywas92^Talk 00:46, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Support my main concerns addressed. The Rambling Man (Stay alert! Control the virus! Save lives!!!!) 09:09, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Source review – Pass

Doing now. Aza24 (talk) 23:59, 10 May 2021 (UTC) Reviewed version: [7]

Formatting

• Ref 6 and 38 missing retrieval dates Y
  • Though, Template:Cite_book#URL: "Not required for linked documents that do not change." Reywas92^Talk 03:06, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
• For ref 38, I almost wonder if United States Department of Agriculture should be the publisher and U.S. Forest Service be the author. I think this makes more sense, thoughts?
  • That doesn't, the USFS is an agency within the Dept of Ag. USFS is the publisher, and the author would be its unnamed employees or the agency as well, but of course its typical for agencies to also list their department on their publications.
• Wondering the same as above on ref 51 (except with National Park Service this time)
  • Same. It's not like departments publish things agencies write, the agency can publish something too.

Reliability

• 24 is on the edge, but is passable, I would think
  • National Parks Traveler is a respected non-profit organization.
• 57 is from a blog (so unreliable), unless you can prove the author is a Subject-matter expert. I would suggest finding an alternative source
  • I have no concerns with this source, Tom Kloster is a founder of Trailkeepers of Oregon and the Mount Hood National Park Campaign. Contemporaneous to that he was published in The Oregonian about Mount Hood and he is an expert on the subject.
    • You'll have to excuse my caution, would you mind proving a source or two to confirm that? Aza24 (talk) 02:30, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
      • [8][9][10]. I'm happy to cite him that mountain biking occurs there. Reywas92^Talk 03:06, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
        • Splendid, thank you. Aza24 (talk) 00:49, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Verifiability

• Suggest adding an OCLC (as a substitute for ISBN— just to "|oclc=") to ref 38 (found here) Y
• suggested OCLC for ref 51 (here) Y Reywas92^Talk 02:28, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
  • Thanks for all of this; if I seemed picky with the retrieval dates, it was only because you had them for other documents of the same nature (was just looking for consistency). Pass for source review. Aza24 (talk) 00:49, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Promoting. --PresN 03:47, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

• Closing note: This candidate has been promoted, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FLC/ar, and leave the {{featured list candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through.

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.