Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chicago/Archive 1

message: Has anyone considered starting a Google Group for WikiProject Chicago?  As far as I can tell, there seem to be at least three different places where discussion on the Chicago article is taking place:
* The Chicago discussion page.
* The WikiProject Chicago page.
* The WikiProject Chicago discussion page.
This makes just the act of following discussion about the Chicago article page very confusing for me, personally, and I have no idea how to contribute because I don't understand what the current plans for the article are.  I think viewing discussions in a threaded environment like a Google Group forum would make things a lot less confusing for anyone interested in contributing.
Ideally, I would think that the WikiProject Chicago page should only provide status visibility for the project: it should only include definitive information about the project's purpose, who's doing what, and where the project is headed--no discussions or proposals.  If no one's interested in having a Google Groups forum, then at the very least, I think there should be no discussions or proposals on the main WikiProject Chicago page, and that there should be some discernable way to figure out what kind of discussion goes on the Chicago discussion page versus the WikiProject Chicago page.
In any case, I'm pretty new to all this myself so maybe everything I just said is completely off.  It's just my first impression.
- varmaa 23 October 2005
Just passing through, but shouldn't this project be part of WikiProject Illinois, or at least connected up to it in some way? Deirdre 23:15, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discussions 

message: *Brookfield Zoo Article
*Chicago Events Taken from earlier Chicago article.  We need to elaborate on some of these, even if that means stubifying/adding pictures.
**Chicago Air & Water Show
**Saint Patrick's Day parade
*Grant Park (Chicago) - Needs more information...
:*I overhauled this page and expanded what was already there and added several new sections.  Please let us know if you were expecting more. Shoffman11 22:41, 23 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article To-Do List 

message: A vote will be held on whether to change the lead picture at the top of the Chicago InfoBox tonight at Wikipedia:WikiProject Chicago/PictureVote. The voting will be open for 24 hours from the posting of this notice on the Chicago talk page. Please come and voice your opinion.
An explanation to why this vote is needed is also included on the voting page.
Thanks,
--Gpyoung talk 21:22, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chicago Lead Picture Vote 

message: I'm not really sure if this is worthy enough to make this discussion page, but just for the curious I have made a self page: User:Dralwik/Chicago of aerial views of the city and metropolitan area. Dralwik 23:00, 14 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Self page 

message: I've been slowly improving some chicago-related articles for the past four months so I figure I'd join the project to maybe attract other members to help. My work is mainly concerned with both the 77 community areas of chicago as well as the neighborhoods within them.
*Community areas of Chicago (including all 77 individual community area pages)
*Neighborhoods of Chicago (Created by me)
*Superdawg (located in Norwood Park, created by me)
— oo64eva (Alex) (U | T | C) @ 23:46, July 19, 2005 (UTC)
:Ahh yes, Superdawg, very nice. =) -- BMIComp  (talk) 01:47, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: But, remember, no ketchup on that dog! Dralwik 02:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  My improvements 

message: I started the Bicycling in Chicago article, but it needs to be reformatted, needs a picture or two (i'll try to get some this weekend), etc.  Once it's looking better we can link it from the Chicago article and maybe even add a summary to it. -- BMIComp  (talk) 03:31, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chicago Biking 

message: Someone has changed the picture back to the old one, which I support because voting was supposed to end August 13 according to the vote page. Also, in my opinion, I do not think the article should have been nominated for FAC without giving prior notice so that everyone could make sure that the article is just the way we want it; or we should have had a recent discussion about what still needs to be done, if anything. This WikiProject is about collaboration and is less than a month old; we should have given it more time before nominating (IMO). HollyAm 12:38, 30 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Regarding the recent Featured Article Nomination 

message: Hi,
I have started a page for a possible "Chicago Collaboration of the Week". I think an organized improvment effort like this will help us to direct our efforts and fix some of those stub articles and red links. Let me know what you think.
--Gpyoung talk 00:36, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The Chicago COTW has been recently marked as inactive - just a heads up, in case anyone wants to revive it. - AKeen 17:31, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I will revive it if people seem intested in doing the projects.  Thoughts?--Twintone 16:52, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chicago COTW 

message: I couldn't find any article on this Chicago topic. Rmhermen 13:54, August 17, 2005 (UTC)
:Then you should create one or add it to the Requested Articles list.
Jasenlee 02:31, August 19, 2005 (UTC)
:I was hoping that it was under some official name that I didn't know. Rmhermen 23:46, August 19, 2005 (UTC)
::I have created this and made it a priority. It is under the Tunnel and Reservoir Plan, which may be subject to renaming since most everyone knows it as Deep Tunnel. However, that's not the name of the project. :-) As it is, Deep Tunnel, Deep Tunnel Project, and any other variations which I stumble upon will redirect to Tunnel and Reservoir Plan. --Rob 16:30, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, and I guess Milwaukee has their own Deep Tunnel project. So I'd leave it as TARP for now. --Rob 19:59, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Deep Tunnel

message: I've finally decided on a place for the first Wikipedia meetup in Chicago: 2 p.m. at Saturday, October 15th at Cafe Iberico, a tapas bar in the River North neighborhood of Chicago at 739 N. La Salle Drive.  They have parking available and are 0.3 mile from the Chicago stop of the CTA Red Line.  See their website for parking information; for transit planning use the RTA trip planner with a destination address of "739 N. La Salle Dr."  Cafe Iberico has vegetarian selections for those who are so inclined (sorry, they're not very vegan-friendly, I'm afraid).  The food is excellent and the environment very suitable for an informal gathering.  Do check their webpage for any additional questions, or ask me.  They typically cost typically costs between $10 and $15 per person; I'm willing to cover for anyone for whom this is too much (as long as we don't get too many people).  
Please let me know before Saturday, October 8th (by email or on my talk page) if you're planning on coming so I can make the appropriate reservations.  See you there!  Oh, and please share this invitation with anyone you know of in the Chicago area who I've missed.  Kelly Martin 19:53, 2 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chicago area meetup 

message: Hi, I'm not sure how practical my request is, but I was hoping that someone from this wikiproject might be able to provide an image Stinson Memorial Library in Anna, Illinois or any other Chicago buildings designed by Walter Burley Griffin. The article is WikiProject Canberra's current featured article workup project. Many thanks.--nixie 12:55, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Image request

message: Use this:  
To get:
Please feel free to move this notice if it should be on the project page instead of here.
:: A userbox already exists... the code is .
Jasenlee 02:51, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  user box created 

message: Just thought you guys might like to know that I created an article for the soon to be closing Berghoff restaurant.  I grew up going there every year before Christmas after my parents would take us to see the Christmas windows at Marshall Field's.  My father, who still lives there, recently informed me that Field's is turning into a Macy's as well as telling me about the closing.  Anyway, that's besides the point.  I just wanted to make sure you guys knew about the article in case you wanted to improve it.  I was planning to but if I don't get to it, I thought someone should...  Dismas|(talk) 16:13, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: P.S. If someone could swing by there and get a photo of the sign before they take it down or something that would be great! Dismas|(talk) 17:51, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It's only a block from my office, so I'll be happy to do it. -- DS1953 talk 18:01, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. See Talk:The Berghoff (restaurant). -- DS1953 talk 04:54, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Berghoff 

message: Just to let everyone know, since the picture vote had ended, I tallied the results and changed the picture in the infobox (number #3 won). I also finally nominated Chicago as a featured article, I hope it goes well!
--Gpyoung talk 18:14, 28 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Chicago FAC

message: Okay my fellow Wikipedian's, the FAC failed and I think we need to redouble our efforts. I know everyone has tried really hard but let's not be too anxious. We should spend some serious time evaluating the work we have all done. Take a moment to go over all past peer reviews and make this the best city article out there. Let's get this project extremely active and build on that. Before anyone resubmits for a FAC I think we should have a vote. Agreed? 
My suggestion is that we all start dumping tasks in the to-do section and then evaluate and prioritize them. From that point we can all start working ad-hoc or assigning tasks to specific individuals. Thoughts?
Jasenlee 01:55, August 5, 2005 (UTC)
:Personally, I think the FAC vote was ended prematurely, as it was still active and votes were still being placed and objections acted upon. I have sent a message to Raul654 who is in charge of the Featured Articles asking him to continue the vote, as I think it was very close and there were only a few outstanding objections that were in the process of being fixed.
:That aside, I do agree that our efforts have to be doubled, or even tripled. Our biggest problems were pictures. One of the more vehement complaints was that 4 or 5 images were not free and as hard as I tried, I couldn't find replacments in time (once again-ended too early). User:bmicomp has contributed some really great free images that have been inserted throughout the article, but we need more. Also, we need to interconnect the article. It was written by many different people and hence, sounds like it was written by many different people. Some minor editing should fix this fairly quickly.
:As for voting before we nominate the article, I agree, although this being WikiProject Chicago and as we know first hand, voting in Chicago is never straightforward and easy, as we saw in the picture vote. I do apologize if people did not want the article nominated when it was. I was in fact the one who nominated it, however I was under the impression that the plan was to nominate it as soon as the picture vote ended.
:Hope we have better luck next time. --Gpyoung talk 02:49, 5 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I may be able to come up with some more pictures. I'll be back in Chicago for the first 2 weeks of April this year, and I'm handy with my digital SLR camera. I also have a slew of pictures from my trip last July - what do we need?Robovski 05:52, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: FAC Failed

message: For the next few days at my user sandbox, I'll be rewriting the history section of the main Chicago article, and when I'm done, will splice it in. Feel free to add your own suggestions at User:Dralwik/Sandbox. I'm focusing mainly on the 20th century. Dralwik 02:29, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I already revised the history section, and am now using my sandbox for other things. Dralwik 04:28, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewriting history section 

message: I created a Project Categories section because to me, it seems as though there are some natural groupings in the Chicagoland template that lend themselves to being a part of a category.
Something like "Buildings in Chicago", for example.
Much like the "Project Templates" section, I would like to see it used as a resource for contributors. I've only included the categories I personally have worked with; if you would like to add your own categories, you are encouraged to do so. Thanks! --Rob 15:26, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Project categories 

message: Why not add school zoning information for Chicago neighborhoods?
Chicago Public Schools has a zoning tool. Punch in an address and the zoned school will appear WhisperToMe 02:14, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  An idea for Wikiproject Chicago

message: Does a stub exist for a Chicago article in need of expansion? Thanks. —Rob (talk) 23:20, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stub for articles in need of expansion? 

message: Dear fellow Chicagoans.
I have been working on the Danish translations of the main article. Maybe we should put some more time into the translations of the main article? The da:Chicago article was but a stub before I started translating parts of it. It is still painfully short, but still much better than what was there before. I think more complete translations of this article would raise it's profile in Wikipedia. Does anyone else here agree with me? --OrbitOne 19:36, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it's a great idea - however I am no use with languages other than English (and some think that is questionable). The more languages the article is available in the better.Robovski 22:59, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: One important thing I want to have done is a translation template. A selection of the text from the article with the most important things to have in a translation. I want to have this so there is some uniformity in content between translations. So this is something you can help with Robovski. Maybe we should make it into a subproject if enough people show interest in this? --OrbitOne 23:27, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Translations 

message: Hello. I'm a member of the Version 1.0 Editorial Team, which is looking to identify quality articles in Wikipedia for future publication on CD or paper. We recently began assessing articles using these criteria, and we are are asking for your help. As you are most aware of the issues surrounding your focus area, we are wondering if you could provide us with a list of the articles that fall within the scope of your WikiProject, and that are either featured, A-class, B-class, or Good articles, with no POV or copyright problems. Do you have any recommendations? If you do, please post your suggestions at the listing of all active Places WikiProjects, and if you have any questions, ask me in the Work Via WikiProjects talk page or directly in my talk page. Thanks a lot! Titoxd(?!? - help us) 18:50, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team|Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team]] cooperation 

message: I've created a category :Category:Chicago films and added a few articles to it - mostly those movies that I could remember "off the top of my head".
If you recall any of the dozens if not hundreds of other movies set in or filmed in Chicago, please add them.
MattHucke(t) 13:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Movies 

message: I've worked for the past month to update Portal:United States and keep it better maintained.  Though, I think the Portal:United States would be even better with broader participation.  One way to do that is instead of choosing the "selected article" myself each week, if others would nominate articles and help make decisions.  (same goes for pictures, though these are stocked up through July 29)  If there is anything related to Chicago (or anything else related to the U.S. - culture, music, literature, geography, history, politics, ...), please nominate.   I'd also like people to weigh in on the nominations and help select what should be featured. Thanks. --Aude (talk contribs) 23:42, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Nominate articles for [[Portal:United States]]

message: Can I write an article about a southeast chicago newspaper please send me a message stating If I can write it or not.Animereadabouter2 04:30, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Only because no one else has come forward to state this: Yes you can. Anyone can write any article. That said, anyone else can re-write your article, so be prepared to have this happen. Robovski 22:53, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can I write this? 

message: In case anyone hadn't noticed, Wikipedia:Communities strawpoll is voting on a uniform naming convention for all neighborhoods of U.S. cities. The proposition currently leading by a wide margin would entail renaming most Chicago neighborhood articles to neighborhood, Chicago, Illinois. older ≠ wiser 18:52, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Neighborhood naming convention 

message: I'd like to try to get a meetup going again.  Maybe second or third week in September.  Anybody up for one?  We also need a venue.  Maybe a Borders or B&N in Evanston or in the Loop.  Kelly Martin (talk) 04:53, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Meetup again 

message: Due to the (much-needed) move to Chicago, several redirects were created. I have fixed most of them, but one remains. My suggestion for a collaboration is to redirect the several hundred links to Chicago, Illinois to the page at Chicago. Any help in this undertaking would be appreciated. Thanks, --- Dralwik|Have a Chat  My "Great Project"
:Also, Chicago, IL needs to be fixed. Chicago, IL is fixed! --- Dralwik|Have a Chat  My "Great Project"
::AWB to the rescue!  Kelly Martin (talk) 03:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redirects 

message: I was looking through :Category:Skyscrapers in Chicago and realized that some articles don't have photos, and of those that do many of the photos are low quality, are from a bad angle, or could just be better.  I comprised a list of articles that I think could use better photos.  Buildings that are under construction I marked in parenthesis with site.  Perhaps we could start a Construction photographs section in those articles similar to Trump International Hotel and Tower (Chicago).
*340 on the Park (site)
*Auditorium Building, Chicago
*Boeing International Headquarters
*Brooks Building
*Chicago Place
*The Clare at Water Tower (site
*Dirksen Federal Building
*James R. Thompson Center
*Kluczynski Federal Building
*Lake Point Tower
*Marina City (Needs updated after construction is completed on the west tower)
*NBC Tower
*One Museum Park (site)
*Skybridge, Chicago
*Water Tower Place (interior of shopping mall)
*Waterview Tower (site)
Is anyone interested in taking some of these photos?  If we get several volunteers we could split them up between us and get them done quite quickly.  Or are there suggestions for additional buildings to be added to this list, or for some to be taken off?  Or does nobody really care? Jtrost (T | C | #) 22:32, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll be downtown Tuesday and have a few hours to spare, as well as having access to a nice 8 megapixel digital SLR.  I'll grab pictures of those buildings which I can walk to, clean 'em up, post them, and report back on what I was able to get.  At the very least I should be able to grab the Thompson Center, Klucynski, Marina City, and NBC Tower.  - seinman 03:07, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Great.  I've started to photograph buildings that I pass throughout the day. Jtrost (T | C | #) 17:00, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Better photos for skyscrapers 

message: Is this worth saving? Opinions wanted. Zagalejo 17:03, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd say so - and I did. Robovski 22:51, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Golden Nugget Pancake House]] up for deletion

message: Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory.  This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you.   B2T2 19:00, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Project directory 

message: I have changed the CHICOTW article which seems to have been unchanged for months.  I am willing to continue to oversee selection if people are interested in nominating and editting articles. TonyTheTiger 21:20, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  This page is believed to be inactive for sometime now.  Is this an abandoned idea?--Twintone 16:50, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have changed the collaboration and am awaiting editorial assistance.  I will monitor. TonyTheTiger 01:33, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New CHICOTW 

message: I was thinking that it might be helpful to start a "Chicago Collaboration of the Week" (or maybe two weeks like the United States Collaboration of the Week). We have a great list of red links and fairly important sub articles (ie. Community Areas of Chicago has to potential to be an excellent article because of the cities great diversity) and it might behoove us to start coordinating work on them. Of course, we are all still working on Chicago, but there is more to be done then just that. I will start a page for the Chicago(land?) Collaboration of the Week and we could hold a discussion there and decide if we want to do this. 
--Gpyoung talk 20:35, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  This page is believed to be inactive for sometime now.  Is this an abandoned idea?--Twintone 16:50, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have changed the collaboration and am awaiting editorial assistance.  I will monitor. TonyTheTiger 01:33, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Chicago Collaboration of the Week?

message: It is uncertain how many wikipedians are interested this project as it seems inactive.  As such very modest amounts of edits have occurred on the CHICOTW.  It is likely that this will be converted to a monthly collaboration.  If anyone has an article they would like to nominate for the collaboration go to the collaboration page.  TonyTheTiger 19:30, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  CHICOTW vs. CHICOTM 

message: I am once again going to bring up the idea of a meetup.  My preference is to have one somewhere around Davis Street in Evanston, as we seem to have had more interest from the north than from the south, but this is obviously not set in stone.  In any case, the location should be convenient to public transit both for those lacking vehicles and especially for those likely to be visiting from out of town.  Kelly Martin (talk) 18:20, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: We held the last meetup in River North, but attendance was poor.  The last time we discussed a location, a northside location was preferred because most of the interested parties were in the near north suburbs, far north suburbs, or Wisconsin.  Evanston (and specifically near Davis Street) was favorable because (a) good access to mass transit as well as Amtrak commuter service (b) decently good access to road transit.  The meetup is intended to be a meeting of persons in the Chicago area who are interested in Wikipedia, and not specifically a meeting for people interested in editing Chicago-related topics.  Kelly Martin (talk) 01:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Meetup 

message: How strongly do people here feel about suburban topics?  I live in the suburbs (Niles) and take my camera almost everywhere; as a result, I'm constantly getting new pictures of various things but mostly in the near north suburbs (Niles, Skokie, Evanston, etc.).  I don't get into the city as often, and when I do I often can't stop to take pictures because it's so much harder to park in the city.
I will make an effort to photograph the COTW when I can (although I don't think I'll be able to make it down to Intelligentsia this week).  Anyway, if anybody wants north suburban photos for north suburban topics, I'm game. Kelly Martin (talk) 18:35, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not suggesting that we recommend deleting the articles on the various suburbs that already exist and merging them into Chicago; that would be silly.  Rather, I'm asking whether a suburban article is in scope for the collaboration of the week.  Kelly Martin (talk) 01:42, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

text: That sounds cool, I'd definately support that. We have a really cool history, albeit unfortunate, of our suburban sprawl and how quickly its expanding and everything. Maybe we should look at making different independant articles such as one for all the north suburbs, one for the sound, one for the southwest, etc. Much like how we have the sides of the city laid out, detailing which neighborhoods belong to which side. Solutus 15:12, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps :North Shore (Chicago) would be one to try. -- DS1953 talk 03:49, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scope 

message: Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention.  Badbilltucker 22:08, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia Day Awards