Talk:Birmingham/Archive 13

Twinned with Nanjing?
This page and the Nanjing page list a Birmingham–Nanjing twinning but neither gives a reference for it, and the Birmingham City Council list of partner cities doesn't mention Nanjing. Does anyone know whether they are twinned or otherwise linked? --Mgp28 (talk) 10:55, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The Local Government Association database of twinned towns also makes no mention of Nanjing being twinned to Birmingham. --Mgp28 (talk) 11:12, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I've taken it off the list until someone comes up with a reference for it. --Mgp28 (talk) 21:06, 12 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Birmingham's not listed on the relevant page on Nanjing's internet site so I think it's safe to leave Nanjing off permanently. -- Daduzi  talk  12:38, 21 April 2011 (UTC)


 * The twin towns section needs proper sourcing; if proper third-party sources cannot be found, it probably should be removed. --John (talk) 10:28, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

Tidy up?
This article is quite long at 115kB and has a few sections whose purpose or value seems unclear


 * Notable people - although this is a section mandated by WP:UKCITIES, it seems to make a lot more sense for small settlements where being the birthplace of an actor is a big deal, rather than a city of a million people with three centuries or so of global historic and cultural significance, where the number of notable residents and births is going to be huge. Manchester has no Notable People section and is a FA, London, Glasgow, Leeds and Sheffield manage without one too. And most of the content here seems to be at best duplication anyway - surely the notable musicians should be in the music section, the notable politicians in the history section etc?


 * Crime and Policing - no mention of this in WP:UKCITIES, and no other major cities seem to have a dedicated section with such a detailed breakdown. This might have a point if crime in Birmingham was exceptionally notable, but in fact it seems neither particularly high for a city of its size (much lower than London or Manchester, or even Hull, for example), nor exceptionally low (it's well above the national average). Wouldn't this section be best replaced by one or two summary sentences in the Governance section? If a detailed statistical crime breakdown was felt to be an essential facet of encycolpedic coverage of Birmingham then it could be moved to Government of Birmingham.


 * Places of interest - again a fair bit of repetition here - the art galleries are already mentioned in the culture section, would the museums be better moved in there too? The parks stuff is important though, WP:UKCITIES suggests it should go in a "Community facilities" section, what do people think?


 * Nearby places - seems to fall foul of WP:LIST, and again doesn't seem to have equivalents on other major UK city articles. The prose in the geography section already mentions the major urbans contexts of the Black Country and Solihull, would it be better to replace nearby places with a sentence or two about surrounding towns outside the conurbation?

Thoughts?

JimmyGuano (talk) 21:16, 12 September 2010 (UTC)


 * In the absence of any howls of pain I've made a start on this. More to come... JimmyGuano (talk) 08:45, 19 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The article seems to have grown since you wrote the above (not helped by me either) so I think I'll be lending a hand where I can to help streamline the article without losing the quality.Pahazzard (talk) 17:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Proposals for further tidy-ups

 * Population figures are entered three times, in the opening section, in the infobox, and in the Geography section. Should we keep just one set of figures in the info box?Pahazzard (talk) 18:57, 6 May 2012 (UTC)
 * First time I read this i agreed, but thinking about it again the entire purposes of both the lead and the infobox are to repeat content from the article - the lead to summarise and the infobox to tabulate. Population figures are definitely sufficiently important to merit being in both - "how big is it?" is probably one of the two most crucial pieces of information to contextualise a settlement (alongside "where is it?"), and city/urban area/metropolitan area and the three standard worldwide measures for this. JimmyGuano (talk) 08:42, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * This para in Economy section: The city's three Universities, (Aston University, University of Birmingham and Birmingham City University) and two University colleges have over 65,000 students and employ around 15,000 staff, making a significant contribution to the city's economy as well as its research and innovation base. almost repeats in the education section. Should we combine into a single statement in the education section?Pahazzard (talk) 18:57, 6 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Can't see any need for this to be duplicated - everything in the Education section is part of the city's economy, by definition. JimmyGuano (talk) 08:42, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * There is nothing whatsoever about prisons and hospitals - Birmingham has some notable ones, but do we have the room? Pahazzard (talk) 20:11, 6 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Hospitals definitely - it's mandated by WP:UKCITIES too. Less sure about prisons - are Birmingham's prisons particularly notable? JimmyGuano (talk) 08:42, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * It looks like we need a Public Services section then, which would also incorporate the paragraph on police, fire, and ambulance services; prisons probably not worth a mention. I have also already written some words on Birminghams water supply, which I think is noteworthy given the Elan Reservoirs and aqueduct:


 * The Birmingham Corporation Water Department was set up in 1876 to supply water to Birmingham, up until 1974 when its responsibilities were transferred to Severn Trent Water. Most of Birminghams water is supplied by the Elan aqueduct, opened in 1904; water is fed by gravity to Frankley Reservoir, Frankley, and Bartley Reservoir, Bartley Green, from reservoirs in the Elan Valley, Wales.


 * I'll put something together on hospitals and see where that leaves us Pahazzard (talk) 16:54, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Good plan. That looks an excellent addition. JimmyGuano (talk) 18:47, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * The water addition looks great, though it could perhaps do with a reference or two, especially as the linked articles are themselves quite poorly referenced. The addition of a public services section is also a step forward, though I'm not sure that it makes sense to include Education within it (WP:UKCITIES mandates a separate Education section as part of the core article structure). Public Services also seem a bit excessively subdivided at the moment - I'm not sure we need a sub-heading per paragraph. What do you think? JimmyGuano (talk) 20:33, 8 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Yes, references are lacking, I'm hoping to fix this sometime this week (but don't let me stop you in the meantime of course). I hadn't picked up on the seperate education section in WP:UKCITIES before, but that is an easy fix. As for sub-headings, on the negative side they do break up the text somewhat, but on the positive side they make things easier to find in the Index links, which is useful for a big article. I think I would always lean towards having them in, but I'm not precious about it either if the consensus is not to have them. I'll try to do some more work tonight on the above Pahazzard (talk) 11:59, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Industrial History
It seems to me that there is a possible new section or sub-section required to better describe Birminghams impressive and famed Industrial History; jewellery, guns, cars, motorcycles, clocks, and industrial engineering to name just a few. Many of these are of course mentioned in the article already, but they are somewhat spread around the sections. Something more condensed, and it does not have to be many paragraphs, might be better to provide an easily read summary or overview. Any thoughts or comments? Pahazzard (talk) 22:20, 4 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Shouldn't that just be part of the history section? If a particular industry was a major influence on the course of the city's history then it should be part of the city's core narrative. If it wasn't, then it's probably not significant enough for this article (except perhaps as part of a list illustrating the city's general historical economic diversity).


 * While this article has got a lot of scope for improvement, we need to bear in mind it's already quite long. Major additions of more detailed content probably belong in sub-srticles unless there's stuff we can prune from this article to make room for it. Economic history of Birmingham might be a much more appropriate home for detailed, industry-by-industry coverage and has a lot of scope for growth, for example. JimmyGuano (talk) 06:27, 5 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Given the length of the article then yes, this should be limited to a paragraph or two either in the history section, or the science and invention section, and then perhaps tidy ups elsewhere to help condense the other more distrubed information (easier said than done perhaps given the scope). My (very rough and ready) thoughts on the wording are something as follows:


 * Birmingham has a rich and varied industrial and manufacturing heritage, that continues in the present day. This renown includes for gun making and jewellery, from which certain quarters of the city owe their names; finely engineered devices, such as silverware, pens, clocks and watches; the automotive industry, including for various manufacturers of bicycles, motorcycles, cars, coaches, tractors and lorries; and foodstuffs such as custard and chocolate; to name but a few. Throughout the centuries various manufacturers have come and gone, been merged and conglomerated, but many have gone on to become worldwide brands, such as Cadbury's, Jaguar, and Dunlop, that can trace their ancestry back to humble beginings in and around Birmingham.
 * Pahazzard (talk) 13:26, 5 May 2012 (UTC)


 * A lot of that comes dangerously close to being peacock prose - words that "promote the subject of an article, while neither imparting nor plainly summarizing verifiable information". What are we trying to say here? It's pretty well established, generally considered significant and eminently citable that Birmingham had an unusually diversified economic base for much of its history, but the article already says that - in the lead, no less. (And remember that modern historians such as Maxine Berg, John Money and Eric Hopkins have stressed that this economic breadth extended well beyond manufacturing and included important finance, service and what we'd now call "cultural and media" sectors, even in Birmingham's industrial heyday - contemporary views may have stressed the drama of Birmingham's industries because they were new, loud and highly visible, but the evidence is that Birmingham was never simply "a vast forge"). "Manufacturers have come and gone, been merged and conglomerated" - well yes, that's what companies do, particularly when you look at a span of several centuries. I agree that the "Economy" section could probably do with a brief mention of some of the more notable historic companies and brands in the manufacturing paragraph, though, in the same way that Lloyds Bank etc are mentioned in the service sector section. JimmyGuano (talk) 07:21, 6 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Yes, it is a bit peacocky isn't it! but I did say it was "rough and ready". Since I suggested this, and having re-read the article several times over the last couple of days, I have the following observations: The Science and Invention section feels a bit lost at the end of the article; and the history section, Early Modern sub-section in particular, includes a lot of descriptions that could/should(?) fall under Science and Invention as well.


 * My current thoughts therfore are that the History section is slightly re-arranged perhaps, include for a Science and Invention sub-section, (or perhaps this is re-phrased to something like Industrial History, or Science, Invention and Industry), and including some of the contents from the sub-section Early Modern, and finally including for a summary sentance or short paragraph, something like I have written above - but less peacocky of course.Pahazzard (talk) 09:28, 6 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Fair enough! Wasn't having a go I promise. And well done with all the cruft-pruning the other day. The Science and Invention section is definitely a bit weak and its purpose unclear - moving its content to the general history bit where it's not already duplicated there does make sense. Science and Invention (or more precisely the wider phenomenon of which it is a part - free-thinking and innovation) and industrial entrepreneurship are so central to the story of Birmingham's growth and to its importance from a global perspective that I'm still not sure that it makes sense for it to have a separate section, though - it's really the narrative core that the whole history section should be built around, as it is with the early modern bit. I'd vote for mentioning the major historic brands in the Economy section, deleting Science and Invention as a separate section and making sure that Science, Invention and Industry are fully covered in the relevant bits of the history section (It's badly lacking from the 19th and 20th century bits - can't believe that there's no mention of Alexander Parkes, Rowland Hill or the Frisch–Peierls memorandum for example) It would be good if we could keep the more trivia-focused bits out though (Brylcreem, custard powder...) JimmyGuano (talk) 08:22, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * No need to worry about the peacock thing, I thought it was funny that's all. I'm inclining to agree with your thoughts on the format of the history section, and building in a core narrative to better gel together the science, invention and industrial entrepreneurship stuff. Oh, and if anyone deserves praise for the development of this article, then it is you - I'm just happy to help where I can, Pahazzard (talk) 10:06, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * No, it's great that you're giving it a bit of concerted attention. It's good to hear that I've made a positive difference, but I could sometimes perhaps do with reminding that I don't WP:OWN the thing too. Apart from the usual drive-bys (which can obviously be important and positive parts of the wiki-ecosystem) and the odd "Second City"-obsessed Mancunian or Glaswegian it's felt a bit lonely here on occasion. JimmyGuano (talk) 13:02, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Oh, hi. Mr Stephen (talk) 21:18, 7 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Didn't mean to over-generalise! There are a few though - we probably all know who they are. JimmyGuano (talk) 20:07, 8 May 2012 (UTC)


 * There, I did it! Well I made a start at least in merging the science invention stuff into a new sub-section in Early Modern History. This seems to fit well here. There are some good words that I did not want to delete, but I think some further pruning and edits may still be required? Pahazzard (talk) 20:28, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Article Size
OK, since it is bound to come up at some point: This is a big article, but put it into context, it is on par with other UK city articles:
 * London = 166,525 bytes
 * Birmingham = 149,495 bytes
 * Liverpool = 146,902 bytes
 * Manchester = 132,156 bytes
 * Newcastle = 125,829 bytes
 * Edinburgh = 120,572 bytes
 * Leeds = 119,419 bytes

So, it's big, but it's also a smaller article than London, and since it is the second biggest city in England, is that not some justification? I'm not saying that this makes it an automatic "right" to have an article this length, but it does provide a context.

Suggestions then? I can't rationally see anything in particular that is surplus to requirements, in fact there could be more that could be reasonably added. Some pruning might still be required in places, but anything more than a few thousand bytes most likely would be detremental to the content and quality. Given the "advice" on article size there may be suggestions at some point to do something more extreme? I have estimated the 'readable prose' is just over 60,000 bytes, and from WP:Article size it is stated:
 * > 60 KB Probably should be divided (although the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading time)

In my viewpoint then, and considering the scope of the subject, and in context with sizes of other UK cities articles, the article size for Birmingham is probably acceptable. Any other views? Pahazzard (talk) 21:53, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Manchester is the only FA there, and at the time it was promoted it was about 100k. That was plenty big enough in my opinion. Mr Stephen (talk) 21:12, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's so unprecedentedly huge that it needs an immediate wholesale slaughter of content, but I do think it's at the point where anybody proposing major new additions needs to be suggesting what they are proposing to replace. Any decent-sized city, by the very nature of cities as large complex multi-faceted things, is going to have far more stuff notable enough for inclusion in wikipedia than can feasibly be covered in a single article. That's what sub-articles are for! Birmingham has quite a lot of quite poor sub-articles on some pretty important subjects - they are far more needing of love than the main article, which isn't actually that bad. The main article on any city is always going to be an exercise in separating the "nice to haves" from the "need to haves". Writing less is always harder than writing more. JimmyGuano (talk) 20:24, 8 May 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't see any reason to split it other than page load speed of course. Other than that it's a model article every contributor should be proud of with no immediate issues. Thanks  J e n o v a  20 20:37, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

A more useful measure of article size than kb of raw wiki text (which can be inflated by tables or alt text for images) might be the number of words. For comparison, when the Manchester article was promoted in 2007 it was 6,778 words long and could probably now do with a trim. 8 or 9,000 words isn't unmanageable for readers in a single sitting, but it is an issue worth bearing in mind when adding further detail. Nev1 (talk) 21:11, 8 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Liverpool 10,468
 * London 9,593
 * Edinburgh 9,188
 * Birmingham 8,801 words
 * Newcastle 8,325
 * Manchester 8,133 words
 * Leeds 7,965

Montage
I've changed the montage picture at the top of this article. The existing one had a few problems - above all it didn't credit any of its constituent pictures, so wasn't following the attribution element of CC or GDFL licensing. Additionally its skyline photo was poorly exposed and about a decade out of date, with an unfinished Orion building, a pre-reclad Rotunda and a still-existing Stephenson Tower; it had two photographs of what is essentially the same building - the Council House/Art Gallery - which is anyway relatively un-notable architecturally; and it had a slightly odd photograph of an anonymous series of apartment blocks on the edge of the Jewellery Quarter.

For the replacement I've used an up-to-date skyline shot that reflects both the urbanity of the city centre and the leafiness of the suburbs; and a selection of other photos of buildings that all qualify as recognised landmarks and together represent the full range of the city's architecture: the city's most notable 18th century, early 19th century, late 19th/early 20th century, early postwar and contemporary buildings respectively. I've also tried to avoid using pictures too similar to ones already used elsewhere in the article. JimmyGuano (talk) 08:58, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Music
It in the section about music, it reads "Although it produced no single band as big as The Beatles..". Now, i think that statement is a little too one-sided. I mean look at Black Sabbath and Judas Priest. I would say that those two bands are as big as the Beatles. BS and JP are pioneers of heavy metal and they did change the sound of music when they first came out in the late 60s. Norum 22:09, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Black Sabbath have been called "The Beatles of Heavy Metal", but nobody calls The Beatles "The Black Sabbath of everything except Heavy Metall". Seriously though, the point is there because it's in the source. It's also correct - Black Sabbath are hugely influential worldwide and their importance is probably underestimated because of metal's unfashinability, but I challenge you to find a serious reliable source that would claim they're more important than The Beatles. JimmyGuano (talk) 21:38, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Obviously nobody can call the Beatles the Black Sabbath of pop/rock or whatever just for the fact that the Beatles came out several years before Black Sabbath did, but I believe that BS had as much influence on music as did the Beatles. (by the way, I actually like both bands).  Norum 02:28, 31 August 2012 (UTC)
 * That's a perfectly legitimate opinion, but for inclusion in wikipedia a statement needs to fairly reflect reliable sources. If you can find a significant body of these that support your claim then account should certainly be taken of them, but I suspect it's not a widely held opinion. (I like Black Sabbath as well as the Beatles too - "Paranoid" in particular is an astonishingly fine song by any measure) JimmyGuano (talk) 20:57, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

With regards to population
Was there any reason why my edits to include the population of the urban sub-division were reverted? The population for the city is indeed 1,073,000, but the town of Sutton Coldfield that lies in the city borough is counted as a separate town within that, which is why I added the figure for the sub-division of just Birmingham itself. It would also fall more in-line with the figures used on the article for List of largest United Kingdom settlements by population, which lists Sutton as separate. --LivingInMediocrity (talk) 11:50, 5 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Although I didn't revert it I do agree with its reversion - Urban Sub-divisions are a very odd and low-profile measure that although reliable in their source are used by almost nobody, so aren't really appropriate for the lead of the article. There are all sorts of perfectly legitimate but highly obscure ways of measuring the populations of cities (eg three different types of Primary Urban Area, Larger Urban Zones, Travel to Work Areas etc). We can't include them all. The lead of the article should stick to the three standard measures that are most universally used and understood: the administrative city, the urban area and the metropolitan area, delineating respectively the political, physical and economic extent of the city (it's not an accident that these are the three figures specified in the standard infobox template). There might be an argument for including some of the more "niche interest" measures, perhaps including localities, in Demography of Birmingham, I guess.


 * Falling in line with List of largest United Kingdom settlements by population is definitely the last thing on earth we should be doing - that's a travesty of an article, wrongly and misleadingly titled, inconsistently sourced and riddled with original research. JimmyGuano (talk) 19:20, 5 September 2012 (UTC)


 * If nobody uses them, then why are urban sub-divisions cited as the population figures for other towns and cities, rather than exclusively the figures for the administrative areas? --LivingInMediocrity (talk) 15:06, 7 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Good question - that's one of wikipedia's great mysteries. It's wishful thinking in some cases - life would be so much simpler if there was a single definitive measure of a settlement, and some wikipedians have latched on to "localities", with some of their obvious absurdities covered up by a bit of judicious original research, as the answer to their prayers when in fact there's absolutely no evidence to suggest that they are definitive, or even particularly widely recognised. They are also used sometimes when they suit individual editors agendas. Brummies determined to prove that Birmingham is conclusively the "second city" find them very attractive for example as they show Birmingham to be over twice the size of pretty much everywhere else, so wouldn't it be great if they were somehow the only measure that counted. (Salford is entirely unrelated to Manchester - Hooray! Look how tiny Leeds is - Hooray!)


 * I'm not suggesting we should exclusively use administrative boundaries though - just that we should use common and widely understood measures in preference to obscure ones wherever possible. There may be some circumstances when "localities" are simply the only option, in which case they are obviously entirely legitimate as the ONS is a very reliable source. They should be used as a last resort, rather than ubiquitously though, IMO, and should always be carefully explained (in particular they are "localities", not "settlements") JimmyGuano (talk) 07:29, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

Population density
Someone keeps editing this to alter the population density statistics, but without giving any reference for the changes. The only up to date reference I can find is this: http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/cs/Satellite?blobcol=urldata&blobheader=application%2Fpdf&blobheadername1=Content-Disposition&blobkey=id&blobtable=MungoBlobs&blobwhere=1223529056174&ssbinary=true&blobheadervalue1=attachment%3B+filename%3D5571004BDB_2012-02_201__Census_Population__estimates.pdf

Which gives the density as 40.07 persons per hectare. But I don't know how that translates into per km or per mile. Can someone check this? G-13114 (talk) 13:58, 31 March 2013 (UTC)


 * 1 sq mile is about 260 hectares and 1 sq km is exactly 100 hectares so, 40/hectare works out at 4000/sq km or about 10400/sq mile, (which sounds a lot to me; I'm glad I don't live there any more :-)). --Roly (talk) 15:13, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Disambiguation header
I was about to shorten the header, but saw a hidden note telling me to come here. So here I am. Clearly the UK city is primary topic, no question. But there is still a decent minority of people who might type in Birmingham thinking of the Alabaman city, hence the hatnote. 100% of the people looking for the Alabama city will follow that link once they see it. Do we really need to include "the U.S. city named after it" (emphasis mine)? On smaller resolutions this stretches the header out. I don't see the rationale. How does reading that the city was named after Birmingham, England narrow it down to help anybody find the Alabaman city? "Oh, good, phew, I almost clicked on that link--whoops, I need a U.S. city named "Birmingham" not named after the original one in England!" Red Slash 18:06, 18 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Sounds a good point to me. The extra clause is particularly unhelpful as some of the other American Birminghams, eg Birmingham, Michigan, are also named after the English one, so instead of disambiguating the options it is actively ambiguating them (if that's a word...) by implying a distinction that doesn't actually distinguish between them. JimmyGuano (talk) 19:35, 18 May 2013 (UTC)


 * In the absence of any objections I've changed it to be hopefully a bit clearer. JimmyGuano (talk) 18:00, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Political influence
I have reverted User:Lozzaboy's deletion of a sentence form the lead for the second time. The first time round he/she deleted three references to printed works on the basis of "broken links" (not quite sure how books can be broken links???), now it has been deleted on the basis that "this is not a travel blog".

The key work cited - by Ward - is a scholarly work that summarises the city's political history, and the quotation - "Such a firm basis of local support enabled political leaders, from Thomas Attwood to Neville Chamberlain, to exert leverage in national politics. No provincial city had a greater influence on the shaping of British democracy and on the governance of the British state than Birmingham." - directly supports the claim in the lead.

This content was discussed previously at Talk:Birmingham/Archive_12.

JimmyGuano (talk) 20:42, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Sentence was reverted in good faith, the book quoted is a literary work from one publishers perspective, not a view cited by general different bodies of work. The wikipedia article should read what is the general perception of the city, not as a travel document highlighting the work of one individual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lozzaboy (talk • contribs) 21:25, 15 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Happy to assume good faith. However there are three books cited. One is by Asa Briggs, one of the leading British historians of the twentieth century, possibly the world's foremost expert on Victorian England and Birmingham's official historian. One (Ward) is the most recently published single-volume political history of the city, and the quoted sentence is from its summary on the cover, not an obscure sentence lifted from deep within and given undue prominence. The third work cited (Hattersley) is not by an academic historian but as a published biographer and major figure in British political life for 4 decades his views are hardly worthless. The statement in the lead isn't in any way an obscure or minority opinion, it is mainstream historical thought, and the cited sources are about as reliable and authoritative as you could possibly hope for. JimmyGuano (talk) 14:43, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Birmingham Montage
Birmingham has had the same montage on it's wiki page for over a year now. It's nearly 2014 and we need to change it. Please agree or disagree with this. As soon as we get 10 votes we will appoint a designer and hopefully it will be ready by the new year. Please click on this link below:

http://poll.pollcode.com/1576189#sthash.HtDouAVe.dpuf — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sploderjak (talk • contribs) 18:13, 11 November 2013 (UTC)


 * As per WP:DEMOCRACY, decisions like this are taken by discussion and consensus, not random "for entertainment only" polls.


 * Quite a lot of thought went into the current montage, but it's far from sacrosanct. The fact that it's been there for over a year is far from a reason to change it though - stable articles are a good thing, not a bad thing. What do you feel is missing, or which of the current images do you feel doesn't justify its place?


 * JimmyGuano (talk) 19:25, 11 November 2013 (UTC)


 * The Alpha tower and University of Birmingham pictures need to be updated or changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sploderjak (talk • contribs) 07:23, 12 November 2013 (UTC)


 * Why? And what would you propose to replace them with? JimmyGuano (talk) 09:24, 12 November 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree. There is no need for them to be changed - readers understand what it is. It's not like there bad quality or anything Bschoawsb (talk) 10:01, 12 November 2013 (UTC)


 * I was thinking of the montage on the bloc hotel website: http://www.blochotels.com/out-in-birmingham.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sploderjak (talk • contribs) 20:49, 25 November 2013 (UTC)