Talk:Blue Mountains (New South Wales)

message: The Blue Mountains are not a range of sandstone mountains.
They are a disected sandstone plateau.
Nowhere are the sandstone gorges up to 1000 m deep.
The maximum depth is around Mt Banks and the Grose River where the elevation ranges from 1062 m to 300 m.
The area of the City of Blue Mountains local government area (BM LGA) is stated as 1433 square kilometres on their website www.bmcc.nsw.gov.au/ This seems to be written from the BMCC point of view rather than a neutral point of view.  Many people would be referring to a much larger area when they refer to the Blue Mountains.  Bushwalkers would talk about the Grose Valley and areas within the city of Blue Mountains as the central Blue Mountains, areas around the Kanangra Boyd National Park and Lake Burragorang as the southern Blue Mountains and areas in Wollemi National Park as the northern Blue Mountains.  From that point of view the area of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area would be  a better estimate of the area of the Blue Mountains.  Others may include much of the developed areas near the National Parks as part of the Blue Mountains.  The National Parks and Wildlife Service Blue Mountains Region covers a much larger area but not all of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area is within that region!
In this regard, while parts of the City of Blue Mountains (the National Parks) are part of the world heritage area, the rest of the local government area is not.
We need to be clear what Blue Mountains this article is talking about.  It seems to keep changing.
The Blue Mountains Range extends north west into the Lithgow local government area and is tenuously connected to the Great Dividing Range by Wolgan Gap.  It is mostly separated from the GDR by the Coxs River valley.  1111 m is not the highest point on the Blue Mountains Range.  It may be the highest point in the City of Blue Mountains.  It gets to at least 1190 m in the Lithgow local government area.
Stringybark forest is not the predominant vegetation on the higher ridges of the Blue Mountains Range.  Above about 800 m the predominant vegetation on the ridges is "Blue Mountains Sandstone Plateau Forest".  This is an open forest dominated by Eucalyptus sieberi Silvertop Ash and Eucalyptus piperita ssp. piperita Sydney Peppermint.  Neither of these species is a stringybark.  Other species in this forest type include E. oreades, E. radiata, E. sclerophylla, E. oblonga and E. mannifera.  Of these only E. oblonga is a stringybark.
Heath is found on the plateau edges above the cliffs.  It is quite extensive in some places.
The Wollemi Pine grows in one remote and isolated valley in the Wollemi National Park in the northern Blue Mountains not on the Blue Mountains Range nor in the City of Blue Mountains local government area.
In recent years extensive bushfires have caused only the loss of a handfull of houses in the Blue Mountains. The 1950s and 1960s were much worse. This is true of the Greater Blue Mountains area not just the local government area.  There is certainly the potential for great loss of property and loss of life.  Compare this with loss of over 500 houses, four lives and $300 million damages in Canberra, the capital of Australia, in January 2003.
The upper Blue Mountains (within the BM LGA) have had large fires in recent decades.  The Bell Range fire in January 1994 burned from the upper mountains all the way to the Hawkesbury River at sea level.
The Mount Hay and Mount Hall fires started in the "upper mountains".  There have been extensive wildfires in the southern and northern Blue Mountains in the 1990s and 2000s.
It is wrong to say "A program of winter burning seems to have been quite successful in reducing fires in the upper mountains".  Hazard reduction burning is seldom successful in the higher elevations of the Blue Mountains Rural Fire District (roughly the same as the City of Blue Mountains). It is normally too cold and wet to burn in winter and too dry and risky to burn in summer.  Burns are attempted in spring and autumn but seldom are hot enough to remove enough fuel to make a real difference above 800 m.  At lower elevations well planned hazard reduction burns are often successful.
--144.131.98.43 08:44, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a separate article Blue Mountains City Council so I have moved the City of the Blue Mountains material there. This article can refocus on the mountain range. Nurg 07:46, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Although I realise the comment was made many years ago, the text is still in place. In keeping an article neutral the contested sentence above could read "A program of winter burning is in place to reduce fires in the upper mountains", thus removing the subjective portion while still stating the fact. A referencelink to the program should be included. Iamthouth (talk) 10:08, 7 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: earlier comments

message: This article has obviously been vandalised, can someone revert it? I don't know how. Thanks Naysie 12:19, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Vandalism

message: I was told the eucalyptus oil story growing up in the area, but have come to doubt it. I have since seen blue distant mountains on sunny days all over the world. I think it is just the same refraction of light that causes the sky to be blue. What do you folk think? Rumiton 09:43, 13 July 2007 
Does anyone have a reference for the death of David Iredale on Mt Solitary a year or so back? Am doing an article on Mt Soli and would like a reference for David's death. I have a clipping but it does not have the date and page number.
Sardaka (talk) 11:17, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Distant mountains appear to be blue, all over the world.  The Blue Ridge mountains in Virginia were named for the same reason.Eregli bob (talk) 10:48, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: The blueness

message: Here are the stats for the other Blue Mountains up to the 16th. This will change as days go by:
*Blue Mountains (Australia) - 5617 [Blue Mountains (Australia) 
*Blue Mountains (Oregon) - 1178 
*Bankstown Bunker - 1639  in Jan
*Blue Mountains (Congo) - 118 
*Blue Mountains (Estonia) - 133 
*Nilgiris (mountains) - 929 
*Blue Mountains (Jamaica) - 1297 
*Blue Mountains, New Zealand - 97  ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
*Abajo Mountains - 261 
*. Adam (talk) (talk) 01:19, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for finding the stats. Hmmmm - I'd say if it was not for the Oregon. Nilgiris and Jamaica examples, then there would be no need for a DAB, ie direct to the Australian Blue Mountains. However, while page counts of 100 are insignificant compared to 5,000, 1000 page counts vs. 5000 is not insignificant. As someone who knows the Blue Mtns intimately, if anything I'd say the stats above actually support the need for a disambig page. --Merbabu (talk) 04:50, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The Blue Mountains disambig may actually lead more people to the Australian Blue Mountains article. Someone looking up the Jamaican, New Zealand, Oregon and so on may have a quick look at the Australian while they are at it. Adam (talk) 05:05, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the stats. Thinking about it another way, that's 5617 hits for the Australia Blue Mountains article, and 3752 hits for other Blue Mountains articles, or about a 60/40 split. Looks like the disambig page is a good idea.Northwesterner1 (talk) 11:41, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Smart arse! ;-)  --Merbabu (talk) 11:49, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

text: You're right, Blue Mountains (disambiguation) should point to Blue Mountains. There used to be only a single disambiguation page at Blue Mountain. Per Figaro's suggestion above, I split it to Blue Mountain and Blue Mountains. I neglected to correct the redirect you discovered, and I have just done so. Thanks for catching it.Northwesterner1 (talk) 05:23, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

text: "well over half" go to the Australian Blue Mtns. Or, "almost half aren't for the Australian Blue Mtns." depends how one spins it. --Merbabu (talk) 07:30, 22 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It doesn't depend on how one spins it. All we need to determine is which is the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, which is absolutely, 100% clear by a huge margin. Debate 木 07:33, 22 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you - this is what I have been trying to argue for a while. JRG (talk) 13:00, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Naming conventions, even in Australia, have exceptions for very very well known landmarks, which the Australian Blue Mountains are. And combined with the above assertions about primary topics, I believe it should be the primary page, with the other topics noted as the first line on the main article and in a separate disambig page as was the case earlier. JRG (talk) 13:00, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: The other Blue Mountains stats up to the 16th of June 08

message: I think all the wikilinks to Blue Mountains which should point to this article are now corrected.  A good number of the referring articles use the text ...Blue Mountains, west of Sydney or something very much like it.  Even some Australian authors didn't think they were all that well known.  There are 61 links remaining linked to the Blue Mountains disambiguation page:  24 are from anonymous editors' talk pages, probably warnings for vandalism; 4 are permanent navigational assistance links like The Blue Mountains; approximately 13 relate to debating the move; 14 are bot logs or dab tracking pages; 2 are the talk pages themselves; and 4 are of indeterminate character.  Thanks to everyone who participated in swiftly resolving the issue.  —EncMstr (talk) 22:09, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Swiftly resolved? I don't think so. No one ever replied to Debate's or my own comments. We need to sort this out, as the links primarily to the main page were to the Australian mountains by a long shot. JRG (talk) 12:40, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Dabs complete

message: The history section says it is a "misconception" that Blaxland, Lawson and Wentworth were the first to cross the mountains. This needs a reference. I always understood that B,L and W were the first to do it. Does anyone have any views on this? Can anyone suggest any authoritative books?
Sardaka (talk) 11:05, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: there is managed to cross and managed to note it in a journal and get it published. Caley journaled that he made it to Mount Banks, not Linden. Dave Rave (talk) 23:57, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: First Crossing

message: Can we avoid any suggestive language that pioneer settlements did not know the mountain passes? Patsy Adam Smith:
I hardly think that level of interest in the area developed out of the commercial life of Sydney in the days when the iron horses travelled at most twenty miles an hour. Ottre (talk) 11:57, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not sure it's a POV problem. Perhaps factual. Anyway, there is much there that is not cited. Perhaps remove it all and only allow very well-cited info back in. Also, I moved the tag down to the relevant section for clarity. I'm not sure that is any benefit having the whole article tagged.--Merbabu (talk) 23:31, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

text: Thanks sardaka. The questions above were raised, and POV tag provided by Ottre. I've asked that he respond to the changes made, and to re-clarify. regards --Merbabu (talk) 05:54, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

text: Thank you all for being so patient. Was busy with several articles this week. Heading into the city today, might stop by the state library and see if there is anything more on this. I realise it makes little sense to anybody just reading the quotation above. Ottre (talk) 22:19, 29 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV language 

message: Since there is so much stuff on the mountains, I thought it might be worth having an article with a comprehensive list of all the articles on the Blue Mts. Does anyone know if a list like this exists already? Haven't seen one.
Sardaka (talk) 11:12, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: How about a navigation box (if there is not one already) or even a category. If there was a navigation box or template, this could be used in all the related articles, if it was appropriate and would be there for all to see, like this Template:City of Bankstown topics. This would also allow for some of the 'see also' lists to be removed and transferred into the template as well. For example, the list of peaks in the Blue Mountains article could be transferred into it and then taken out of the article. Something like this would help others to find article they normally would not find. When it comes to a separate article as a list chances are a lot of people will not see it and miss out. Some would, some wouldn't. Let us know what you think and then we can get working. Adam (talk) 21:43, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think there is a category but I have not checked the content of it. There might be a need for more sub cats. With the template, what if it was a collapsable template. Adam (talk) 23:20, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: A good category and sub-cat system should be the default and priority. Having said that, *a* well-conceived nax-box should actually be fine. Perhaps my real concern is a proliferation of nav boxes (the Indonesia page once had over 15 at one time, with many more been suggested!), however, I don’t think this will be such a problem on the Blue Mountains as it is inherently a much smaller topic. So, collapsible or not, is probably fine. regards --Merbabu (talk) 23:49, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I wouldn't mind working on a template myself but we would have to work out what topics will actually go in the template. I think someone like Sadarka would have a pretty good idea and a few others. I guess you could have topics like maybe tourist attractions, suburbs, peaks and so on. I'm not a hundred percent sure. If someone gave me a list or an example I could start working on it (on the weekend).  Adam (talk) 09:03, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Blue Mts articles

message: I am just curious as to what the circa 1885 means in this black and white photo. Does it mean the photo was taken around this time or is the building from around this period? Also should we still be using black and white photos for modern day images in articles Adam (talk) 22:00, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi thanks for replying to this. This photo is a modern day photo that was taken this year. It was either taken in black and white or changed to black and white after it was taken. Maybe the author of the photo is trying to say that the structure (pictured) was built around this time perhaps. .         Adam (talk) 00:52, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that all modern photos should be in colour but I think that the author was trying to be artistic in some kind of way or create an effect of some sort.         Adam (talk) 02:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, i can see that the intent was artistic which should of course be encouraged in the correct time and place, but this is an encyclopedia for information, not artistic expressions. cheers. :-) Anyway, it's not really a big deal - perhaps a solution in the near future might be to replace it with an actual historic shot of an important part of mountains in "the olden days". --Merbabu (talk) 02:55, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Black and white photo

message: Someone has mentioned three times that a route via the Cox River is the easiest way to cross the Blue Mountains.  This is simply nonsense,  if it was true,  someone would have built a road that way at some point,  and nobody ever did.   From the Megalong Valley on the Cox's river,  there was never a road to the Burragorang Valley,  and there was never a road through the Warragamba Canyon either.  Its simply nonsense and unless someone has a good reason otherwise, I will soon change it.Eregli bob (talk) 09:31, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Whats this obsession with the Cox River  

message: The "Greater Western Sydney" article also lists Hawkesbury Council as being a part of that district.  I know that parts of that council could definately be considered as being in the mountains, such as towns Like Kurrajong, etc, however going by my UBD directory, most of the council area in the mountains seems to be National Park.  Perhaps someone could put a map up defining, roughly, which is which?  Looking at other "regions of Sydney" articles, I'd actually like to know what the source is for certain suburbs being in, say, the "inner west" or "upper north shore" (for example), as there doesn't seem to be any clear definition available online. 202.168.112.15 (talk) 02:29, 4 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Part of the Blue Mountains falls within the Hawkesbury Council local government area.Eregli bob (talk) 10:51, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hawkesbury part of the Blue Mountains? 

message: Coxs River was the easiest way to cross the mountains on foot, back in the 18th century. It was never a way to cross the mountains in a vehicle.
Also, who made the statement that John Wilson was the first person to cross the mts? He MAY have been; it couldn't be confirmed. I have corrected this.
Circa 1885 means approximately 1885, which would mean the building was built then, but I can't explain further because I can't remember the original caption.
Such a fuss about a little pic in sepia. Is there a law saying shots have to be in colour?
Sardaka (talk) 08:58, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: What is the basis for your claim that Cox's river is the easiest way to cross the Blue Mountains ?    It is a nasty,  winding,  rocky canyon the whole way.  As the Blue Mountains are a dissected plateau,   the valleys contained within it are all almost impassible,   whereas the top plateau surface is relatively easy to walk around on,  as long as you avoid falling into any of the canyons.   No road,  of any kind,  has ever been built through the Cox's River canyon.  Does that tell you something ?   The claims of uninformed contrarain pinheads notwithstanding,    the easiest way to get anywhere in the Blue Mountains,  is to follow the flat ridges,  not the valleys.Eregli bob (talk) 10:55, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  he did mention on foot. Don't extrapolate to cars. For crossing the divide, why climb the cliff to descend again. There is a road from the west side of the dam to megalong valley. Maybe not all the way through but ... --Dave Rave (talk) 23:50, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Coxs River

message: I'm quite sure the widely believed myth concerning the blue colour is that the (supposed) prescence of eucalyptus oil vapour discolours the light.
There is no way people would widely believe it is caused by light "reflecting off eucalypt leaves" since most species of tree have leaves of a very similar colour.
150.101.206.3 (talk) 05:11, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Eucalyptus myth 

message: Who would like a Blue Mountains wikiproject. I think that it would be a good idea due to the content and like on this page. Any support?? De Mattia (talk) 06:15, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blue Mountains wikiproject 

message: Under tourist attractions there seems to be an advert for "True Blue tours"  
see: "True Blue tours are one of a few coach tour providers."  I don't think that is correct either as there are many of tour operators that service this area.
Not sure if this should be removed.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Narkie (talk • contribs) 00:33, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tourist Attractions 

message: The sentence..
"European settlers initially considered that fertile lands lay beyond the mountains, as was China in the belief of many convicts, but that this didn't matter much, since the mountains were impassable."
It makes no sense. China was fertile? The route to China was impassable (though its not a close country)?
I looked through the history to see if it has been changed recently but it seems to have been in place for years. Maybe someone can explain what it means.. but I think it should be removed unless it is going to be clarified as to what it means.
danielg 12:40, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  "as was China in the belief of many convicts" 

message: not a lot for the refs to the shale / torbanite mines
Blue Mtns shale mines were
Jamison Valley, Megalong Valley, Cedar Valley, Hartley Valley, and if you're not too picky about how far west it goes, Newnes and the other two towards Mudgee too
Glen Davis, Capertee, Airly, Torbane
so, Industry, on Blue Mtns or Katoomba or both with separate relevant links ? Dave Rave (talk) 03:43, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Industry 

message: Seeing as most of the other pages for "Blue Mountains" in other countries are listed as Blue Mountains (country), shouldn't this page be moved to Blue Mountains (Australia)? Thoughts? -download ׀ talk 01:07, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Move to [[Blue Mountains (Australia)]]? 

message: Suggest include www.bmbw.org.au to be listed in External links or in a sub-heading Blue Mountains Crossing Re-enactment 2013. SignedJohnsonL623 (talk) 06:32, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mtns.Blue Wave org. 

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replies: text: it works, but it's not a pretty fix Dave Rave (talk) 08:07, 30 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: the square kilometres of the blue mountains are NO 1 CARES FIND ME WHAT I NEED101.183.196.98 (talk) 12:08, 4 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  square kilometres 

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thread_title: Assessment comment

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