Talk:Mitta Mitta, New South Wales

Australia: Places / Riverina Low‑importance

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Conflict in location from a cockatoo's perspective or by road?

The NSW Geographical Names Board states "A locality on bank of Mitta Mitta Creek about 14 km S of Bethungra". Our info states 30 km from Bethungra. GA Aust states 15.3 km see query [1]. The difference is presumably road vs cockatoo flight. Not sure which one we should be using.--Golden Wattle ^talk 21:47, 23 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Good question Golden Wattle. As I have been progressing through these Riverina towns/villages/communities I have been analysing various road maps etc and where possible using the stated road distances between points that I then post into the info box. My logic being that most people will drive/ride/walk these distances by road (rather than fly or go cross country) and hence the longer distances. Just for information I have almost always been using the two nearest towns/villages etc so that viewers can step from one point to the next (especially because some of these places are extremely difficult to find). Your thoughts?V i r tualSteve 22:51, 23 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Seems a fair enough approach to me - I have no strong convictions either way. I suggest annotating with a comment using the tags  so people know how the information was derived. We might also want to take the discussion point to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Australian places - I have just done Elmore as the Cocky flies - in part because I didn't get up and find a road atlas. I suspect the road atlas approach is better. The cocky method does give a sense of geography though - fascinating that it is twice the distance by road from Bethungra to Mitta Mitta NSW than flying.--Golden Wattle ^talk 00:06, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Good point on the idea of a comment - my thoughts are to add the words by road to these types of articles - where the distance is found by road atlas because it gives the immediate information to readers of wiki. I have added it now and will continue to add in the future. (I had been doing that on other articles and for some reason did not on this one.) Agree with your interest on the double distance issue for Mitta Mitta - the turn off to Mitta Mitta (along a dry crappy old dirt track) winds near a meandering old creek bed for 8 or 9 kms before it reaches the church and the turn off for that dirt track is 21-22kms from Bethungra (according to my bike's odometer).V i r tualSteve 00:44, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My 2 cents worth. I generally use Travelmate MapMaker to calculate distances for me. Not always 100% reliable but generally pretty good. When designing the new places info box they have had the same discussion about by road or as the crow flies, and the consensus was by road as that appeared to be more meaningful. I would link to it but for the life of me I cannot find it.--Mattinbgn 02:08, 24 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]