Talk:Penarth

Penarth is lovely
LOL...Penarth lovely??? The image that immediately springs to my mind after 25 years of being away from the town was the period during the 1970s when some bright wag added graffito to the sign on the edge of town, so that it read ' Welcome to Penarth - the last resort' 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 07:18, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Billybanks?
18 February 2008 I am more than a little stunned by the reference to the (soon to be demolished) 'Billybanks' development being named after its builder's foreman. To my recollection the bank, upon which the 1960s housing block was built, was known locally as the Bilibanks way way before the building was even conceived. My father and grandfather both told me that it was a shortened version of the Bilberry Banks and had been named after the 'Bilberry' (or blueberry) bushes that grew there naturally on the slopes from pre-Victorian times and were annually raided for the berries by local residents to make fruit pies each autumn. I remember as a child standing amoung the bushes with metal bowls, helping my mother and grandmother harvesting the sticky fruit. Are there any older Penarth residents that can confirm this? Or is there any actual written provenence for this rather peculiar and unlikely 'named after foreman William Banks' story? 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 16:21, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Having spoken to several older Penarth residents regarding the 'Billibanks' history over a hundred years or more I have now reverted the incorrect statement that it was called after a builder's foreman called William Banks in recent years.21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 17:20, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Cogan Coronation AFC 'Peacock Words'
I have removed several paragraphs of information relating to Cogan Coronation. It was full of 'Point of View', flowery 'peacock words' and unsubstantiated statements, none of which had any references. It was written in a style totally unsuited to wikipedia and would be more suited on the teams own website. 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 17:20, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Hancock FRHS.jpg
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Old Cogan Church
Old Cogan Church is noted as being "generally believed to be a saxon church". Is this St Peter's? I didn't know the Saxons settled in Penarth. There's no mention of it in the History section - and it's pretty notable. Does anyone have a source for that? I couldn't find anything on Google. Cheers, Daicaregos (talk) 11:15, 22 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I wondered the same thing. I tidied the line up because it was all in bold, but left the wording as it was. Saxon is hard to swallow...Norman would be unsurprising. Needs more investigation and I will have a nose around when I visit Penarth in the New Year. 21stCenturyGreenstuff (talk) 12:58, 22 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I look forward to that. Pretty intriguing stuff, eh? Enjoy the holidays, 'till next year. Daicaregos (talk) 13:51, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Economy section
This whole section as it stands is almost laughably POV, full of random uncited statements and namechecks - even apart from the fact that most of it has precious little to do with 'economy' as it is generally understood.

"Shoppers are finally being lured back to the town centre, but although local politicians of all parties have been keen to claim the credit for this, it is more likely to be due to the application of local traders and a general civic pride."
 * Completely POV

"A local delicatessen owner, Mrs Sian Fox, won the 2008 Vale businesswoman of the year award."
 * Well good for Mrs Sian Fox, but is this (unsourced) bit of trivia really encyclopedia-worthy? Will anyone read this in the future and think, wow, I never knew that crucial piece of Penarth information!

"The town centre also serves Penarth's many retired residents with a variety of high quality cafes and coffee houses."
 * So anyone under the age of 65 daring to venture into one of these high quality establishments is liable to be thrown out in short order?

"...contributing to Penarth being established as a fair trade town after an initiative by previous mayor Councillor Mark Wilson..." "...the chair, Councillor Mark Wilson, expressed determination to consult with many interested groups..."
 * Not one but two namechecks for this guy! Kind of makes you wonder who wrote....but hey, let's not go there!

"However, despite town centre improvements, the past thirty years has seen many attractive and imposing seafront Victorian hotels and houses demolished in favour of bland 1960s and 1970s style apartment blocks."
 * Unsourced POV

"Many of the town's residents and prominent developers have voiced frustration and anger at the apparent neglect of the seafront area and steer much criticism for this at the Conservative-controlled Vale of Glamorgan local authority..."
 * Unsourced political agenda-pushing

Needs sorting out! Draggleduck (talk) 04:00, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I couldn't agree more, that whole section has always wrankled with me. I have tried searching for valid economy based facts to replace the current content with but have so far failed to find anything germain. There are several anonymous IPs from all political party standpoints that frequently push party lines and attempt point scoring - the most blatent cases of which have been reverted. Hopefully someone with more knowledge and a wider access to cites and references can improve the section. 21st CENTURY  GREENSTUFF 08:49, 12 July 2010 (UTC)


 * If it's a vanity project then delete and renew, even if the majority of the work could be referenced it was still not worthy of inclusion. I've pruned the section back heavily. FruitMonkey (talk) 18:12, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Tides at Penarth
I grew up in Penarth and was very pleased to read the entry, telling me several things I was unaware of (like the abandoned Normandy landing barges on dock beach). The quote about Penarth having the second highest tide range in the world is not how I remember it - it was the Bay of Fundy first and Barry Dock (a couple of miles down river) second. I do not have any facts to quote and the citation given is not explicit.Ppeetteerr (talk) 08:29, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
 * In anything bigger than a regional context, Penarth and Barry are the same place, and have the same 2nd-highest tides. Andy Dingley (talk) 08:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
 * The second highest tidal range is the for the whole of the Severn Estuary, so relates to all places along the coastline - Barry, Lavernock, Penarth, Cardiff, Cleveland, Bristol, Weston etc equally. 21st CENTURY  GREENSTUFF 08:54, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Time for a Clean-up
There's evidently been a lot of work put into building this article, on an important town in Glamorgan. But I think it will be well wort spending some time tidying it up, creating some balance to the sections and improving the inline citations.

A major problem, in my view, is the enormous section on World War 2 in Penarth. This seems completely disproportionate and largely (if not exclusively) drawn from first hand accounts of war veterans on the BBC website. This would constitute first hand research and (on this scale in particular) contravene the guidelines and purpose of Wikipedia. I would strongly suggest this section is edited and concentrates only on notable, verifiable key events.

Less important but still worth doing, would recommend the citations are expanded to describe them better (where, who, what, when, when viewed). Some of them are to dubious sources (e.g. student work) others are outdated or don't verify the facts.

As you can see, I've added a section on the pier - it seems to be one of the most notable things about Penarth but almost nothing about it in the article at the moment. Sionk (talk) 22:51, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Agree. Where shall we start? FruitMonkey (talk) 22:54, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, if you and 21stCenturyGreenstuff think Alfred Sisley is irrelevant to the history of Penarth, then 86-year old Rose Glenn certainly needs to be culled too :) I would suggest the section on World War 2 is reduced to a couple of paragraphs at most and the first-hand quotes in particular are cut out immediately. IMO that is a painful but necessary act. A certain editor here whose name begins with two digits clearly sees himself as a budding war historian and should go away and write a book ;D


 * contrast, Cardiff seems to have very little about WW2, which is the opposite extreme. It was certainly a notable event. A balance needs to be struck.
 * I've identified a few citations that are outdated or broken. I'll flag them as such until replacements can be found. Sionk (talk) 23:34, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Wartime Penarth
Unless there is compelling evidence to the contrary, I suggest a single sentence is retained from each of the paragraphs on World War 2 in Penarth. It seems all of the section is taken (often direct quotes) from the BBC archive project of WW2 veterans' memories - this can almost certainly be described as first hand evidence therefore not appropriate for Wikipedia. Some other info is uncited and could be original research by the author of this section.

A large amount of the information is wordy, in an essay style and wholy un-notable. For example, almost every town in southern Britain had a Home Guard and had to dismantle its wrought iron fittings for scrap. There are a few snippets of interesting info that could be retained (especially as an excuse to retain the section's photos), for example the air raids from 1941, the RA stationed on Flatholm, the local yachtsmen taking part in Dunkirk, the bombing of the church... To be honest, I visited the Central Library yesterday and couldn't find anything on WW2 in Penarth (in fact more was said of WW1). There are no authoritative references online either.

In effect, if the section on 'Notable people' can be reduced to a small paragraph, the same rule is even more applicable to the Wartime section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sionk (talk • contribs) 09:42, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20101007071719/http://www.bbc.co.uk:80/wales/southeast/sites/penarth/pages/article_davidowen.shtml to http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southeast/sites/penarth/pages/article_davidowen.shtml
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20121029054326/http://www.welshicons.org.uk:80/html/penarth.php to http://www.welshicons.org.uk/html/penarth.php

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External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20081002062404/http://www.coflein.gov.uk/pls/portal/coflein.w_details?inumlink=6081138 to http://www.coflein.gov.uk/pls/portal/coflein.w_details?inumlink=6081138

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Cleanup
A decade on from earlier concerns being raised about POV, flowery language, uncited material, trivia and way too much anecdote and local "lore", this article still needs a hell of an overhaul. It really isn't a B class article. As part of some work on the Cadw/ICOMOS Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, I've added a small section on Urban parks, as Penarth has three on the register. If anyone has the time/inclination, what would be better is to have separate articles, or maybe one on Penarth parks? KJP1 (talk) 18:17, 12 February 2023 (UTC)