Wikipedia:Peer review/Virginia/archive3

Virginia

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This peer review discussion has been closed.
Virginia achieved Good Article status last year, but didn't receive a thorough line by line review. Two previous requests this year for Peer Review also went without any human review. Third time the charm? This article is quite close to FA, but where else does it need work? Where are more references needed? Which topic are too lengthy and which too short? How does it read? I think the article on a whole can be shortened, but which paragraphs can be broken off without damaging the readability? Even if someone could review a single section or subsection that would be an exemplar for the rest of the article. Thanks for your help, Patrick Ѻ 14:29, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

If you haven't done so already I would make a request to WP:LoCE and ask them to review the article.
The length as you mentioned is too long.
I would consider putting geography and geology and terrain into their own article with a paragraph in the main article.
Climate could be reduced and be included with the paragraph to be formed from combining geography and geology.
Flora and fauna could also be included in that smaller paragraph and reduced.
"At Jamestown 2007" should be changed. Jamestown 2007 according to its article is an organization.
- On second thought, I am not really sure how much info you want to remove. I looked at Oklahoma, which is a FA, and the length difference is not much. You have a great article here, you just need a little bit of polish.
I noticed a few of "In 1773" without a comma after the year in the history section.
"During the culmination of the Jim Crow era, legislators in 1901 rewrote the Constitution of Virginia to include a poll tax and other measures on voter registration that effectively disfranchised African Americans," I would remove or reword the in 1901. It doesn't flow well.
Consider reversing the sentences to have Sept 11 last as it was later. "Northern Virginia was targeted in the September 11, 2001 attacks because of the Pentagon site, where one hundred eighty-five people died. In 1926, Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin, rector of Williamsburg's Bruton Parish Church, began restoration of colonial era buildings in the historic district with financial backing of John D. Rockefeller Jr. The resulting Colonial Williamsburg project is a major part of the Historic Triangle and Virginia's top tourist destination."
Consider removing or trimming these: "and offices for international firms such as Hunton & Williams LLP, McGuireWoods LLP, Reed Smith LLP, Troutman Sanders LLP, CapitalOne, and Philip Morris USA." I have no idea who the first 4 are and why they are relevant.
Necessary? "The adjacent city of Alexandria has a historic seaport district.[66]" Most of the east coast could make this claim.
Try and incorporate this somewhere, one sentence paragraphs are not good. "The five largest reported ancestry groups in Virginia are: African (19.6%), German (11.7%), unspecified American (11.4%), English (11.1%), and Irish (9.8%)."
"Tomatoes recently surpassed soy as the most profitable crop in Virginia." When?
I would be careful with linking, in some places almost entire sentences are linked. I don't think "battlefields" needs a link.
Bluegrass music is linked twice in the space of 3 paragraphs.
Newspapers doesn't need to be linked.
"Other members of the executive branch include the Lieutenant Governor and the Attorney General." Necessary? Every state has these.
"Virginia could become a more competitive state in future presidential elections, and is classified as a "swing state." I don't like this sentence, I think the classification as a swing state is relevant, but the could become isn't good. Maybe reword.
"The election of Democrat Jim Webb as one of Virginia's two U.S. Senators in the 2006 Virginia Senate election seemed to reinforce this shift. His election also demonstrated the disaffection of Independent voters with the Republican Party." Reword, seemed to is not good language for an encyclopedia.
In the 2008 should have a comma after it.
"Virginia is by far the most populous U.S. state without a major professional sports league franchise.[164], although the Washington Redskins have Redskin Park, their headquarters and training facility, in Ashburn, Virginia." This needs work. By far is not encyclopedic. There is also the problem with the comma and the period after franchise. And the end of the sentence just falls off.
"When the New York Mets ended their long affiliation with the Norfolk Tides in 2007, the Orioles took over the affiliation." 2 affiliations in one sentence.
'Notable successes include James Madison University Dukes' 2004 Division I football championship and George Mason University Patriots' advancement to the Final Four of the 2006 NCAA tournament." I think you may need a couple of "the"s in there.
"The other nickname, "Mother of Presidents," is also historic, as eight Virginians have served as President of the United States: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Woodrow Wilson, and Sam Houston served as president of the Republic of Texas." I think the and Sam Houston part may need its own sentence.
Citations:

2 - paper needs to be italicized, date also needs to be linked.

12 - something wrong with the url format

13 - does nascar.com need to be italicized? Same thing with 14, 15, 19, 20.

21 - url is messed up, publisher is italicized. I don't think you need the publisher linked also.

31 - date needs to be linked

32 - Again, I don't think you need to externally link to the publisher.

40 - two periods after School

34, 43, 44 all look like the same source, they should be one single number, with the pages used all under one

Same with 46, 47

I went through 87, go through the other ones looking for the same things. It looks like the name of websites are italicized because you used the work field of the citation template. I always use the publisher field for this type of information. My understanding is that the only thing to be italicized is a published work, newspaper, etc. I am not sure if the way you did it is correct. Maybe read up on citations.
Negative information. I really didn't see much besides health. Has there been any major controversy or problem in the state? Traffic? Crime? Pollution? Disenfranchisement? Think about it, because it will be brought up in a FAC.

Overall I think this is a great article. Wide and detailed coverage that is an interesting read. Like I said above, you just need to do a little polishing. I highly recommend the WP:LoCE. They do good work on the little grammar and punctuation problems (which always trip me up). Work through these and let me know if you have any questions or need any help. Good work! KnightLago (talk) 18:44, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]