Talk:U.S. Route 12 in Indiana

Untitled

There are some notes at Talk:U.S. Route 12 in Indiana/Dunes Highway. --NE2 01:19, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:U.S. Route 12 in Indiana/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Viridiscalculus (talk · contribs) 17:26, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

This article has failed its Good Article review. The main reason is the article does not fulfill Good Article criteria 3a and 3b, which require the article to cover all main aspects of the subject but not be overly focused on one particular part of it. In particular, the History section is heavily focused on one major part of the highway's history and completely neglects anything that happened in the last 80 years. However, it is not just the history that is a major problem. The Lead does not adequately summarize the article. The article is very sloppy with regards to spelling and grammar. The references are inconsistent and incomplete. There may be copyright violations. I put together a list of the major issues and some details that need to be fixed before this article can be sent to Good Article Nominations again.  VC  17:52, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Infobox

• For the West end, remove the "beneath I-90..." clause because it is unwieldy. Change the city from Chicago to Hammond, since the route actually enter the city of Hammond at the state line.

• For the East end, mention the nearest city to the state line.

Lead

• "withUS 20 twice" "from Michigan City to Michgian state line" There are at least two typos in the first paragraph of the Lead. There are many more spelling, spacing, and grammar issues in the remainder of the article. Your prose does not need to be flawless for the Good Article process, but you are expected to look over your own work and correct careless spelling and spacing errors like these.

• First sentence: The word "historical" implies this route no longer exists. Delete it. I would say "parallels" the Lake Michigan shoreline. "runs along" implies the highway is directly on the shore, which is not the case.

• Second sentence: Indicate the cities at or near the highway's endpoints in Indiana. Also, you need to include the length somewhere in the Lead.

• "US 12 through Whiting, East Chicago, and Gary is concurrent withUS 20 twice." Two problems with this sentence. One, the concurrency with US 20 is given undue weight. Two, it is not clear where the concurrencies start and end. I would extract the cities, integrate them elsewhere in the first paragraph, and toss the concurrency information.

• The last two sentences of the first Lead paragraph should emphasize major sights along the highway instead of the highway configuration.

• "US 12 was part of the Dunes Highway from the Illinois state line to Michigan state line, concurrent with US 20." The first mention of Dunes Highway should be bold because a search for Dunes Highway redirects to this article. "was part" is wrong because the highway still follows Dunes Highway. The last clause in the sentence implies US 12 was concurrent with US 20 throughout the state, which is wrong; US 20 does not enter Michigan.

• Add the definite article "The" to the front of the second sentence.

• Chicago and Detroit do not need their states included. Everyone knows which state they are in. Pipe the link. I also advise moving the first mention of Chicago much further to the front.

• The second paragraph jumps around chronologically. The first sentence is fine, but then it jumps from 1922 to 1918 to 1920s to 1950s to 1926 to unknown. The jump from 1950s to 1926 is particularly acute because of the use of "then."

• The last sentence would look better if moved to the mini-lead of the Route description.

Route description

• "Only the segment of US 12 that is concurrent with the U.S. Route 20 from the Illinois state line to the split with US 20 in East Chicago are included..." Subject-verb agreement: "Are" should be changed to "is"

• Spelling: "concurrenct"

• Wikilink the casino

• "a distance of 2.24 miles (3.60 km)" Remove this clause. One, exact distances like this are rarely necessary in the Route description. Two, the length contradicts the Major intersections table.

• US 12 makes several turns to bypass downtown Michigan City. Those need to be mentioned.

History

• This section is very unbalanced and incomplete. There are three long paragraphs about the Dunes Highway and one tiny paragraph about route designations in the 1920s and 1930s. There is absolutely no history after the early 1930s. This was the primary highway between Chicago and Detroit for several decades until superceded by the Interstates. There have been several realignments of the route, the most obvious one (to me) being at Michigan City, yet there is nothing about that.

• This section starts out with an extensive quote, which is a sore thumb as it is not smoothly integrated into the text. This quote can be paraphrased quite easily. It is possible the quote could be a copyright violation, although I will need a second opinion on that. Please see WP:QUOTE for the proper use of quotes in an article.

Major intersections

• "Max Mochal Hwy." Expand the last word to Highway. There is no need to abbreviate, especially where all generics are spelled out elsewhere in the table.

• The location where US 12 has a junction with SR 520 is "Pines" in the junction table but "Town of Pines" in the Route description. Make references to locations consistent throughout the article.

Images

• Something seems wrong with the 1925 postcard with regards to copyright. Why would ancestry.com release to the public domain something with an unknown author? I will check with someone more familiar with Wikipedia's policies to see if my suspicions are confirmed.

References

• There are multiple references included multiple times in the list with slightly different details. Examples of this include Refs 12, 15, 18, and 20, and the references to the Albert C. Rose and Suzanne Hayes Fischer works. There are several bullet point references that are implied to be subsets of a numbered reference but are not. Many of the newspaper references are missing page numbers and titles.

A portion of US 12 was rerouted in the Miller Beach area of Gary. US 12 now continues it's concurrency with US 20 past Lake St where a poorly signed unsignalled intersection has been built. US 12 eastbound turns left at this intersection on the new road which is a realignment of Dunes Highway. Drivers on US 12 westbound from Dunes Highway come to a T intersection with US 20 East and US 20 West signage. Drivers have to figure out that they should turn right to continue on US 12. (The reroute of US 12 is part of the South Shore's double track project.) This realignment likely changes the accuracy of the description of the path through Miller Beach (passing Town Hall, etc.) so that will need to be researched and fixed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.245.250.60 (talk) 06:04, 1 May 2022 (UTC)

Major intersections

A few things that are inaccurate/need clarification in the Major intersections table.

1. Why is ArcelorMittal main entrance in the table and Gary Steel Works (U.S. Steel Gary Works), which is one of the biggest steel mills in the US North America and was the worlds largest steel mill, is not listed in Indiana 53 or Indiana Toll Road table?
2. The ArcelorMittal table entry says it is a folded diamond interchange what it is not. It is more just a right in/right out with an underpass and another right in/right out. Look near NYC and many other northeast U.S. cities have this setup and not every single one is listed. If anyone does leaves US 12 in that location you are trespassing it is a PRIVATE ROAD and PRIVATE PROPERTY, even using the ramps to turn around could get someone in legal trouble.
3. The "main entrance" part is also incorrect that might be what google maps calls it but is not the main entrance. The Main ArcelorMittal entrance is the east one it has a stoplight with US 12 at least it is the main entrance for trucks.
4. IN 49 ends BEFORE the bridge over US 12 see Indiana 49 outline shield and a bridge over/under a road in Indiana is not uncommon someone could spend years listing them all.
5. US 12 and IN 212 doesn't have indirect access from eastbound US 12 to southbound SR 212 and northbound SR 212 to westbound US 12 via Frazie Road. Frazie Road is not even signed in that area look another google maps mess up. INDOT owns that little road, that at one time was US 12, and signs it as an access ramp for northbound SR 212 to West US 12 movement see and nothing stop someone from turning right from eastbound US 12 to SR 212 street view.
6. SR 249 doesn't have a folded diamond interchange at US 12 it uses the ramps to get to US 12 to end. The bridge over US 12 is George Nelson Drive and enters Burns Harbor.

If the editor that added this information would have driven on the roads or look at streetview and not just used google maps (or other online maps) this would not be a problem.Traviswa (talk) 21:51, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I am not knowledgeable enough to have an opinion about most of this stuff, but I can confirm that the ArcelorMittal ramps are on private land. This can be verified through the Porter County GIS. For example, the parcel to the south of US 12 (which includes the ramps to and from eastbound 12) has PIN 64-03-33-126-001.000-024 and is registered to an ArcelorMittal subsidiary. -- Visviva (talk) 02:25, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

The ramps to ArcelorMittal is their private driveway what ever they want for a driveway is up to them. So if I build an interchange for my driveway on any state road it would/should be listed in the "major intersections", maybe the table should have a different title other than "major intersections". I'll suggest a few "Major intersection with some private driveways" or "Somewhat major intersections". Every ramp to and from US 12 have at least two Private Property and No Trespassing signs. I'm sure they don't want anyone using the ramps other than employees and maybe some deliveries. Traviswa (talk) 15:08, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

@Traviswa: @Visviva: Could the Arcelor Mittal ramps be colored gray and tagged as private on the exit list, as is the case with the driveway off I-94 to the Military complex west of Battle Creek on Interstate 94 in Michigan? It's still an exit if a private one, and I was told that all exits are to be listed on any road that has them. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 02:52, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

@TenPoundHammer: I think maybe a discussion at USRD might not be a bad idea. When someone told you all exits must be listed they probably didn't know of any being used as a private driveway. Someone could probably count on one hand how many times this happens in the whole U.S. (I seem to recall passing an interchange in PA (near Pittsburgh) that could be similar, not sure about it being on private land.) The only thing about having it grayed out is that gray means closed/former. The Military complex above has many jersey barriers and a trench blocking access to the property, so that kind meets the closed part. This one is wide open but only to ArcelorMittal employees and anyone that they allow to use it (contractors, deliveries, etc), but not to be used by the general public. Looking at Template:Jctbtm it says "closed/former Previously complete and open, but now closed (temp. or perm.)", might need to change the wording to include not open to the public. In western state like Texas and Montana they have interchanges that only lead to private roads, but the DOT owns the interchange and the general public can use the interchange for any reasons (turning around, truckers taking a break, etc). This interchange is not owned by INDOT and has no public right of way. Traviswa (talk) 13:22, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

BTW Trespassing in Indiana can be a felony, one of only a few state that is the case. All that the property owner has to do is placed "private property no trespassing" or "no trespassing" signs, signs that are placed in this case. Traviswa (talk) 17:30, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

@Traviswa: MOS:RJL says "All grade-separated interchanges, without exception". This is a grade-separated interchange; therefore it should be included. Noting in the junction list that it's private should be sufficient. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 17:04, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

The legal argument is irrelevant (and I doubt any court would convict based on private property signs that are posted AFTER you take the exit ramp). We do list the NSA-only exit on Baltimore-Washington Parkway, and even have an article about a private rail station for a GE plant. The important thing is whether it's a major intersection. This is sometimes subjective, but we've decided that interchanges are always major. And this is obviously designed as an interchange, not a set of RIROs that happen to be connected. The one thing that gives me pause is the nonstandard exit sign, but it's no stranger than what some cities might post. --NE2 17:36, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

At a former job I picked steel up at this mill many times and on the first run with the trainer was told never user that exit, Burns Harbor/Port of Indiana "rent a cop" will be after you. Indiana is ass backwards on many laws once you pass the signs you have trespassed, at least that is what they told my coworker at court. He was even picking up from them and used the exit to turn around. The trespassing signs have to be on private property, someone not from IN telling someone from IN about IN laws only on Wikipedia and they can figure out what the problem with this site is. Do You think someone could buy beer in a case in Indiana on Sundays? You would be wrong this is the only state that you can't, see another ass backward law. Tell me more about the IN court system you have NO FUCKING clue about. Traviswa (talk) 19:55, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

Yawn --NE2 20:04, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

Hmmm. Because I disagreed with Traviswa here, he reverted my changes to U.S. Route 62 in Arkansas, and he seems to be flaming out elsewhere. Travis: go ride your bike and piss off motorists; it's what I do and it's more satisfying. --NE2 21:23, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

Ok, it's been said already, but our MOS says to include grade-separated interchanges, so we need to unless there's a very good reason not to follow that guideline. The private property argument is a non-starter in that regard. The interchange exists, it should be listed, and an appropriate note added so that readers understand that it's a special case.

As for other comments not discussed above, if US Steel/Gary Steel Works isn't listed on the sign, but ArcelorMittal is listed on its sign, then that would be a good reason why it was omitted from the table. If you feel strongly, add it to the "Notes" column though to avoid the implication the INDOT has listed it on the main guide signs

Re: SR 49, does INDOT list SR 49 on the sign even though the highway ends just short of the interchange? If so, follow the signage and make a note in the "Notes" column if necessary.

All other issues can be addressed with calm, rational editing without the need to call editors names or impugn their ability. We're all volunteers here, and if you can improve the article, just do so. Imzadi 1979 → 00:59, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

I believe that ALL interchanges along a highway need to be included, whether it be with a public or private road. The Mid-Atlantic has several examples of interchanges for private features such as corporate headquarters and shopping centers along with non-road public facilities like train stations and park and ride lots. An interchange signifies an important junction or feature along the road as the junction or feature must generate enough traffic to warrant access from a freeway or a grade separated junction in lieu of an at-grade intersection. Dough4872 00:50, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

That analysis doesn't quite apply here, since the bridge was already there to separate US 12 from the railway. But the design of the ramps distinguishes it from the standard RIRO interchange of necessity. --NE2 02:51, 5 February 2015 (UTC)