I have been into Wikipedia for some months now and thought I should introduce myself. I live in Kent, England and am in my mid-70s. Having spent a third of my life as a regular soldier, I then took up teaching before retiring some 15 years ago. I have an Open University degree, and spend some part of my life as a public speaker. My main interests are in the fields of Geography; local and family history; and have a lifetime's love of railways. Peter Shearan 07:01, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)
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Since starting to contribute to Wilkipedia I have concentrated on two areas:
A great many articles on Kent towns and villages: in particular adding some of the history of those places. I found that a great deal of many articles seemed to have been written off-top-of-head, and often had little substance as to what a town or village stood for. I don't mean to be too sweeping about that, but that was certainly my impression at the time.
A rewrite of the growth of the county organisation in Kent, since it all, like Topsy, "just growed" - and this was not the impression given in the article.
Railways:
I began with the Metro (West Yorkshire) article : through this I began to see that as a general rule, articles had been written in isolation about each of the railways over which the Metro had control. Even though many of the lines traversed the same tracks, the articles read as though they were all working in isolation. I tackled each of the individual Lines, adding historical facts where I could.
I have also done the same kind of work on the Southern franchise lines
I am now tackling the South West Trains franchise in the same way. A great deal of this TOC's work is done in the London suburbs and I am coming to the opinion that articles such as Category:London railway stations and List of London railway stations err since they stop listing at the London Borough boundaries - whereas the suburban rail traveller would consider, eg Shepperton to be in London as well - but no its in "Spelthorne" in Surrey: whoever would guess that?
I am in the process of producing a series of article covering the open spaces in the conurbation that is London - see my comments at Category:London parks and commons, which is an attempt to cover the green "lungs" of the capital. Peter Shearan 09:17, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
I have recently completed a project to provide the basis for an article for all included in List of civil parishes in East Sussex, provided an opening piece for each and also other info as I find it. Many are still stubs, but at least there is something. I am now in the process of tackling List of civil parishes in West Sussex in the same way. I look at all the existing articles too and add the fact of the civil parish (and other details) if not included. Peter Shearan 11:48, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I have had something of a sabbatical over the past 18 months, but have now returned. I am at present looking at some of the articles on Kent villages and towns. Dartford has caught my attention as needing a good deal of work Peter Shearan 07:16, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
Welcome back. There is certainly room for a dedicated editor. If you are looking for articles that need attention Dartford would be a good place to start - as would anywhere that has a railway station- or a bus stop. I am still concerned about the tone of Dartford Heath, the refs tally, but I don't really think that the activity is much more interesting or notable than dogwalking.
Rivers are undergoing a major expansion with a lot of work being done on watermills. Many have dedicated walk leaflets that are a good starting point, the River Bourne/Shode has expanded from nothing to B class in weeks. The River Medway itself is lacking- but try looking at the River Trent There are good resources by Googling Flood Relief partnerships. Still it all takes time!
I am currently waiting for the sunlight to return so I can get some encyclopedic Kent images, on commons, that are properly Geotagged. Todays effort was Ebbsfleet, Bluewater and indeed Dartford but so little light- now after tomorrow...
I have had a good look at Kent towns, and have done some considerable rewriting on Royal Tunbridge Wells; Southborough; Maidstone and Dartford, inter alia. I also made an attempt on River Medway. I am now taking a look at the River Stour collection which seems to be very untidy and completely illogical in the way it has been tackled. Every tributary, however small (one is 3.5 miles long) is given its own article, yet the map supplied shows hardly any of them. There is a perfectly good detailed map on the Environment Agency website referred to, but that isn't mentioned in any article... It makes it almost impossible to understand the words used in each article as to there they are. (A picture (and especially a map!) is worth a thousand words as somebody once said! Peter Shearan (talk) 09:35, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
My home town by birth! Took a look at this one: it is a M.E.S.S. I guess any article on a town with a tourist base will suffer from overegging the pudding - after all the town PR is trying to sell itself - but this one goes too far! On top of that an unpaged editor has created a stub article for almost everything that moves ... Some great references in the way of books - I have two of them myself - unfortunately they are not used, editors preferring to go their own way. So we have an article in which the history is Romans - Norman Conquest - Victorian seaside ... and the geography talks like a tourist guide, ignoring the actual facts of the town. The remainder of the article is random thoughts without any structure. I am in despair!!! Then we read that A Level students are copying/pasting this stuff!! To top it all there is a rogue editor without a talk page - Kentem where art thou? Peter Shearan (talk) 15:38, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
I have now completed the major rewrite of the Hastings article. At least it now has some structure, and looks less like a PR job for tourists. I am also putting forward the suggestion that the St Leonards-on-Sea article is merged with it - on the basis that the new town of the 1830s has done just that! I await the flak Peter Shearan (talk) 07:21, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I have spent a few days taking hold of the Rother articles re civil parishes. I have added infoboxes where none occurred: so far I didn't manage to get the location map added! I have also put reflists where none existed before, and slightly amended titles on the Rother article where necessary: this could probably have some more facts added, I am sure. In addition I have included them all on the Category:Local government in East Sussex: IMO that is the place for them, since they are all the third tier of local government, and NOT in the Category:Parishes of East Sussex which separates them out for no apparent reason. Peter Shearan (talk) 17:01, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
