Talk:Kowloon Walled City

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Good articleKowloon Walled City has been listed as one of the Geography and places good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
April 7, 2014Good article nomineeListed
On this day...A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on March 23, 2023.

Validating Information[edit]

"Also, as the Walled City was beginning to be torn down, a group of Japanese explorers took about a week to tour the empty walled city, making a sort of map and a cross section of the city"

Interesting bit of information with no online source to validate or confirm. Would someone mind posting a link to this reference? This statement just hangs there... Not saying to remove it, just support it.

Accidently found it http://web.archive.org/web/20020208225753/www.flex.co.jp/kowloon/story/index_e.html Now would someone mind adding the citation?

I agree with the first comment. Referring to this as "Kowloon" for the article is a bad idea... why not Walled City?

The first comment is here in the hope that a knowlegeable person will make the relevant changes in the article. olivier 13:47 16 Jul 2003 (UTC)
OK, tried my first attempt to consolidate everything. Did it traditional inverted pyramid style -- try to give big picture first and go more specific. Feel free to clean up and clarify. (Fuzheado)

This is a new comment and I'm not totally sure that this is the correct way to do this but oh well. The walled city was documented before it was torn down. A book was published entitled "City of Darkness, Life in Kowloon Walled City." It's available on Amazon.com and it runs around $85. It's expensive, but if you're interested in urban culture and architecture it's fascinating. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.21.97.102 (talk) 03:53, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Depictions in Popular Culture[edit]

I'm gonna get a screenshot of this as soon as I find the episode of where it's at, but if anyone can help me out on this - In Ghost In the Shell : SAC 2nd GiG, when Hideo Kuze talks about his revolution and a new society, there is a scene which is basically identical to this one >>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:KowloonWalledCityAlley2.jpg

In fact, I think that the whole refuge district concept is very similar to this. Rokasomee 08:19, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

got it. http://www.fileden.com/files/10493/combo1.png >>> a screenshot of the refugee district Rokasomee 10:09, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes...the Japanese Wikipedia article on this topic does mention that Ghost in the Shell drew inspirations from this place, maybe that's why. _dk 10:26, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think a mention of Long Arm of the Law and its sequel deserves mention. It used the locale memorably in both films climactic action sequences.

Questionable copyvio?[edit]

I swear i've read the text somewhere... and it's not on wikipedia. What caught my attention is the style.

... With the Triads' power diminished, a strange sort of synergy blossomed, and the Walled City began to grow almost organically, the square buildings folding up into one another as thousands of modifications were made, virtually none by architects, until hundreds of square metres were simply a kind of patchwork monolith. Labyrinthine corridors ran through the monolith, some of those being former streets (at the ground level, and often clogged up with trash), and some of those running through upper floors, practically between buildings. The only rules of construction were twofold: electricity had to be provided to avoid fire, and the buildings could be no more than about fourteen stories high (because of the nearby airport). A mere eight municipal pipes somehow provided water to the entire structure (although more could have come from wells). By the early 1980s, Kowloon Walled City had an estimated population of 35,000 - with a crime rate far below the Hong Kong average, despite the notable lack of any real law enforcement.
Over time, both the British and Chinese governments found this massive, anarchic city to be a bit too much - despite the low crime, for if the 'Black Market' ever had a physical location, this would have been it, and needless to say, the sanitary conditions were, well, a bit wanting.

Here I've highlighted some perculiar use of description and structures that are not very scientific and encyclopedic. POV? I will fix up some of the punctuation in the meantime. --Kvasir 23:04, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I have placed a copyright violation tag. Some sections appeared to be lifted word for word from this paper.[1] See page 131. --Kvasir (talk) 22:16, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm pretty sure that this site copied from Wikipedia, not the other way around. This paper is dated 2005, while large parts of the article already existed in 2004. See [2]. I don't think that this is a copyvio. Andrew_pmk | Talk 04:20, 5 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Is this settled? I'm going to remove the tag for now, it's really distracting and it doesn't seem like there's any evidence that this article is a copyvio. Putting that tag on an article without specifying what source it's copied from is really bad form.P4k (talk) 04:29, 5 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Shenmue 2[edit]

Is this the same city as Ryo visits in Shenmue 2, called Kowloon? If it is, maybe information on differences btw Kowloon in the game vs Kowloon in real life could be added? --Konstantin 12:23, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I just read this article and the similarity occured to me. This might go under a "trivia" section. Shawnc 03:40, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The city in Shenmue 2 is most definitely the Kowloon Walled City. --Golbez 03:45, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

neutral POV?[edit]

I think this paragraph is a bit biased: _____________________________ Evacuation and demolition

Kowloon Walled City before its demolition.

Over time, both the British and the Chinese governments found this massive, anarchic city to be a bit too much - despite the low reported crime. If the 'Black Market' ever had a physical location, this would have been it. Needless to say, the sanitary conditions were a bit wanting. _________________ Can someone change it without losing the general message?

Exclave vs. enclave[edit]

The intro previously called Kowloon an exclave, but it also said it is located "in the middle" of Hong Kong. I'm pretty sure it can't be both. An exclave, by definition, must not be entirely contained within the larger state. If it's completely surrounded by one state (such as Hong Kong) then it is an enclave. List of enclaves and exclaves has it as an enclave, and assuming the "in the middle of Hong Kong" part is true, I believe that's the correct classification. Kafziel Complaint Department 07:19, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Under construction...[edit]

Just posting here as a heads up that I'm currently doing a fair amount of work on this article. At the moment City of Darkness is listed just as a general reference, so I'm not sure what statements use it as their source. I will be reading through that book and adding inline citations where applicable. I am also compiling some possible quotes that could be used in the article. If anyone can provide additional good images, or reliable sources for unsourced statements in the article, that would be very helpful. —tktktk 03:21, 21 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Having looked over various population estimates, I've seen a few sources claim that 50,000 people lived in KWC at one point. However, given that (according to City of Darkness) the population was about 10,000 in 1971 and about 33,000 in 1987 based on government surveys, this seems doubtful. It may well be that people took the highest estimate that anyone had come up with and ran with it. If anyone can provide a solid, reliable source for the claim, though, I'd be quite happy to be proven wrong. —tktktk 21:57, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I am also removing (after searching for sources) examples in the "Cultural depictions" section that do not explicitly reference KWC. A "Walled City" is a generic term that could mean any city with walls, and "Kowloon" is the general area in which KWC is located. Neither term on its own can be definitively said to be referencing KWC. Of course, if a reliable source can be found for anything I've removed, please do add it back. —tktktk 22:37, 24 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I've removed two of the images that are copies of the photos in City of Darkness, and put them up for deletion on Commons. It's really unfortunate (aereakowloon.jpg in particular was amazing), but copyright violations do need to be dealt with. I replaced them with another image and a quote from City of Darkness that gives a wonderfully vivid description of life in KWC circa the 1970s. —tktktk 03:04, 6 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]


Interestingly enough[edit]

Doing informal calculations, I found population densities of cruise ships such as the Carnival Triumph, etc., to be something like 1200/acre (although such densities could well be more)(note: the unusual footprint of a ship makes it hard to calculate density per square foot of "land", given the bulletlike floorplan of a ship's hull and varying floorplan of its superstructure.) Kowloon Walled City clocked in at over 5000 people/acre, which is a lot. The population density of a Boeing 737-300 approaches that of KWC (4 964.93649 people/acre), but that population is all on the same floor on an airplane, whereas multistory buildings made up KWC. 192.12.88.7 (talk) 07:46, 3 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Going with the population of 33,000 and the area of .01 sq mi, the desity would be 3,300,000 per sq mi. Daniel Christensen (talk) 12:34, 23 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"Hak Nam"[edit]

Kowloon Walled City was also widely known as "Hak Nam", Cantonese for "City of Darkness", I am told. Could someone add this to the article? I would, but I don't know where would be best, nor what hanzi should accompany the term.

(And ideally a Hongkong-ese person could please add whether Hak Nam was a matter-of-fact name, or something deeply disparaging? I think you'd have to be from around there to know.) Sean M. Burke (talk) 13:35, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In the Hitman series[edit]

Though the article mentions it is used as the setting for certain missions from the Hitman video-game series, it is not actually the case. No mission from the game takes place within the Walled City itself. The larger city of Kowloon is used however. I may be wrong on this but I remember the series well and cannot recall any overt reference or depiction of the Walled City. 70.180.248.94 (talk) 03:45, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Location, location, location![edit]

Overlaying the 1915 map on Google Earth imagery puts the "Chinese Town" shown in that map about half mile SE (22.3283 N, 114.19454 E) of the location given in the article (22.33228 N, 114.18866 E) and in what later became part of the airport. The possibilities are: (1) The map is distorted and wrong, (2) The "Chinese Town" shown in the map is not the walled city which would be outside the area of this map, (3) The location given by the article is wrong, (4) I have made a mistake somewhere. All seem unlikely but what is the explanation? Other maps of the late 19th or early 20th century could shed some light. GS3 (talk) 11:59, 30 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The location you got from overlaying the map (22.3283 N, 114.19454 E) is roughly in the middle of the Lung Tsun Stone Bridge, which was the pier used for accessing Kowloon City aka. the "Chinese Town". You can see it very clearly with the satellite view of Google Maps, including the excavated remnants of the bridge. You can find additional old maps and a lot of information by browsing the references and external links of the Lung Tsun Stone Bridge article. It is very possible that the two different location data simply point to two opposite ends of the Kowloon City, which was fairly large. Underwaterbuffalo (talk) 13:02, 30 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
After more investigation it seems clear that the four corners were roughly located at (22.33112, 114.18959), (22.33225, 114.18893), (22.33319, 114.19087), (22.33201, 114.19152) and so the center was at about (22.33214, 114.19023), where the remains of the yamen are still today. I have corrected the coordinates in the article accordingly even though the change is very small. Still, overlaying the 1915 map in Google Earth puts the city itself out where the airport end was. Not the bridge but the city itself. Not a big deal because the map might be slightly distorted and it might show as built city areas which were deemed to belong to the city but were open.GS3 (talk) 16:17, 30 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

how about a basic street map in the infobox or at least a note in the opening paragraph about WHERE it is relative to something in the modern world?! rather than some dusty old 1915 map. "NT" is pretty vague and most people don't really want to go off-page tracking this down.

was it indeed near Kai Tak? their existences overlap so obviously comments above that Kai Tak took over the space cannot be correct.

what MRT station(s)? all this talk of overlay maps -- please someone put it IN THE ARTICLE! 66.105.218.25 (talk) 03:44, 24 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Coordinates are given at the top of the page. You can click on them and view the location on Google Maps. Seems quite modern world to me. In case this is not enough, the article mentions "The area where the Walled City once stood is now Kowloon Walled City Park", which in fact means that there is nothing really notable in the vicinity. So interested readers will better go off-page to figure out the location, I believe. Underwaterbuffalo (talk) 20:34, 27 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Flat unit size[edit]

Thanks to MusikAnimal for nominating this as a GA, and LT910001 for reviewing. There was some uncertainty about the meaning of the statistic "Because apartments were so small — about 60% were 23 m2 (250 sq ft)" so it was taken out. Here's the original quote, which is talking about compensation for moving residents out pre-demolition:

"The final formula tied compensation to bringing the cheapest HOS [Home Ownership Scheme] flat within reach of the owner-occupier. Based on a unit size of 23 square metres, the size of some 60 per cent of all flats in the City, owners in the first phases were to be given $320,000[.]"

It seems pretty clear to me from "unit size" that the author is saying those flats are exactly 23 m², rather than "up to" 23 m². I've re-added the statistic (and clarified the wording to say "about 60% had a unit size of 23 m2 (250 sq ft)"), as I think it helps readers to better visualize just how small many of the flats were. If anyone takes issue with that interpretation, let me know. —tktktk 05:04, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

@Tktktk: Hi there. I found this, which suggests that the flats were "approximately 23 m²", not exactly. Might be a useful ref to add as it's quite detailed. Best, ► Philg88 ◄ talk 05:27, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, no worries. "Based off" indicates that they took an average size. I would be extremely surprised based on the hodge-podge housing and notorious lack of law-and-order if the units all turned out to be exactly the same size. --LT910001 (talk) 10:31, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Philg88, unfortunately the paragraph you're referring to actually looks like it's describing the New Territories in general. LT910001, you may be right about them taking an average size. I've changed the article to say "a typical unit was 23 m2 (250 sq ft)", since that would be accurate in either case. —tktktk 17:35, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Tktktk: Indeed. Looks good. ► Philg88 ◄ talk 17:45, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nice! Should have pinged you before removing that, but glad we got it back in. Thanks :) — MusikAnimal talk 14:55, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Wall Street Journal project[edit]

There's some good information in this interactive webpage from WSJ http://projects.wsj.com/kwc/ including interviews with the residents, a virtual tour, newspaper clippings of the years before its destruction, and a discussion on its cultural legacy. I think some of the stuff from there can be added into this page; and if not, they're interesting nonetheless! _dk (talk) 10:03, 27 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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Volumetric density[edit]

I know Wikipedia is an encylopedia but I still want to propose the following even though allready taken out because of WP:OR: "Given the vertical scale and block shape of the settlement provides a basis to calculate an uncommon volumetric population density of roughly 400,000 per cubic hectare, at an average hight of 30m." Nsae Comp (talk) 00:33, 26 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Depictions in literature[edit]

Aren't there any other literary depictions of KWC outside a single website? That seems strange, to say the least. I can't work on it right now, but at the very least almost the entirety of Cyberpunk literary genre contains references or inspirations drawn from KWC, and it does appear in some of Gibson's books.

Forgot to sign... Monteparnas (talk) 14:05, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

SCP Foundation[edit]

The first time I added this piece to the article it was accepted, in 9th March 2019. It was removed after more than a year, in 23 August 2020, without any explanation except be called a cruft and no talk about it whatsoever. For more than one year others polished and even restored this part when removed, in 2 April 2020. It is a sourced reference, primary-sourced for acknowledgement of existence, to a notable site. The referenced piece is explicitly about KWC. The "In Popular Culture section already contains less relevant citations. Why does it need further complications to be re-added now?Monteparnas (talk) 14:23, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The reference is a minor story that, while on a site that is considered borderline notable (it's been nominated and deleted previously for being non-notable) doesn't mean every story or page on that site is considered notable. The story itself is only barely about KWC and it is a very minor story of no lasting cultural significance. There is zero indication that the story of the artifact is in anyway embedded in the public consciousness to the extent that it can be considered popular culture, and it reads as something completely throw away. It's, in and off itself, not notable and basically including it is trivia.
I must ask though what your connection to this story and the site is. Since almost all your edits are about adding this to the article, it could imply you have a connection with it. At this point, having added it now 3 times across several years, it feels like you're trying to promote this particular story. Canterbury Tail talk 14:35, 15 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I added it the first time because I thought it relevant enough as a paragraph or line under In Popular Culture. It was taken down because it lacked a reference, so I added the reference as I thought that was it. I didn't looked again at the article for years, then I noticed it was taken down again. I searched in the history for the reason and what I got was an insult instead of a reason, and an earlier instance of someone deleting it and you re-adding it, so I thought it was just an error and re-added.
On that matter, I also read the newly formatted section and noticed a number of references that are just as minor, coming from sources I sincerely can't see as significantly notable, or where KWC plays a minor-to-non-existent role. I personally don't think they should be taken down, yet I don't see why they're more notable than this.
My only relationship with this reference is to know it, I have a greater relationship with my contributions being respected. The story isn't barely about KWC as it is both inspired and an alternative explanation to the city, and again not bellow the standard I saw on some the other standing references.
This situation really upsets me. I'm being called out as suspect of CoI because I want my contribution to be respected instead of being at the mercy of random fancies, while less notable references are kept. At least now it is clear the reason instead of justified with a gratuitous offense, and that being accepted. Monteparnas (talk) 16:23, 6 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
So any contributions to Wikipedia can be altered, changed, reverted etc that's just part of the nature of the work, it's no longer your edit once you commit it. Can it be disheartening, yes I agree it can at times, try not to let that get you down from that perspective. There's not much more I can say on that point.
So I still don't believe this extremely minor short story, in a barely notable website, is part of public consciousness enough to be included in a In Popular Culture section. I will note I personally dislike these sections as they tend to be a magnet for trivial mentions and non-notable items which can lead to situations like this. You say other mentions are less notable, but I'm not seeing it. The other mentions are all about items that actually have their own specific articles for the item in question, whereas this short story is simply one story buried away among thousands of others on a collaborative writing site. It's sort of the kinda of same notability as if someone mentioned something in a throw away line in a movie, we wouldn't consider that notable. If there are others less notable than that then by all means bring them here to the talk page about removing them. Canterbury Tail talk 11:54, 7 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Size of the enclave[edit]

So, I really don't know what to do with this information, since it is certainly WP:OR rather than WP:RS, but, having looked at a lot of photos of the enclave over the years and looking at the size we currently state for it...I mean that's just clearly much more than 6.4 acres, right? I've looked for alternate figures for a bit now, but the problem is that the bulk of the media content about the enclave now consists of media articles that postdate this article, so there may be an element of WP:CIRCULAR at work here, but that too is speculation. In truth, I haven't done a deep dive on the research looking for older figures or the original secondary or primary source from which the current one originates, let alone attempting a systematic/technical approach measuring the footprint using historical data or metrics of the current park from contemporary maps (which would also be OR in any event). I'm still going to try it before long (if only to try to resolve the doubt) but it might take me a little longer than someone else with a more robust skillset for such things, so I thought I'd start by sharing my impressionistic reaction here. It's possible I'm falling prey to some forced perspective effects, but I really think that's significantly more than 6.4 acres. SnowRise let's rap 04:37, 23 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Snow Rise:: The size does seem remarkable, but it is sourced to a journal article from 1987 which states the same figure (or 6.5 at least) ... that doesn't mean that the current source is necessarily correct of course - best way to change it would be to find a reliable source saying something else. Mujinga (talk) 13:38, 23 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The figure has to be wrong. 6.4 acres is the area of two or three houses on my street. The picture clearly shows more than that. Richferrara (talk) 15:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'd guess it's more like 25 acres. Seems like there's consensus it's wrong so maybe it's best just to remove the figure. Hopefully eventually someone can find a better source. Mujinga (talk) 08:22, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Seems okay. 6.4 acres is the rough area of 5 American Football fields or just less than 2 Manhattan standard city blocks. That's a lot of area to have this kind of structure on and seems reasonable to me. Buildings and structures tend to have a lower area footprint than people think. Remember it is very dense. Looking at the park that covers the area and using the measure tool in Google Maps it comes to about 200m by 130m which does indeed calculate to 6.4 acres. Canterbury Tail talk 09:01, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Oh that's a clever method! I was taking the the little pitches to the right of the city in the article pic as one football pitch and guesstimating from there, now I see on gmaps that they are practice pitches (and below them is a full-size pitch) so I would downscale my estimate back down to around 6.5. Cheers, Mujinga (talk) 09:46, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, well, I guess that's the best measure we have in the circumstances, with a more precise survey impossible without some extra records--and certainly more than I thought to do. If the math adds up, that's good enough for me, though I still say that looks more like 12-15 acres to my (not entirely untrained) eye. But again, with the perspective utilized with the wide shot images, combined with intuitive assumptions about the size of the structures that may not be entirely accurate, and so forth, I can see how it may very well be just 6.2-6.7 acres (depending on the source: I did see some minor discrepancies in how we quoted the particular sources which I should go back and change now, so some small benefit comes of my little exercise here). In any event, I appreciate the indulgence folks. SnowRise let's rap 17:44, 24 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Oh no worries. Always nice to have a civilized discussion this stuff. And I was curious enough myself to want to do the math. Canterbury Tail talk 01:32, 25 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Featured picture scheduled for POTD[edit]

Hello! This is to let editors know that File:Kowloon Walled City - 1989 Aerial.jpg, a featured picture used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for July 06, 2023. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2023-07-06. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! Aviafanboi (talk) 14:10, 26 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Canterbury Tail: What is Air rights according to Wikipedia definition? --95.24.66.215 (talk) 10:04, 3 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Why does that matter to anything, Wikipedia is not a reliable source. We go by what the reliable source in the articles say. Anyway this is about an illegal set of structures, disregard is more likely the correct term than an overuse of rights (since they weren't legally applying for or using any of them.) Canterbury Tail talk 12:31, 3 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Canterbury Tail: In that case the link should not lead to the Air rights article in Wikipedia. --95.24.66.215 (talk) 10:35, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is no better article to link to. If a right is disregarded or violated it does not mean that it no longer exists. Sjö (talk) 10:46, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
And I have to ask you the same thing that I asked at Talk:Ethnic groups in Finland: where are you going with this? Do you propose a change in the article or is this a forum-like discussion where you just want to vent your views? Sjö (talk) 13:46, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]