Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Canada Roads/Ontario/Archive 2
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City roads
There was recently an attempt to get rid of articles on roads like Bloor Street and Bathurst Street. It would be good to have some discussion about what city roads should have articles, and what the content should be, to avoid conflicts like this in the future.
My own opinion is that, as with anything else, if you can find multiple, independent, and reliable references, a road should have an article. A page like Bathurst Street with its central importance to the Jewish community, major transit infrastructure, and many landmarks is easy to find refs for. A road like Morningside Avenue (currently at AFD) has fewer, but there are still several useful sources for it.
As to content, the standard that has developed is to have a prose description of the neighbourhoods that the road passes through, and section on history, transit, and a list of landmarks. I think this makes sense, and is what readers would be looking for in these sorts of article. - SimonP (talk) 00:17, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- My opinion is the same, but I believe our concept of what is worthy of an individual article, and what belongs in road articles, differs. If any article can be written well, reliably sourced, organized, and like an encyclopedia article and not a brochure or a grade 3 geography report, then I believe it should be included. I'd say this roughly corresponds to a C-class article, where there is no original research, no synthesis, and no undue weight placed on restaurants, churches, schools, buildings, parks, airports, conservation areas, etc etc etc. See Don Valley Parkway - granted this is an expressway and not a city street, but I refer to the content and not the notability - The entire route is discussed in detail, but nothing along the route is focussed on. It is mentioned, and then it moves on. I digress; the fact is that a new article should not be written if it will be a stub or unsourced, that's why we have the notability guideline and afd.
- Unfortunately, the fact is that a good number of the road articles in Canada (75% actually) are stubs. Most have been since they were created like a herd of bunnies in 2003 and 2004. I have been putting forth a lot of effort in Ontario to reduce that to 0. I'm attempting to do so without tossing away any important information, but most of these articles are filled with non-notable information. From listing the Jewish churches and schools on Bathurst Street, to naming the stores along Bloor Street West. This information does not belong in road articles, and is WP:TRIVIA and WP:UNDUEWEIGHT, not to mention a directory. What is left inbetween that and a terribly written article (take them to peer review, I dare anyone) is a bit of history, often unsourced, and a very rough description of the route. Hardly worthy of an article. Unlike villages, which merely need exist to warrant an article, roads must be notable. Where they aren't, a list of roads within an area can be made. Each road is listed under its own header or in a table. Voila, no more half-complete unsourced stub, and one complete comprehensive list with a well-defined criteria for inclusion. This improves the encyclopedia instead of leaving it a trash strewn mess. There's no reason another individual can't look at the list, view the history of the redirected article, and recreate it as a well-sourced and well-written standalone article at sometime in the future. Improvements don't always have to come in the form of expanding. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 00:47, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Also, "get rid of" has great connotations, but the reality is I was attempting to merge the salvageable information into an article on all Toronto streets. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 00:56, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- I agree with both Simon Pulsifer and Floydian. Some side streets, such as Raymore Drive or De Grassi Street are notable, while Warden Avenue is not, despite the fact that more people use Warden Avenue than both Raymore Drive and De Grassi Street combined. Johnny Au (talk/contributions) 01:00, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- A street like Warden Avenue really depends on what sort of references you can did up. For most streets you can get good stuff on etymology, history, major landmarks, transportation etc. For most of the big ones, you should be able to dig up enough to justify an article. What I really don't like is merging them. Merging does nothing to address concerns about referencing or triviality, it just takes the same content and makes it much harder to use. - SimonP (talk) 02:08, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'm cleaning out the crap and summarizing the bloated descriptions as I merge them. As for sourcing, you'll see List of roads in Toronto is very extensively sourced. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 16:30, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Merging is not a bad thing. If a street doesn't meet WP:GNG, which means there are not secondary sources on the street in question to establish its notability, but it is part of a system that is notable, it's only appropriate to merge the elements of the system together into a single place. Simply existing with information on the name does not make a street notable. Wikipedia is not a travel guide. Several years ago, there was a campaign to wipe state highway articles for the US off the encyclopedia. Not merge the articles, but outright deletion. Since that time, the best defense against mass AfDs has been to be proactive about merging the questionable items into a list. USRD calls the technique the "Rockland County Scenario" (WP:USRD/RCS), which does not preclude expansion and recreation of articles at a later date. Marginal cases should be merged, which preserves the full edit history of the article. (Deletion wipes that out, except for admins.) Many of the details though that haven't survived the merger shouldn't necessarily be revived. Floydian has my support on this. Imzadi 1979 → 03:51, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- But whose trying to delete them? All the ones on AFD don't have a single delete vote other than the nominator. - SimonP (talk) 14:35, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Check again, the nominator isn't advocating for deletion, but merger/redirection. Imzadi 1979 → 14:52, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Even better then, no one at all is proposing deleting these pages. So thus why are we employing a strategy to prevent deletion? - SimonP (talk) 15:05, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- So then you agree with redirecting them? - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 15:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- It's less about potential deletion from inside the project, but rather the many editors who 1) don't think roads should even be covered in the encyclopedia (except something like US 66 or the Silk Road) 2) the editors that come across poorly written, barely notable articles (like minor city streets) and PROD/AfD on sight. If we pre-emptively merge the borderline cases now until the articles could be improved, they won't RfD the redirects. Imzadi 1979 → 16:01, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- It's just about as much work to redirect and merge the pages as it is to improve them. Even Floydian seems to think that Lawrence Avenue is now a swell page, and that took less than an hour. Wouldn't it make sense to put our efforts into improving the articles, rather than making them more difficult for others to improve? - SimonP (talk) 17:50, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- It's less about potential deletion from inside the project, but rather the many editors who 1) don't think roads should even be covered in the encyclopedia (except something like US 66 or the Silk Road) 2) the editors that come across poorly written, barely notable articles (like minor city streets) and PROD/AfD on sight. If we pre-emptively merge the borderline cases now until the articles could be improved, they won't RfD the redirects. Imzadi 1979 → 16:01, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- So then you agree with redirecting them? - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 15:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Even better then, no one at all is proposing deleting these pages. So thus why are we employing a strategy to prevent deletion? - SimonP (talk) 15:05, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Check again, the nominator isn't advocating for deletion, but merger/redirection. Imzadi 1979 → 14:52, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- But whose trying to delete them? All the ones on AFD don't have a single delete vote other than the nominator. - SimonP (talk) 14:35, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- A street like Warden Avenue really depends on what sort of references you can did up. For most streets you can get good stuff on etymology, history, major landmarks, transportation etc. For most of the big ones, you should be able to dig up enough to justify an article. What I really don't like is merging them. Merging does nothing to address concerns about referencing or triviality, it just takes the same content and makes it much harder to use. - SimonP (talk) 02:08, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- I agree with the merges being completed by Floydian, and the use of the RCS system. --AdmrBoltz 07:04, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- I agree with both Simon Pulsifer and Floydian. Some side streets, such as Raymore Drive or De Grassi Street are notable, while Warden Avenue is not, despite the fact that more people use Warden Avenue than both Raymore Drive and De Grassi Street combined. Johnny Au (talk/contributions) 01:00, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- You need to judge each article on a case by case basis and not do a blind mass merging/deleting of articles based on personal opinion that some article topics are "trash." Bad form and and it appears an attempt to sidestep community input. --Oakshade (talk) 03:37, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
- I did. The articles that were small enough to be merged were the ones I merged. This was definitely scant enough prior to this nomination to be merged. The fact is that SimonP just wanted to ensure each article that already existed continued to exist. John Street was literally a single paragraph when it was originally merged. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 03:52, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
This has turned out to a giant mistake. We have dozens of articles that are now redirects to List of roads in Toronto, but that giant list has now been split into smaller lists which are still huge. So in effect you've taken dozens of articles which, although not perfect were a starting point, into several giant ugly looking lists that nobobdy wants to look at and even fewer people want to edit. I was going to update transit information on a few road articles, but the current setup means that I will be taking my efforts elsewhere. There is a reason we have stubs; almost every good article out there started as one. The effort to consolidate has resulted in driving readers and editors away. Ng.j (talk) 16:48, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
- I'll leave the discussion to Talk:List of roads in Toronto. Needless to say, these articles have been left to rot, as I indicated I would do 6 months ago. I have no intention of improving the situation. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:59, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
Landmarks
I've done Lawrence Avenue as an example of what I think a landmarks listing should look like on these articles. Does anyone object to adding this as one of the possible sections? - SimonP (talk) 17:37, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Copied from the talk page of WP:ONRD/STDS - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 17:46, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- My biggest problem is that visually, it dominates the page, giving it too much visual weight. I realize that's not truly WP:UNDUE, but it looks like it. Imzadi 1979 → 18:10, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- I tend to agree. That wasn't a problem with the old lists, but I do like the images with the new list. Perhaps a smaller image size? - SimonP (talk) 19:02, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- Please wait longer than 24 hours before deciding that "nobody objects", and stop changing guidelines (most of which are copied from CRWP when ONRD was forked out, and most of CRWP is based on the experience of USRD, which has GOOD ARTICLES) to suit what you personally think belongs in these articles. Wikipedia is not a travel guide, its not a directory, and its not a bus schedule. Transit does not need its own section; it should be incorporated into the Route description if you INSIST that it must be included (though I'd like to have a discussion at the Canadian Wikipedians board regarding this in the near future). The landmarks table is a temporary measure until those landmarks are alos integrated into the Route description. This is an encyclopedia, not a picture book. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 17:57, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- If the transit is four or five sentences, why should it not be it's own section? That's longer than many of the other sections in these articles. - SimonP (talk) 17:59, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Four or five sentences do not warrant a seperate section on any article, any nomination at GAN or FAC would make that apparent. The route description is more than adequete for that infomation. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:03, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- A cursory searche seems to disprove that. Look at today's featured article, Shale oil extraction, there are a bunch of four or five sentence sections. - SimonP (talk) 18:11, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- They're subsections. In a technical article, I can see the need to divide things more clearly. However, you still haven't presented any reason why transit shouldn't go in the Route description, thus not leaving a barren three sentence section. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:20, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Route description is for a linear description of the route of a road, covering what neighbourhoods and landmarks it goes past. The presence of a bus line or streetcar is not part of its route. Wikipedia:WikiProject Canada Roads/Ontario/Standards does not state that transit should be covered in the route description. - SimonP (talk) 18:30, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Thats because the precedent is not to include ANY bus route information. It was not written with that in mind. The streetcar tracks are built into the road. That is a description of the route. The 24 Victoria Park uses this road. Again, a description of the route. The description doesn't need to be limited to permentantly affixed structures. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:33, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- How is "24 Victoria Park uses this road" a description of the route? It is a description of the road itself, not the route, and thus works best as a separate section. - SimonP (talk) 18:37, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Thats because the precedent is not to include ANY bus route information. It was not written with that in mind. The streetcar tracks are built into the road. That is a description of the route. The 24 Victoria Park uses this road. Again, a description of the route. The description doesn't need to be limited to permentantly affixed structures. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:33, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Route description is for a linear description of the route of a road, covering what neighbourhoods and landmarks it goes past. The presence of a bus line or streetcar is not part of its route. Wikipedia:WikiProject Canada Roads/Ontario/Standards does not state that transit should be covered in the route description. - SimonP (talk) 18:30, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- They're subsections. In a technical article, I can see the need to divide things more clearly. However, you still haven't presented any reason why transit shouldn't go in the Route description, thus not leaving a barren three sentence section. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:20, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- A cursory searche seems to disprove that. Look at today's featured article, Shale oil extraction, there are a bunch of four or five sentence sections. - SimonP (talk) 18:11, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Four or five sentences do not warrant a seperate section on any article, any nomination at GAN or FAC would make that apparent. The route description is more than adequete for that infomation. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:03, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- If the transit is four or five sentences, why should it not be it's own section? That's longer than many of the other sections in these articles. - SimonP (talk) 17:59, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Please wait longer than 24 hours before deciding that "nobody objects", and stop changing guidelines (most of which are copied from CRWP when ONRD was forked out, and most of CRWP is based on the experience of USRD, which has GOOD ARTICLES) to suit what you personally think belongs in these articles. Wikipedia is not a travel guide, its not a directory, and its not a bus schedule. Transit does not need its own section; it should be incorporated into the Route description if you INSIST that it must be included (though I'd like to have a discussion at the Canadian Wikipedians board regarding this in the near future). The landmarks table is a temporary measure until those landmarks are alos integrated into the Route description. This is an encyclopedia, not a picture book. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 17:57, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- I tend to agree. That wasn't a problem with the old lists, but I do like the images with the new list. Perhaps a smaller image size? - SimonP (talk) 19:02, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
- My biggest problem is that visually, it dominates the page, giving it too much visual weight. I realize that's not truly WP:UNDUE, but it looks like it. Imzadi 1979 → 18:10, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
The route description is a description of the road itself. The physical nature of the road. The culture surrounding the road. Places near the road. Schools on the road. Transit services along the road. These are all part of the route description. You don't need a level two header for a three or four sentence bus guide. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:42, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- By that understanding, everything in the article should be in that one section. We should just treat the articles as standard Wikipedia pages. If a section is long enough to stand on its own it should get its own header. If it isn't it shouldn't. Consider Bathurst Street, it has a central role in the Jewish community and that content gets its own section. There is no need to demarcate in policy what should be in each and every section. Every road is different, and every article on a road will have its own differences too. - SimonP (talk) 18:50, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Ok. Notice the section on Bathurst street is rather long, and not three or four sentences though. There are certainly exceptions, but more often than not its better to limit to those level two headers, and make everything else a subsection of that. This is organization. If there is enough info to warrant a SUBSECTION, than by all means. I don't believe two or three sentences is enough though. For Eglinton or St. Clair, you could write a lot about transit. For every other road... not so much. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:54, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'm not saying every page should have transit as a separate section, just every page where the content merits a separate section by normal rules. For a shorter article, like Victoria Park Avenue four or five sentences is fine for a section. - SimonP (talk) 18:58, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- And I'm only saying it would work better at a subsection rather than as an independent section. Any stations along the route fit in the RD easily. The remainder (this bus # travels along the road form here to here) is something that can be said in one sentence at the end of the RD. Or... how about the Services section that is used on the 401 and 400 to describe the ONRoute service stations? Transit is a service. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 19:08, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'm not saying every page should have transit as a separate section, just every page where the content merits a separate section by normal rules. For a shorter article, like Victoria Park Avenue four or five sentences is fine for a section. - SimonP (talk) 18:58, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Ok. Notice the section on Bathurst street is rather long, and not three or four sentences though. There are certainly exceptions, but more often than not its better to limit to those level two headers, and make everything else a subsection of that. This is organization. If there is enough info to warrant a SUBSECTION, than by all means. I don't believe two or three sentences is enough though. For Eglinton or St. Clair, you could write a lot about transit. For every other road... not so much. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:54, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- SimonP, speaking as a new editor - I feel we do require a policy to format content. Would this not speed the task of standardization, or at least make it easier to lift the general quality of Ontario road articles? Floydian, I agree with SimonP in that "Route description" does not instantly suggest "Public transit" to any hasty readers or editors, but I can see your point about Public Transport not necessarily meriting a level two header. What about a sub-header at the end of Route Description? Mappetop (talk) 19:40, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'd be more than happy with that. My main issue is keeping the number of level 2 headers to a minimum, and then organizing content within those. The intent is that all Ontario road articles have the same basic structure; consistency is key. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 19:44, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
Route description
Why do we have the word description in the title for these sections? Isn't it superfluous? The nature of an encyclopedia is for every section to be a description. We don't say "services description" or "transit description." Is there are reason we do for the route section? - SimonP (talk) 21:21, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- Yes. That's the standard that's been in place for 5 years because it is a physical description of the road. "Route" isn't a good word to use alone. In some dialects of American English, a "route" is a legally defined term, akin to "state highway". Sorry, I want to keep the header left alone. It clarifies what the section is about, a description of the route a road takes. Yes, all sections are descriptive to some degree, but the History section is more of a timeline. Other sections are more list-like. This "issue" has never been proposed at the various articles the US has taken to FAC, and we universally use the heading name. Imzadi 1979 → 21:52, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
Streets vs. highways
I'm seeing a division of sorts here. There's an intrinsic difference between a city street and a provincial highway. They have different information to cover. Some things that are wholly inappropriate for the coverage of a provincial highway should be covered in an article on a city street, assuming that there's some significance and notability to cover the street in the first place. I'm going to propose that as a first step, that all city streets be placed into a task force, separate from the provincial highways. That task force should then decide on its own article standards. Eventually, I'd split it off as a separate project. In the US, we have USRD for state highways/county roads and USST for city streets. The latter project coordinates with the various city-level wikiprojects while the former is coordinating with the state-level projects. The projects use different infoboxes and do their own thing to cover similar, but different topics. Imzadi 1979 → 21:58, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
- That's true. In the US there is a separate Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Streets, perhaps that is a model to follow here too. - SimonP (talk) 01:11, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'd approve of this. If street editors wish to discuss how to make the articles look their way, cramming as much unoteworthy information in as possible, then they should be left to do that. The articles can rot while the rest of the roads in Ontario are improved to GA, A and FA by editors who actually give a damn about content, and not the number of pages in the encyclopedia. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 04:53, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
Now that the stub goal is done, we need a new goal
Does anybody have any ideas or thoughts towards a goal to head towards now, or a drive for 2012? I had a few but I didn't want to just steer without input.
- Get all 400-series highways to GA or better
- Would be tough for a select few, but a good short term goal
- Start removal drive
- Next step after stubs. A good 2012 goal; there are not that many and at least half are cleaned up and just need one of the big three sections
- New articles for decommissioned King's Highways
- Many are missing (no current highways are missing), including some important ones like 22, 25, 33, 43 and 86. This is a good mid-range length goal.
- Important highways to GA or better
- This would be Highways 2 to 21, excluding Alternate and Business routes, a total of 19 articles (18 if Highway 12 passes GA)
Any other suggestions? -- ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 18:47, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
- I figured this would be the case :S If nobody speaks up by new years, then I'm going to go for several goals and set the project to go for those goals.
- Get all 400-series highways to GA or better - 400, 403, 406, 407, 410, 416, 417, 420, 427 and the QEW
- Come up with a better categorization system - doing it by Transportation in X categories by municipality doesn't work for many highways
- Convert all junction tables to template form (using {{ONinttop}} for the header row, {{ONint}} for each entries (one per row) and {{jctbtm|col=xx}} for the footer, with the number of columns entered if not 4)
- Add the advanced browsing template to all infoboxes that require them
- Possibly others
- - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 03:40, 11 December 2011 (UTC)
- Sounds good to me. #3 is parallel to an effort USRD looks to be undertaking for better consistency and compliance. Imzadi 1979 → 00:16, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
- I figured this would be the case :S If nobody speaks up by new years, then I'm going to go for several goals and set the project to go for those goals.
RFC on coordinates in highway articles
There is currently a discussion taking place at WT:HWY regarding the potential use of coordinates in highway articles. Your input is welcomed. --Rschen7754 01:37, 26 December 2011 (UTC)
Highway 401 has been nominated as a featured article candidate
Ontario Highway 401 has been nominated as a Featured Article Candidates. Any input is welcome at the nomination page. - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲ τ ¢ 04:09, 31 December 2011 (UTC)
Niagara Region Shields
A semi-complete inventory of Niagara Regional Road shields has been uploaded. It covers every entry in current highway exit lists, but if any are missing and needed, let me know and I will whip up a fresh batch. - Floydian τ ¢ 07:51, 11 December 2013 (UTC)
2014 Goals
I've added new goals for 2014. Not sure if anybody else will be helping me, but regardless they shall be met! - Floydian τ ¢ 06:26, 16 January 2014 (UTC)
Use of colour in junction tables to represent concurrency junctions
This is a discussion regarding the use of colour in junction tables to represent the start and end points of concurrencies. As a background, WP:RJL was amended several years ago to allow the use of colours in junction list tables to represent various scenarios, such as former or unbuilt intersections/interchanges or partial-access interchanges. These amendments also included a colour for representing the junctions where another route becomes concurrent with the subject route. Personally (as the person whom, until recently, was generally the only one making significant changes across ONRD) I've made significant use of the former/unbuilt (grey/orange) colouring, but have strayed from colouring "concurrency termini".
Recently, several new editors have made a direly-welcomed entrance to ONRD; I cannot stress enough how excited I am to have these new contributors, and this discussion should not be taken as a rejection of their efforts whatsoever!
That said, I've noticed a few editors making use of the cyan colouring for concurrencies, and I'd like to discuss whether or not we should adopt or deter this across our article scope.
Now to my personal opinion; there are a few reasons I dislike the idea of adopting this scheme:
- With few exceptions, most concurrencies in Ontario are brief or unsigned. 12/7 and 11/17 are the only significant (lengthy) duplexes that come to mind.
- The average reader will not understand the concept of "concurrency termini" (as the legend at the bottom of the junction tables labels them) and thus the significance of the colouring.
- All concurrencies are presently noted in junction tables in the notes column as "Beginning/End of Highway X concurrency"
- The additional colouring crowds existing colouring and reduces its significance while providing little additional benefit over aforementioned notes.
As an example, see Ontario Highway 7#Major intersections.
-- Floydian τ ¢ 03:09, 6 August 2016 (UTC)
- We're using it in Alberta. I don't think it hinders in any way, only adds info, and it helps bring us in line with WP:USRD and WP:RJL. 117Avenue (talk) 03:01, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
- (Drive-by comment) Cyan isn't for concurrencies, but for indicating where the route number on a road changes, on articles about named routes. --Rschen7754 03:51, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
Shield input
Earlier tonight I downloaded the OTM and made some shield templates for Ontario. I haven't uploaded anything yet, but I have been in contact with Floydian about them. Anyway, I noticed that there are two types of signs for primary highways, as MTO calls them: shields and crowns . Is the crown style used at all any more or is it a relic from the past? Iff the crowns are still in widespread use, I'd like to propose using those for {{Jcon}}
and {{Jct}}
and leave the infobox as it is. They would be much friendlier for readers at 20 pixels than the shields are.
In addition, I'd like to make some generic regional road markers, which would also be easier to read at 20 pixels. This would be similar to how we at USRD use generic county road markers in junction lists, but specific markers for infoboxes. The rationale for creating the generics is that the location text is near impossible to read at 20px whereas the number is legible.
Once I get some input, I can begin creating and uploading new sets of route markers for you. –Fredddie™ 05:32, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
The shields are used as reassurance markers, and the crowns at junctions or on exit signage. (At least that's the way things are supposed to be, but it's often messed up) - Floydian τ ¢ 07:01, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
Condensation of Templates and Categories
Over time I've noticed the gradual creep of categories and navbox template on Ontario road articles. While I have little time nor interest for the politics ensued within Toronto street articles, I will be both proactive and sweeping in changes to Ontario highway articles should no reasonable persuasion arise.
It's time to reconcile these templates and categories into a hierarchy. I propose the following:
- Any road which falls within a single jurisdiction receives the navbox/transportation-within category for that jurisdiction.
- Any road which falls within a single district (/county/region) but multiple jurisdictions within shall receive the navbox/transportation-within category for that district.
- Any road which falls into two jurisdictions almost equally (cases to be defined as they arise, assume 75/25 split/alone for now) shall receive both in accordance with the previous two clauses.
- Roads which fall into none of the above should be integrated into a new navbox/category representing that region of the province (Southwestern, central, eastern, northeastern and northwestern).
- Provincial highway articles shall solely be located within the "Provincial highways" category, and only contain the provincial highways navbox. However, they shall be listed in the district navboxes through which they pass.
Now the important part is linking these navboxes and categories. This is the heirarchy
- Ontario roads
- Provincial highways
- Ontario roads by region
- Southwestern Ontario
- Southcentral Ontario
- Southeastern Ontario
- Northwestern Ontario
- Northeastern Ontario
Within each are the categories by region, within those by municipality.
In an ideal world, no road article should have more than three navboxes and two categories related to roads. Each should fall up the chain in the heirachy as required.
Please add opinions and comments by April 30, 2017. Cross-posted to the Canadian,[1] Canada Roads,[2] Canada Streets,[3] and Highways[4] wikiprojects.
Regards - Floydian τ ¢ 03:28, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
- Addendum - IMO, navboxes and categorization compliment one another. Categorization need not include everything within a something, where navboxes can supply that. Categorization should be high-level. - Floydian τ ¢ 23:20, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
- I like this suggestion very much. Technically we've always had a policy that a provincial highway could be categorized by individual city or county if it was confined to just one or two jurisdictions (e.g. Highway 427) but not if it would have to be category-bloated into five or ten or twenty divisional categories at once (e.g. Highway 17) — but actually enforcing that rule in the face of people who were determined to category-for-every-county the shit out of the Highway 17s and Highway 401s became a waste of time, so I just gave up trying anymore. Proposal is a much better balance. Bearcat (talk) 14:56, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
- Hmmm... I guess in my proposal I should add that a provincial highway should only be in the provincial highways category (which could also be divided into portions of the province if the need arised), and not in individual jurisidiction/district transportation-within categories. Navboxes for provincial highways are a different coloured horse, as each district should list the highways that pass through. - Floydian τ ¢ 23:20, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
Input requested at List of numbered roads in York Region
Your input requested at Talk:List of numbered roads in York Region#Regional Road 67 / McCowan Road --papageno (talk) 17:24, 14 February 2018 (UTC)
- Done --papageno (talk) 19:16, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
Request for information on WP1.0 web tool
Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.
We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
Creating a proper hierarchy for top level index articles
Not sure if anyone still lingers... but anyways, I'm going to be going through the top level articles in the next week or two with the aim of creating a better hierarchy of the road network in Ontario. Currently there are the present articles, with my best attempt to organise them:
What I'm thinking at the moment (and this is early concept here) is the following
- Roads in Ontario - Top level list that summarises and links to the various types of roads in Ontario:
- Ontario Provincial Highway Network - Top level article on roads under MTO jurisdiction, including King's Highways. Moved and rewritten from Highways in Ontario
- List of provincial highways in Ontario
- 400-series highways
- Lists of secondary highways in X district
- List of former provincial highways in Ontario
- List of provincial highways in Ontario
- List of county and regional roads in Ontario - A list of lists for numbered roads in Ontario by county/region/municipality. Moved from List of county roads in Ontario
- Lists of numbered roads in X county/region
- Local roads... not sure how to branch that out to articles on municipal arterial roads such as in Hamilton, Toronto, London, Ottawa, etc.
- Ontario Provincial Highway Network - Top level article on roads under MTO jurisdiction, including King's Highways. Moved and rewritten from Highways in Ontario
That leaves List of Ontario expressways as a straggler. Personally I feel the article is entirely original research since there is no formal definition of an expressway in Ontario.
Feel free to add thoughts. I'll be working on a draft for now for Ontario Provincial Highway Network using Michigan State Trunkline Highway System as a template. - Floydian τ ¢ 06:55, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
Making maps
Steps for making maps for infoboxes:
- Draw up a KML in Google Earth. Save it as a KML, then open the KML with notepad.
- Copy contents of KML to Template:Attached_KML/"Article name" (without the quotes)
- Add User:Evad37/kmlToJson.js to your Custom Javascript commons.js (Preferences->Appearance->Shared CSS/JSON/JavaScript for all skins)
- While viewing the KML article, click the tab at the top: geojson
- Copy the contents that are generated to Wikipedia:Map data/Wikipedia KML/"Article name"
- Add {{maplink|frame=yes|plain=yes|frame-align=center|frame-width=290|frame-height=290|raw={{Wikipedia:Map data/Wikipedia KML/"Article name"}}}} to the map parameter of the article infobox. You can also add {{Attached KML|display=title, inline}} in the See also, or above the navboxes at the bottom of an article. "title" displays a clickable globe at the top right of an article, which displays a map when clicked. "inline" displays a small right-aligned box with links wherever the template is placed.
- Add |map_custom = yes as a parameter in the infobox.
-- Floydian τ ¢ 01:58, 31 January 2021 (UTC)
Popular pages for December
I've filtered out Ontario articles from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Canada Roads/Popular pages for December, which should help in analysing reader intentions for organising articles better.
-- Floydian τ ¢ 02:04, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
Redirects link
Hey guys here is a link to Wikipedia:WikiProject Canada Roads/Ontario/Redirects that I found sitting in the road backlog so you don't lose it because it appears that it doesn't show anywhere else in this portal. Dylpickle2k (talk) 04:55, 8 May 2021 (UTC)
- You may find a few other hidden goodies in the index of subpages, and also User:AlexNewArtBot/CanadaRoadsSearchResult that catches new articles for roads. The group pages could use a cleaning/tidyup at some point. - Floydian τ ¢ 16:34, 8 May 2021 (UTC)
Please see the above discussion. Rschen7754 04:41, 9 February 2023 (UTC)