Talk:Prospect Park
From Science and Technology: Baruch IDC 3002H
Hello Prospect Park group,
I like the citations that you have posted so far. They seem to fall in to two major categories that I hope to see in your final wiki:
1.) F. L. Olmsted's vision for Prospect Park, and his approach for creating urban parks in general. What did he originally want to create? How was it created? What were his motivations? Was there any ecological basis to his design? How has the relationship between Brooklyn residents and the park changed over the years, i.e. who uses the park and why?
2.) The ecology of Prospect Park's forest: What is different / the same about urban parks in Brooklyn vs. more "natural" forested areas? What are the plants and animals that occurred in Brooklyn before, and what occurs there? (i.e. what data has R. Loeb or the Parks dept. made available?)
These are some questions that you should consider for your wiki. Remember that each of the 10 references you have presented should also cite earlier works that you can draw upon.
Have you guys seen this webpage? [1]
You should make every effort to go to the Lefferts house and env. education center. You can do most of your background research at those two places and easily complete an excellent project!
Your pictures are fine, but in the final version you will need to tell us what these photos are showing. Did the artificial ponds, for example, play some particularly important role in the early design of the park? I would like to see historical maps, drawings, photos of the park, as well as contemporary images that correspond to the same or similar sites.
Let me know if you have any questions...remember that a rough draft is due on Nov. 5th. You guys will need to decide if there is much overlap between your poster project and this wiki.
Regards, Jason
Hello Prospect Park group,
I am making some specific comments on your wiki. We will speak tomorrow in conference about the wiki and poster, but I wanted to jot down some thoughts now.
The image in the top right needs a caption.
The introduction could be toned down a bit...it is less informative and more like an advertisement for the Park. Maybe just introduce some of the basic statistics (how big? how many tree species? etc) and basic history (when created? etc...)
The 1870 map is fantastic? However, it needs a citation. Where did you get it?
It seems that you have quite a few historical photographs of Prospect Park. Can you integrate these into an expanded narrative of the history and design of the Park? What do each of these specific sites tell us about the ideas behind the park's design?
The section on Olmsted seems to rely more heavily on his early biography...his later accomplishments in life that led to him being chosen for the design of Prospect Park would seem to be more relevant.
The "Vision" section seems to have too many long quotes. Can this section be refocused on their vision for urban parks and parkways specifically? That information would seem to be more topical. The last paragraph in the section talks about some of the specific features of the park. Can you expand this section and tie in the historical photographs from one of the sections above?
You also mention the Midwood forest and the "Ravine". Can you include a historical map of Brooklyn showing where these features would have been placed? Any other information on the original state of this area?
Where did the information on historical ecology come from? Citations are needed...the information is good, but could be supplemented with images of the ice sheet in NY or something similar!
Scientific names should be in italics!
The "current ecology" section is pretty good, but also needs citations. Where did you get this information? Can you bring in pictures of any of the more important species or forest types? Make sure that they are not copyrighted! It seems that you have several pictures at the bottom that could be better integrated into this section of the narrative.
IMPORTANT
It seems to me that you list a number of citations that you then don't use in creating your wiki. What about Brooklyn's urban forest? You also cite a few social science studies on how people relate to parks in Brooklyn. Where is the information? Even if you have trouble obtaining the full papers (use Interlibrary Loan!), you could at least read the abstracts on the web! The historical information seems well-referenced and pulled from high-quality sources, but the social science and ecological information needs deeper coverage.
