Wikipedia:WikiProject UK Waterways/How to write about UK Waterways

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This is a project guideline for the structure of Wikipedia articles about UK Waterways. Discuss it at WikiProject UK Waterways.

The order of sections is optional, although it is strongly recommended that articles conform to the basic structure of a lead followed by history, decline (where applicable), today/restoration (where applicable), route, as those sections contain much of the basic information about any waterway. Beyond that, editors are advised to come to a consensus that works best for the waterway in question. References are required for every article.

While this is just a guideline, it does provide a basic framework for a UK waterway article, as well as useful tips to help in bringing an article up to good article or featured article status. Some articles have achieved GA status and adhere loosely to these guidelines.

Please ensure that all changes to this page are discussed on the talk page and reflect consensus.

In the United Kingdom, the meaning of "waterway" can be ambiguous. This project covers waterways which are, or have been, used for navigation. It does not cover those built and used solely for drainage or water transfer.

The scope of the UK Waterways project is stated as: canals, navigable rivers and related features (locks, reservoirs, bridges, aqueducts, boats, people, etc.) located within the United Kingdom.

Article scope

Navigable rivers may end up having two articles describing the river. The one covered by this project would be the one describing the river as a navigation, and would be titled River xxxx Navigation, or similar based on the company name. A second article may be written about the natural river and might include content about the whole catchment area, tributaries, ecology etc.

Where navigations have changed ownership or merged, it may be appropriate in complex cases to have multiple articles describing the history of them. One article, using the current name, should describe the waterway as it stands today, and outline the history. Other articles may describe the history of the component parts using the historical names, but only up the point at which the name change occurs. A good candidate for changing under this guideline would be Ellesmere Canal.

Article structure example for a U.K. waterway

NOTE: "Infobox" and "Lead" are not headings in their own right, and should not be included on articles as such. The order of sections is also optional, and sections may be moved around to a different order based on the needs of their settlement. Editors are strongly encouraged, however, to at least begin with the lead, followed by history, decline (where applicable), today/restoration (where applicable), route. References are a requirement of any article. Further, alternative headings are listed under the "Optional headings" section below. Section titles should generally not start with the word "The" (see WP:HEAD).

Infobox

There are no standardised infoboxes for UK waterways.

Lead

Lead (see also WP:LEAD): Include the following

Name of waterway, type of waterway (e.g. canal, navigable river), location.
Connecting waterways.
Notable unique characteristics and characteristics commonly associated with it.
Lead section must not exceed four paragraphs.
Geographic map (see Kennet and Avon Canal)

History

History: You may wish to include the following

Who built the waterway?
Why was the waterway built?
Who owned the waterway? (Canal, navigation and railway companies)
What summits and river valleys are crossed?
Describe any notable engineering obstacles and achievements.
Describe the cargoes carried, volume of traffic etc.
Avoid using headings that arrange the history of a waterway according to century or decade.

Decline (where appropriate)

Decline: You may wish to include the following

When and why did traffic stop?
When was the waterway officially closed and/or abandoned?
What happened to it afterwards?
What organisation (if any) was formed to promote restoration?

Today/Restoration (where applicable)

Today/Restoration: You may wish to include the following

The status of the waterway.
Uses of the waterway
Any restoration efforts

Route

Describe the route of the waterway, including any notable features.
Include a routemap.
If including a routemap, add {{clear}} at the end of the section to keep the sections separate.
Split routemaps if needed so they can be reused.
Use subheadings to split the route into appropriate size sections.

References

NOTE: Reference sections may follow a number of styles, including separate "Footnote" and "Further reading" sections, please refer to WP:REF for more information.

Every article of Wikipedia must provide reliable citation, and thus this section is mandatory per policy.
Please use {{reflist}} for a standalone "Reference" section.
Try to avoid over using citation in lead sections.
Consider using an approved citation template to better organise and present references.
When providing a reference, please note that the word or punctuation goes before the reference, with no space in between. Full stops should not appear after a reference (i.e. "this is a quote".<ref>Smith J. (1234), Example book</ref>)

External links

External links should be added only rarely, and in accordance with the guidelines found in WP:EL. Consequently, this section should only rarely be found in most articles. In particular, the use of links as described in WP:SPAM should always be avoided.

If any links are deemed appropriate for this section, they should always be accompanied by an appropriate description of (a) what they are, (b) their justification, and (c) the date on which they were added in the form "Accessed: 07 July, 2007" (WP:EL#External links section gives some more information about this.)

External links used as a form of verification for facts found in the text of the article should be treated as normal references, e.g., cited by enclosing them in <ref>...</ref> tags and conforming to the style of web-based references, which also includes a "Retrieval date" component. They should not be added to this section (see WP:EL#References and citation.) Wikipedia:Citation templates gives useful information about what should be entered and the order in which the separate components of a web-citation should appear.

Optional headings

Some waterway's entries may be dominated so much by a specific landmark, person or movement (such as a feature or event) that it may require its own section (rather than just a sub-section). Where this applicable, try to insert it beneath the heading to which it is most related.

Dos and Don'ts

Per WP:TRIVIA, do not use a "trivia", "miscellaneous" or "other facts" section.
Per WP:LIST, avoid using lists wherever possible (such as for "locks"), consider using tables, diagrams or prose.
Per WP:DATE and WP:CONTEXT, ~~do not link standalone years. Only link full dates or dates with a day and a month. The same applies to dates in the footnotes.~~ Only link to dates if it is likely to deepen readers' understanding of a topic.
Per WP:EL and WP:SPAM, be reluctant to add external links unless they are essential, and always restrict them to the External Links section, or preferably to within an appropriately tagged reference.

Grammar and layout checklist

The lead needs to adequately summarize the content of the article.
There should not be anything in the lead not mentioned in the rest of the article.
Only make wikilinks that are relevant to the context. Common words do not need wikilinking.
A word only needs to be wikilinked once within each section.
It is not recommended to specify the size of images. The sizes should be what readers have specified in their user preferences.
Text should not be sandwiched between two adjacent images.
All fair-use images need a fair use rationale.
Image captions should not end with a full-stop if the caption does not form a complete sentence.
Book references need the author, publisher, publishing date and page number.
Web references need the author, publisher, publishing date, access date, language (if not English) and format (if a PDF file).
Blogs and personal websites are not reliable sources.
Inline citations belong immediately after punctuation marks.
Each "notable resident" needs a reference.
Portal links belong in the "see also" section.
"Further info" links belong at the top of sections.
Include lists only if they cannot be made into prose or their own article.
Lists within prose should be avoided.
Unspaced en dashes are used for ranges. Unspaced em dashes or spaced en dashes are used for punctuation. The same applies to dashes in the footnotes. See WP:MOS#Dashes.
" " (non-breaking space) should be typed between numbers and units.
Imperial measurements should be accompanied by the metric equivalent in brackets, and vice versa. If possible, use a conversion template, e.g. {{convert|5|mi|km|0}}.
Whole numbers under ten should be spelled out as words, except when in lists, tables or infoboxes.
Sentences should not start with a numeral. Either recast the sentence or spell the number out.
Usually, only the first word in a section heading needs a capital letter.
Short sections and paragraphs are discouraged.
The words "current", "recent" & "to date" should be avoided as they become outdated.
Ampersands should not be used, except when in a name, e.g., Marks & Spencer.
Southeast is one word (and may or may not be hyphenated). This does not apply when it is the name of an area, e.g. South East England.
In longer sentences, a comma may be needed before "and", "due to", "such as", "including", "as", "because" or "but".
"Past few years" has a different meaning to "last few years".
"Within" has a different meaning to "in".
Full-stops are needed after each initials in someone's name.
Hyphens should not be placed after words ending in ly, e.g. widely-used phrase (except if the ly word could also describe the noun, e.g. friendly-looking man)
Do not use contractions, such as "can't" and "they're".
"While" should only be used when emphasising that two events occur at the same time, or when emphasising contrast. It should not be used as an additive link.
Using "with" as an additive link can lead to wordy and awkward prose, e.g. the town has ten councillors, with one being the district mayor → the town has ten councillors; one is the district mayor
Beginning a sentence with "there", when it does not stand for anything, leads to wordy prose, e.g. There are ten houses in the village → The village has ten houses. The same applies to "it".
Avoid weasel words, such as "it is believed that", "is widely regarded as", "some have claimed".
Avoid peacock terms, such as "beautiful", "famous", "popular", "well-known", "significant", "important" and "obvious".
Avoid informal or words, such as "carry out" and "pub".
Avoid overly-formal or archaic words, such as "circa", "utilise", "whilst", "upon", "commence" and "prior".
Avoid wordy terms, such as "the majority of" and "a number of".
Avoid vague words, such as "various", "many", "several", "long" and "almost"
Avoid phrases with redundant words, such as "is located in", "the two are both", "they brought along", "they have plans to", "they were all part of", "the last ones to form", "both the towns", "outside of the town", "all of the towns", "received some donations", "still exists today", "it also includes others", "many different towns", "available records show" and "in the year 2007".