Talk:Riga Voyage Tips and guide

Contents

Removed External Links from article, see Where did the "External links" sections go?'. I've stashed them herre in the event someone wishes to incorporate any of these into the article in the customary way. --(WT-en) SHC 16:36, 3 June 2006 (EDT) http://www.riga.lt http://www.riga.lv/EN/Channels/About_Riga/default.htm http://www.riga-airport.com/ Riga Public Transport: http://www.ttp.lv/ (Trolleybus and Tramway) http://www.rigassatiksme.lv/maps.php (Interactive Route map)

I'm wondering: Should the Riga card, which covers both transportation and attractions, go under Get Around or See, with a mention in the other? I'm thinking See --Rastapopulous

I also think See, since the reader will see it with the list of attractions. You wouldn't buy it for the transport alone, but you may buy it for the attraction admissions alone. (WT-en) Andyfarrell 08:10, 12 November 2009 (EST)

Does anyone else know what categories the remaining restaurants are in? --Rastapopulous

I'm trying to figure out a scheme for categorizing the restaurants. Anyone have any ideas? I'm afraid I'm not very good at this. (WT-en) Rastapopulous 18:06, 13 November 2009 (EST)

This will be a nightmare, especially considering I've never been there, but I am going to try and take on this listing. Does anyone know if by "holidays" on the website (in the section w/ the hours), they really mean "weekends"? (WT-en) Rastapopulous 14:29, 11 November 2009 (EST)

Looks like you made a decent stab at it. By the way, the convention is to add new items on talk pages at the bottom. (WT-en) Andyfarrell 08:10, 12 November 2009 (EST)

Okay, I've split it up a bit now. Anyone have any idea whether the "Russian-themed" restaurant is what's on the middle floor? (WT-en) Rastapopulous 18:04, 13 November 2009 (EST)

No, the whole thing appears to be Russian-themed; the middle floor is simply the main (and largest) area. (WT-en) Andyfarrell 09:02, 15 November 2009 (EST)

Okay. What exactly is on the middle floor anyway, that's different from the other two? (WT-en) Rastapopulous 16:30, 15 November 2009 (EST)

I have the suspicion that this listing:

• The markets next to International Bus Terminal are full of people selling their wares at stalls, both inside the large halls and around the outside. The market is actually quite non-touristy with more emphasis on selling things like second-hand clothing, food, furniture or kitchen supplies. In here you can buy almost anything... Very good for souvenirs. There are lots of small cafes scattered around the markets that serve up cheap local eats.

Is the same as the Central Market. It is pretty close to the bus terminal. Can anyone confirm/deny this?(WT-en) Rastapopulous 21:48, 12 November 2009 (EST)

Yes, now I look at it in detail I'm sure you're right. There were stalls outside the back of CM, the descriptions of the things on sale are right. Descriptions of where buses ran from were vague - some said Central Market, some said the Stockmann centre. These were positioned either side of the main railway station, and I don't know where the International Bus Terminal would be. I say delete it as a duplicate item or merge some text. (WT-en) Andyfarrell 03:51, 13 November 2009 (EST)

Do you think I should merge them into Buy or See? I think Buy. (WT-en) Rastapopulous 11:18, 13 November 2009 (EST)

Either one works, as it's a bit of both, so go with your preference. (WT-en) Andyfarrell 11:43, 13 November 2009 (EST)

The listings have been merged together and placed into the Buy section. (WT-en) Rastapopulous 16:54, 13 November 2009 (EST)

[[Image:Doc_budget_hotel_riga2-s.jpg|thumb|250px]] This image was done by myself. The data come from google maps and a latvian magazine. I did it for a friend who work in travel agency. I can confirm the data can be used for any document, and I give to everyone the right to use this picture. It's very usefull for customers. Even if it helps the Top 5 of the hotels in this table, it also provide a right information to others. If a guest get a good deal with one hotel, he can decide if want to spend more time in transport or not for such price. But it will not have an unpleasant surprise. (WT-en) Peterisvalkis 11:21, 6 January 2010 (EST)

I'm going to remove this image. The info it presents is a detailed comparison of hotel distances which, presented in any other form, would still likely be eliminated. It also contains a great deal of tiny tiny text, much of it in other languages, and it does not generally fit with our style to present info tables in image form. (WT-en) texugo 12:08, 31 October 2011 (EDT)

I haven't seen a notice on pickpockets. Be aware, they operate smoothly at the underground passageways connecting old town, 13.janvara iela, stockman centrs and central station. Even the locals say that it is an infamous place for pickpockets. I got robbed from my media player while I was even listening to that device and I didn't see who did it! I have captured a picture of a pick pocketer operating by using a fake hand bag with his arm hidden under it. Maybe I can upload it to this site. From Damian.

In the Hebrew Wikivoyage we are currently using this banner instead of the one which is currently used here. Do you think too that this banner would would better than the existing one? ויקיג'אנקי (talk) 06:55, 23 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

I don't like this banner. First, it is too broad, and each object is so small that it becomes indistinguishable on my 14' screen. Second, it is a 360-deg panorama wrapped into a "linear" image, which makes it confusing: there is only one river in Riga, and you should not see it on both left and right sides of the photo. --Alexander (talk) 07:10, 23 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

Even just purely as a composition, I at least marginally prefer the current banner, although it's a little hazy in the distance.—The preceding comment was added by Ikan Kekek (talk • contribs)

Like Alexander, I find it slightly "disturbing" and unreal to see Daugava River both on the right and the left, hence I prefer the old banner. ϒpsilon (talk) 19:11, 23 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

How about this one, I recropped the panorama to avoid "double river effect". Jjtkk (talk) 19:43, 24 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

That improved it a lot. I would favor replacing the current banner with your recropped image. But I'd like to see what people who know the city have to say, as I've never visited Riga. Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:01, 25 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

This recropped image is now very similar to the old banner. I still weakly prefer the old one, though, because it shows individual landmarks more clearly. --Alexander (talk) 04:24, 25 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

It is very similar cause I like the current banner except the fact that Zeppelin hangars and TV-Tower are cut off and Academy of Sciences is in renovation. When I made the current banner I didn't find the panorama we have now and there were more serious dimension constraints from source photo. Jjtkk (talk) 10:40, 25 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

It would be pretty if anyone who can take photo from the 11. novembra krastmala of Riga, and make banner as this: File:Riga daugava.jpg. --Great Brightstar (talk) 05:28, 10 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

I created a new banner for this, which captured from a panorama image from west side of Daugava River, and I beliebe this should be worthy of the best view of the city throughout the history (see c:Category:Panoramics in Riga). --Great Brightstar (talk) 03:19, 16 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for creating the new banner. Let's discuss the pros and cons of the different banners. The first banner probably has the best light, except for people who prefer sunsets; the third banner has the most distinctive view but is a little fuzzy; and the second banner is probably sharpest but has the least appealing light. Your thoughts, everyone? Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:47, 16 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

1 and 2 look more appealing than 3, FWIW. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 11:35, 16 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

Seen from EXIF information from original file, this was taken during a sunset. -- Great Brightstar (talk) 04:43, 19 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

We'd assumed it wasn't a sunrise, but we have doubts that it's the best of the 3 banners. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:04, 19 September 2023 (UTC)Reply

Its very useful to have a bus rental address, because, people who may visit wiki voyage website are probably planning their trip by them self's, and they are probably looking for a cheaper and a better way to explore Riga and Latvia in this case. If they have a place where they can compare prices with existing bus routes, It may be interesting for them to expand their trip in Riga and Latvia all together.

It could be very useful information for people who are traveling in big groups. Or, for travelers, who are just looking for some options and are planning a group tour. —The preceding comment was added by Oskars123 (talk • contribs)

I'll have some arguments later, but perhaps someone would like to address whether bus rental listings have been permitted on any other page on this site, and what reasoning has been used in regard to policy so far. Meanwhile, please wait for a consensus and don't edit war. Thanks. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:15, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply

We now have 58 "See" listings alone, and I believe there are many more to add, not to mention a lack of most of the important "Do" listings. This will probably push the combined number of POIs in those two sections alone to over 100. Moreover, we still have the Eat, Drink and Sleep sections to cover, which will make it something around 200 with the ones we already have and a few more that will probably be added.

Further still, it is hard to give a single set of directions on getting around for the POI-filled largely pedestrian Old Town, the dense Centrs and the sparsely sprinkled POIs outside of the Centra rajons. Therefore, my proposal would be to split Riga into three separate articles:

• Vecriga
• Centrs (may include the bit of Maskavas forstate immediately adjacent to the railway station)
• Outer Riga (basically everything outside Centra rajons)

I know this seems quite radical and would provide for two relatively small districts and one super-large, but I guess the relative POI density makes it the only reasonable solution. Having separate guides for every of the five outer districts would results with near-empty articles with little chance of being filled with relevant content. Only by combining them do we get a critical mass necessary for a reasonably useful guide.

What do you guys think? Should I go forward with that? PrinceGloria (talk) 08:16, 14 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

PS. User:Ypsilon, User:Jjtkk, User:Abstraktn, User:Nurg, User:Carsten R D - I saw you made edits to this article in not-so-distant past. You may perhaps want to weigh in on the above.

What is Centers? I think even locals will be confused, because the center of Riga is the Old Town.

Riga has several well-defined districts, such as Pardaugava (+Daugavgriva), Maskavas forštate (from the central market and Academy of Science to the church of Old Believers and Jewish memorials; an essential part of Riga that most tourists do not know), Vidzemes or Peterburgas priekšpilsēta (with its Jugenstil buldings and industrial architecture). And the rest could be called Outer districts, where places like Mezaparks and ethnography museum will be described.

If you don't feel that you can write about each of these districts, then perhaps keep everything in one article for the time being? --Alexander (talk) 03:52, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for chipping in, Alexander! I take it you know Riga very well, so your opinion is very valuable.

I have in fact never been to Riga, I am just researching it for the coming visit. What I have found is that the Centrs part of the Centra rajons is very often referenced, and that most POIs that are not in Vecriga are located there, including the Jugendstil buildings (Elizabetes, Albertas, Marijas etc.) It seems to me that the official district of Vidzemes priekspilseta is the one further out, where we do not have many POIs.

Regarding Maskavas forštate, it surely is an important district, but it seems like most POIs, apart from the said Grebenshchikov Church, are actually close to the train station, and there isn't even 10 See items there. So creating a separate guide would provide for a stubby one, so I propose to add this part of the Maskavas forštate to the part on the 19th-century centre (however we call it).

As regards Pardaugava, there doesn't seem to be more than 10 POIs in total (including hotels and the airport, which isn't even in Riga actually) on the right bank of the river. Therefore, I believe we would be creating an empty shell of an article just to "highlight the significance" of the district, which we can well do by appropriately formulating the "Understand" and "See" (and other) sections of the combined "Outer Riga" article.

Do take into account that I am looking at Riga from a tourist's point of view, not local's. There may be many well-defined districts that follow, or don't follow, the official borders, but some of them are simply of less interest to the tourist and I guess we should gauge if a district "deserves" a separate guide by looking at the number of POIs first and foremost, not its cultural, historical etc. significance for the locals. Which is not to say we should not mention and emphasize how the locals see Riga, and what they find important, this is only the principle I'd adopt for districtification.

Finally - no, I cannot write at length about any of those districts much more than is already written, and what I can find in the sources, as I don't know Riga. I was just trying to use the guide to plan my journey and found it unwieldy, due to the extreme concentration of POIs in the Old Town, which I guess could be better described in a separate article, as almost every street has some significance and that would be more of a walking guide. Furthermore, I have found the area that I have found references as "Centrs" similarly filled with POIs to the point that outlying POIs in the other district you mentioned would be distracting. Hence my idea for the split, as those three guides would allow for easy trip planning and would make getting acquainted with the city easier due to the respective POI density.

Lastly - while I believe I have an idea of all the important "See" listings, both already included and still to be added (which I plan on doing in due course), I may be very wrong on that. Would you be so kind and try to add the ones you believe are missing so that we could get a better idea of the concentrations of POIs on the map and then I could better understand your points?

Again, thank you for joining the discussion - I am very happy to have you, with your obvious knowledge of Riga, on board! PrinceGloria (talk) 05:36, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Yeah, Riga is a pretty long article. Been once to Riga, but it was a while ago, so I don't know how much I can help (I added coordinates for everything a few months back but had to use google maps+the address for everything but the most famous sights). IMO it would be logical to divide Riga into four: 1. Vecriga (Old town), 2. Commercial centre or something like that for places around the railway station and northeast of the old town, 3. East bank (east of Daugava outside those two, don't know where to draw the border), 4. West bank.

Or then Vecriga could just be chopped out as one separate district article, Andrewssi did this to Haeundae beach when districtifying [[[Busan]] for the first time.

Or we could keep everything here and arrange sights under subheadings for each district and for the sight-dense Vecriga even "sub-subheadings" for different kinds of sights if needed.

Ps. I'm traveling and won't be editing much this week. ϒpsilon (talk) 07:23, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

This article is long enough to be split in my opinion. Old Town/Vecriga should get its own article but I'm not sure about Centrs, I agree it's hard to define its borders while in Riga. I'd go with three "districts":

• Old Town - UNESCO listed, one day tourists mostly stay just there
• East Bank (with POIs along Brivibas iela and in Maskavas forštate) for those who have a bit more time
• West bank (with islands on Daugava) - not much to see there really

This way borders are well defined and we don't have on huge outer district (which I think are very impractical). That's how I dealt with Riga when I stayed there for two weeks or so. Jjtkk (talk) 08:06, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Well, "Riga for tourists in 2 days" does not need any districts. It should be all about the Old Town plus few points next to its borders. This is what most people see, and one single article covers it very well, even though it will be a long article. But one article is always better than 2-3 articles, because you don't have to jump from one text to another every time you cross the boulevards and leave the Old Town.

I emphatically disagree with statements like "not much to see there really", and I can start adding POIs (how many POIs do you want? how many POIs warrant a separate district?) but this will bring us to a discussion whether each of these POIs is important or not. I also don't think that counting POIs makes much sense, because most of the pre-WWII districts have their own ambiance, which is something that you never get from the map. Maskavas forštate, Āgenskalns, Grīziņkalns all deserve a separate walk and will give you a real feel of the city with its rich history and controversial reality, but this is not what most tourists are interested in.

Finally, one can easily compare Tallinn and Riga, which are cities of similar size and similar tourist importance. The current version of the Tallinn article is pretty much a dumb-tourist-oriented travel guide fitted into a single article. It mentions Nomme as "another residential district", which is quite funny to read about the richest collection of Estonian buildings from 1920-30-s (the short period of independence), let alone the gorgeous Glehn's manor, but indeed nobody goes there because it is not featured in popular travel guides. The current version of Riga article is a similar mainstream tourist thing, and it should fit into one article as well. Whenever we have other people who are interested in non-mainstream things, a proper district scheme can be developed. --Alexander (talk) 09:17, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

User:Alexander, first of all - if you know of more POIs, by all means do add them (both to Riga and Tallinn - we have only 2 weeks until Tallinn goes onto the front page!). You are a seasoned contributor, I seriously doubt we would have any qualms about any POI you may add. Some of them may be "less important", but I guess that's what guides are all about - if we provide and appropriate description, it is up for the tourist to decide what they find important and interesting for them. The more choice and more in-depth information, the better. There is no point dumbing things down.

I believe there is a certain number of POIs that can serve as a good rule of a thumb if a district should be carved out. I'd say this should be around 25 POIs in the See & Do sections combined. May just as well not work everytime, but I believe districtification is first and foremost a way for us to reign in overly long lists of listings. For areas that are interesting, but not really filled with POIs in the strictest sense, a good way is to give them a descriptive and attractive description, e.g. telling tourists that it is worth going there for a stroll and experience the wooden architecture of 19th-century ambiance, particularly along XX and YY streets. We don't need a separate article for that.

OTOH, I cannot agree with you that everything that a "casual tourist" (I wouldn't call them dumb - attractions that are the most popular tend to be so because the most people are interested in them, let us leave judging people's tastes aside) may want to see in Riga is in the Old Town or "next to its borders". First off, Riga's Old Town is very unique in the way that it is quite clearly separated from other parts of town by a river, canal, belts of green and two main roads. Going from the Old Town into other parts requires a conscious decision and I believe tourists can easily see they are going into another district, plus there is a bit of a walk (or a bus ride!), significantly more than between the POIs within the Old Town, between the Old Town and the 19th century Riga.

It is easy to walk from Elizabetes into Albertas, or further into Marijas, Krisjana Valdemara or Baznicas. Just like moving between Doma, Livu and Ratslaukums is a matter of turning around a corner. This is why both of this areas could use walking guides that one could constantly reference while they walk. But crossing the canal is a longer walk and then we can advise the tourist to turn to a different guide, where a different set of instructions would be given (e.g. we pretty much don't have to mention trams for the Old Town, but could discuss individual lines when dealing with 19th century Riga, which is how I understand "Centrs").

User:Ypsilon - thanks for chipping in and finding time for that during your "voyaging"! Seems like your first impression is the same as mine, with the difference that you would split out the west bank entirely. User:Jjtkk thank you as well! With regard to your comment - is the Old Town enough for a day? What about the Elizabetes, Albertas and other 19th-century streets? I guess they may be even more of a draw than the Old Town itself. At any rate, putting Elizabetes and Albertas, as well as the Academy of Science and Central Market, in the same article with outliers like Mezaparks would not provide for a hnady guide IMHO, which is why I proposed to split them in the first place.

What I would propose is for us to start the Old Town article (we seem to all agree this is a separate, well-defined, touristy or not, part of Riga), and I would propose for you to reconsider my proposal for a Centrs article to avoid putting stuff "close to the Old Town but requiring a bit of a walk or two bus stops" and "requiring an hour's bus ride" together. Then we could leave out everything else in the "Outer Riga" article (and continually add to it) and see if any of the further districts mentioned emerges from that as a useful material for a guide. How about this? PrinceGloria (talk) 20:03, 15 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Don't you want to see Riga first? Honestly, I find it very strange when one writes about the city without visiting it. This is something like writing travel guides on the basis of other travel guides and copying their bugs instead of providing your own view based on first-hand travel experience.

Regarding extra POIs, I intentionally refrained from editing the Tallinn article, because it is a good and concise travel guide for a first-time visitor. If I now add 50+ POIs (which is very easy to do), we will have to split the article into districts, write overview texts explaining what to see and why, etc. I don't have enough time to do it myself (in fact, I do it, but very slowly and in Russian), and I don't see other editors having deep knowledge of the city (same for Riga, unfortunately). Therefore, I strongly recommend to keep the article as basic as possible. However, if you want to see Riga beyond standard tourist attractions, here is a list (which is by far incomplete). --Alexander (talk) 11:16, 16 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Either this is a wiki about voyages and we treat it seriously and add content as we go - as it occurs to us, as we have the time - or we are trying to write a perfect offline travel guide. I would hope we all truly accept the perpetually imperfect nature of our guides stemming from the sole fact that they are being created that way. I don't think we should EVER refrain from editing, or adding to, a guide for fear of making it "less perfect". This work is never finished and we should never stop just because it is "good enough for now".

So, if you find the below worth recommending to me, they are worth recommending to any other traveller who might stumble upon our guide. Why don't you start adding them to the article (same goes for Tallinn) and my observation is that this usually starts a snowball effect of other users getting interested, chipping in their knowledge, copyediting and such. So there is no need to worry that you will just add 50 POIs and nothing will happen. Please do just that, and things WILL happen. PrinceGloria (talk) 20:40, 16 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

PS. Regarding the fact I edit this guide BEFORE visiting Riga - I did it several times for places I haven't been before since I started at Wikivoyage, and I found that I usually had little to add or change after I visited the place. There is a surprising breadth and depth of information if you are an inquisitive and imaginative traveller - be it online, on paper or to be got directly from those in the know.

PS2. If after all that we shall see that there is a good reason for districtification of a certain area, it will be done in due course (and again, you will see that even if you don't have the time to write intros and such, somebody will). I would only suggest keeping POIs under headings of districts you may think may emerge, it will make the districtification easier (and will help the travellers anyway, regardless of whether we districtify or not).

Well, I did what I deemed necessary, and now I will step back to see how the wiki mechanism handles this information. --Alexander (talk) 22:25, 16 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

The borders of the old town are not a problem, I'd say. These would be Daugava, Vansu bridge/Krisjana Valdemara iela, Pilsetas kanals and 13 Janvara. But where the border between the "commercial centre" and the outer districts is not as straightforward.

As for now, however I'm fine with keeping the article as one.

Also, if we are going to add a lot of sights with the aim of making districts we should also look into adding other types of POIs. I remember - Alexander for sure also does - the case with Moscow a few months back when a certain user added everything that could be considered a sight (I think there was close to 300 in one of them) and no additional restaurants, stores, hotels and bars and the article looked like an Opel Corsa with 50 sacks of cement in the trunk... ϒpsilon (talk) 17:19, 17 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Maskavas forštate:

• Red warehouses. A huge cluster of mid-19th century warehouses between the train station and Central Market. They remind of the former trade harbor.

• St. Francis Church (Katoļu iela 16). Built in 1892, a gorgeous neo-gothic building in the middle of slums. Features copies of Giotto's mural paintings in the Papal Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi.

• All Saints Church (Katoļu iela 10). Orthodox church built in neo-Romanic style around 1880. Unlike other orthodox churches in Latvia, which are typically Russian in their style and nature, this one was designed by a Latvian architect.

• Church of John the Baptist (Kalna iela 21). Construction started in 1913-14 but it was not finished before the Russian Revolution and continued in 1920s when Latvia became independent. This led to a strange mix of styles rendering the church a rare example of modernist architecture implemented in an Orthodox temple. The adjacent Ivanovskoe cemetery is the main Orthodox cemetery of Riga.

• Church of Our Lady of Kazan (Kalna iela 21). Another church on the same cemetery. Build of wood in 1812-15 in a somewhat awkward style with 5 small domes sitting on a massive drum.

• Church of Gregory the Illuminator (Kojusalas iela 5). Armenian church built in 2011.

• Old New Synagogue (Altnaie Schul, Maskavas iela 57). The only synagogue that survived through the WWII. Built in 1889, partially restored after the war and converted into a residential building.

• Church of Michael Archangel (Maskavas iela 170). Old Believers church from 1894-95, nice example of the Russian Revival style.

• Horse-drawn omnibus (Maskavas iela, crossing with Mazā Kalna iela). A funny monument commemorating the first Riga tram that was driven by horse power. An old iron construction nearby reminds of the former Hay Market.

• Old Jewish cemetery (between Tējas iela and Ebreju iela). A huge area that reminds of the Jewish population of Maskavas forštate. Established in early 18th century, this cemetery kept expanding till the beginning of 20th century. After all local Jews were exterminated by the Nazis during WWII, Soviet government destroyed the remaining gravestones and converted the area into a Park of Communist Brigades. Nowadays, there is a small Jewish memorial.

Āgenskalns:

• St. Martin's Church (Slokas iela 34). Lutheran church from 1850s. Its decorations are fairly plain, but the location among the trees is remarkable.

• Baptist Church (Mārupes iela 14). A mix of cultures and styles. Built in 1913-16, this church had neither a tower nor a dome and resembled a simple residential building. The tower was added in 1936. Baptist services continued until 1961 and resumed shortly after Latvia re-gained its independence.

• Trinity church (Mārupes iela 2). A fine example of Russian style from the very end of 19th century. Don't miss rich decorations as well as eye-catching mural paintings and icons inside.

• Methodist church (Slokas iela 6). A fairly bland building from 1930s. However, the very presence of a big methodist church in Riga is remarkable.

• Church of St. Albert (Liepājas iela 38). Baroque edifice from early 20th century. The interior of the church was partly designed in 1950s despite the official atheist propaganda that was widely imposed in the Soviet Union.

Grīziņkalns:

• St. Paul's Church (Augusta Deglava iela 1). Neogothic church from 1885 marks the center of Riga's main industrial neighborhood. Most of the mural paintings are from 1930s and represent the art of independent Latvia before WWII.

• Two gas storage buildings from 1882 and 1901 (end of Matīsa iela) are landmarks of the old gas factory in Riga. These enormous structures reaching 40 m in diameter are probably the largest buildings of their kind in Eastern Europe. Note the pressure meter that mimics a clock.

• Baptist church (Matīsa iela 50b). Light neo-Romanic building from 1867 looks completely alien to its dark industrial neighborhood.

• Twin water towers located at the crossing of three railway lines (Mazā Matīsa iela) are known among locals as Anna and Zhanna (Ann and Joan). Legend has it that Anna was a skilled quack in medieval Riga. She was accused in being a witch and burnt to death. This triggered her sister Zhanna to commit suicide. Their ashes were brought to a place that was considered wicked, which is exactly the triangle between the railway lines where the water towers are located. This place is indeed quite strange and renowned for its remoteness dominated by a huge cemetery and a prison. The water towers from 1885-87 are very pretty, though, and seen from afar.

• Matisa cemetery adjacent to the water towers has an interesting monument to the heroes of the Russian Revolution of 1905. The monument was built during the time of Soviet occupation (1956-59) and represents the typical gloomy-gray concrete style of Latvian military monuments constructed after WWII. Another and equally gloomy 1905 monument is in the small park on Grīziņkalns hill on Pērnavas iela.

• Valmieras iela and adjacent streets boast gorgeous industrial buildings from late 19th century. The largest factory was Russo-Balt that produced first cars and airplanes in the Russian empire. Most of these buildings are now abandoned and derelict but quite interesting to see. You will find lots of old plaques, signboards and other 100-year old artifacts.

Are those still current issues? Can't find any info on that on the US embassy site. Can anybody more in the know confirm if we should keep all those lenghty infoboxes about those? PrinceGloria (talk) 12:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

I can't comment on the language schools. Regarding the bars, I suggest to remove the list and extend the text in the Stay Safe section. I am not sure whether such things are still common, but they might exist, similar to taxi drivers who tend to drive you for a fixed price instead of using the meter. --Alexander (talk) 12:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

It may well be true that Riga has regular ferry connections to Stockholm, but this picture is confusing. I took the picture myself in Riga, and that ship was going to Turku, not Stockholm. And besides, it was a special Christmas cruise. Normally it doesn't even go to Riga but sails between Stockholm and Turku. JIP (talk) 10:56, 24 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Or it did at the time. Apparently it now sails between Helsinki and Tallinn. JIP (talk) 10:58, 24 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Tallink sails from Stockholm to Riga, but not with Europa (which we BTW won't see around for a while). But showing both a passenger ferry and the terminal I think it is the best photo we currently have on Commons. --ϒpsilon (talk) 15:20, 24 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

I put that picture with the caption there for the very reason outlined by Ypsilon. Silja Europa and Romantika aren't that totally different in terms of ship type and size. This picture is just to show that Riga has a ferry terminal that handles large passenger ferries of that size - and currently the only regular ferry connection is to Stockholm. PrinceGloria (talk) 20:21, 24 July 2014 (UTC)Reply

Much of the old town was either destroyed by fire or destroyed by the Germans in World War II and remained in ruins until it was rebuilt in the late 1990s, mainly to make Riga attractive as a tourist destination.

The only important building rebuilt in 1990s is the House of Blackheads. USSR-time tourists would be surprised to know that the beautiful (and by far less crowded than today) Old Town "remained in ruins" at the time when they admired it

It is surrounded by a ring of ~19th–early 20th century architecture, followed by a mix of private 2-floor house districts (many also pre-WW2) and Soviet-era 5-18 floor apartment districts, with an occasional factory (especially near railroad lines)

Given the fact that Riga was the second largest industrial center of the pre-1917 Russian Empire, "occasional factories" essentially fails to describe the amount of old industrial buildings that are still preserved in the city

The term "centre" loosely refers to quite a large area around Old town limited by the river to the west, the railroad lines to the east and south, and without a definite boundary to the north.

If you allude to Peterburgas forstate, that district has a well-defined northern boundary, the railway.

As such, much of the architecture in Riga has been heavily influenced by Germany.

??? Despite its German name, Riga Jugendstil was developed by the local architect Sergey Eisenstein who was largely inspired by the French architecture of art nouveau. Wooden houses, orthodox churches, Latvian pre-WWII architecture... they have nothing to do with Germany.

There are many administrative districts in Riga; however, almost all tourist attractions, historic buildings and hotels are contained within the borders of Centra rajons, which is relatively small and walkable. The outer districts do have their own draws, but they may require significant travel time and would not be of interest to a sporadic visitor.

I am sorry, but that's bullshit. The outer districts are of little interest because they are not covered in the travel guide that we read before going to Riga and writing this article. Is it what you mean?

--Alexander (talk) 18:40, 27 May 2016 (UTC)Reply

It would be great if you rewrote it to better reflect the city and added the POIs you find missing. PrinceGloria (talk) 21:31, 27 May 2016 (UTC)Reply

Given the limited amount of my free time, I can't promise that I will do it in the nearest future. --Alexander (talk) 15:49, 28 May 2016 (UTC)Reply

User:PrinceGloria, in the case you wonder, it was Alexander's point #2 and #3 above I tried to address with the edit you just reverted. ϒpsilon (talk) 13:07, 3 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

I am not sure if discussing Riga's administrative situation in detail in the very opening of the article is necessary to address those, but then I may be missing something at 4:40AM... PrinceGloria (talk) 02:41, 4 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

At Riga's DotM nomination, in addition to many other things, it was decided that Riga would benefit from districtification. I would propose 4 districts, as per my 2014 comments above; 1. Old Riga, 2. Centrs, 3. the rest of Daugava's east bank, 4. the west bank (ie. Pardaugava). What do you all say? Prince? ϒpsilon (talk) 04:26, 14 June 2016 (UTC)Reply

I disagree, I don't think we have enough content to districtify, nor that Riga would ever need districts. 06:32, 14 June 2016 (UTC)PrinceGloria (talk)

See and Sleep are very long for an article of this size (while Do and Buy are very short). I guess whether to districtify depends on whether there are more activities and shops to list in the district articles than are listed here already. Powers ^(talk) 20:59, 15 June 2016 (UTC)Reply

I've created four district articles in my sandbox: User:Ypsilon#Riga, based on the division above. So, this is what the districts would look like. Except for Get in information (which can be added using a street map and a public transportation network map), all four of them are technically usable. ϒpsilon (talk) 07:53, 1 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

They do need introductions and "Understand" though. I'd also call "Old Riga" > "Vecriga" if we go with "Centrs". PrinceGloria (talk) 08:17, 1 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

Given that there is nobody opposed to the districtification any longer, I'll move the districts to mainspace now. After this it will be easy to eventually add more POIs etc. (perhaps beginning with the ones Alexander mentioned above), no matter if Riga is on the Main Page in September or not.

And to clarify; these districts are not something I single-handedly invented yesterday, but they were discussed already in #District_split above. ϒpsilon (talk) 18:56, 2 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

I think Alexander is right that we went for an odd choice for Centrs borders, leaving out many landmarks. Please go to e.g. Google Maps and type "Centrs" to see the current (?) administrative borders of Centrs and consider applying them instead.

I also believe we have an odd cluster of landmarks in Outer East in Maskavas Forstate, which are easily reachable on foot from the Centrs / Vecriga. I would move to consider a districts like "Centrs and Maskavas Forstate" to cover all of the "close" landmarks together - in my experience this is good for planning a visit to Riga. You will probably not have the time to Pardaugava and Outer East unless you stay for at least one night, but for a day visit the entire area is walkable. PrinceGloria (talk) 04:45, 5 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

If the outer borders of Centrs are incorrect that's my mistake and I apologize. We should of course use the official borders for Centrs (or perhaps a slightly simplified/less zig-zaggy version in the north of Centrs which would make it easier for users navigating around Riga). I checked out the borders sometime in May when it still was possible to see the borders on our dynamic map (last week and now that functionality is broken and also in http://maps.wikivoyage-ev.org/w/geomap.php no borders show up no matter how many times you check and uncheck the boundary box in the menu) and now had to draw it up out of memory. Luckily Google Maps provides the correct borders and I will try to amend them within a few days most importantly with respect to the westernmost corner. Right now our Centrs article also includes a small triangle northeast of the railway station which apparently isn't officially part of Centrs, but I guess it's no harm in keeping it there.

Maskavas forstate is a hard one; the POIs with the central market are indeed close to the old town but the district officially stretches 2-3 kms southeast. Alternatively we could cut off just the westernmost part of Mf (for instance along Lacplesa iela) and include just that part in the Centrs article ("Centrs and Inner East") but I somehow guess that not everyone would be happy with such a solution. ϒpsilon (talk) 06:52, 5 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

I did not realize the depth disproportion between Centrs and MF - let us just call it Centrs and perhaps note somewhere in "Understand" how we included the bit with Central Market and the Academy of Sciences. PrinceGloria (talk) 19:15, 5 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

Let's do this. Uploading a new version of the static map right now with a larger Centrs. ϒpsilon (talk) 17:15, 8 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

Done. So, now there are four things left to do:

1. listingfying and adding POIs that Alexander suggested above to Outer East Bank and Pardaugava Done

2. fixing Riga's Understand section (those oddities) and/or otherwise incorporate the information into the article Done

3. expanding some of the shorter sections in the main Riga article insofar as possible

4. trying to find a couple more POIs for Eat and Drink (possibly Sleep too) for the two outer districts, possibly the chains mentioned in the main article's Eat section. Done ϒpsilon (talk) 19:23, 8 July 2016 (UTC)Reply

Swept in from the pub

In about a week, I and my girlfriend are going to Riga, Latvia. Our hotel is very near the centre of the city, at Kaleju iela, almost right next to the railway station and close to the river. How do we get there from Riga airport? JIP (talk) 19:37, 16 June 2016 (UTC)Reply

Reposted at the tourist office. JIP (talk) 20:26, 16 June 2016 (UTC)Reply

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Monumento a la Libertad, Riga, Letonia, 2012-08-07, DD 13.JPG

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 09:42, 18 August 2022 (UTC)Reply

No FoP in Latvia. Do we want this? SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:16, 18 August 2022 (UTC)Reply

It's a featured picture, but the statue is pretty small when it's used as a thumbnail. I wouldn't say it's obligatory, but then again, I've never been to Riga. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:59, 19 August 2022 (UTC)Reply