Wikipedia talk:WikiProject U.S. counties/Archive 6

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. counties. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

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Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

Archive 7

_ is a county in the U.S. state of [[_]].

[[county]] or [[County_(United_States)|county]]? --Jonah.ru (talk) 17:04, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Here are some examples of usage: "Washington County is a county in the U.S. state of Tennessee." "Jonesborough is a town in Washington County, Tennessee." (The name of the county is always given in the form "Washington County," not "Washington" alone.) Does that information help? --Orlady (talk) 17:13, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I mean that all the county pages start with a sentence like "Loving County is a county in the U.S. state of Texas.". And the word "county" in this sentence is a wikilink in some cases to county and in some other cases to County (United States). My question is which is better. Jonah.ru (talk) 08:16, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

County (United States seems more precise. Qqqqqq (talk) 16:01, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Coordinates format

Hello, I have traveled from WikiProject Geographical coordinates, where we seek wider opinions on whether {{coord}} should offer a N/S/E/W labeled format for decimal coordinates (example: 43°07′N 79°20′W / 43.12°N 79.34°W / 43.12; -79.34) either as an option or by default, or if the existing unlabeled format (example: 43°07′N 79°20′W / 43.12°N 79.34°W / 43.12; -79.34) is sufficient. Please comment there if you have an opinion on this. Thanks! --GregU (talk) 17:45, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

County locator map templates

Using {{Kansas County Labelled Map}} as a model, I'm making similar interactive county maps for the rest of the states. I've already created those for WA, OR, HI, CA, NV, ID, MT, AZ, UT, WY, CO, NM, TX, OK, NE, SD, ND, MN, IA, and MO. Would anyone at all like to help speed up the process? -- Denelson 83 02:37, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I just changed {{Nebraska County Labelled Map}} to more intuitive county abbreviations. If anyone objects for some reason, it can be changed back to the way it was. —Bkell (talk) 00:09, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

{{Iowa County Labelled Map}} edited in the same way. —Bkell (talk) 18:12, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

I've done {{Kansas County Labelled Map}} and {{South Dakota County Labelled Map}} today. I'm looking at the source for {{Texas County Labelled Map}}, and I notice that it says at the top, "Geographical order. Please do not rearrange. And please leave these links as two-letter codes." Here are my reasons for changing the two-letter codes to more intuitive abbreviations:

When looking at the Nebraska county map, it was difficult for me, even as a native Nebraskan who is familiar with all the county names, to figure out what the codes stood for without hovering over them with my mouse.
These two-letter codes seem more or less arbitrarily chosen. For example, Lancaster County, Nebraska was labeled "LR". I don't understand why—surely LA would have been a more sensible choice. Similarly, Dubuque County, Iowa was assigned the code "DQ", rather than "DU".
There isn't a good reason to limit the labels to two capital letters. Many counties (Cherry County, Nebraska and Pennington County, South Dakota are good examples) are certainly large enough to contain the full county name—we should take advantage of that space. For smaller counties, we may not be able to fit the full name in, but we can usually fit three or four letters, if we capitalize only the first and use {{Image label small}}. We aren't assigning county codes for use in a computer database or something; we are labeling a map to be read by humans.
If the two-letter codes are being invented by Wikipedia editors, then this is borderline original research. Going back to Lancaster County, Nebraska, on what basis are we assigning it the code "LR"? Unless there's an official list of county codes we can cite, the choice of codes is arbitrary and unfounded. (Even if there is an official list, though, we are probably better off using more readable abbreviations; see my previous point.)

A separate and less important question is the order in which the counties are listed in the source of these templates. This order is irrelevant as far as the resulting map is concerned, so the only consideration is the ease of editing. I have sorted the counties in {{Nebraska County Labelled Map}}, {{Iowa County Labelled Map}}, and {{South Dakota County Labelled Map}} in alphabetical order, rather than geographical order; {{Kansas County Labelled Map}} was already in alphabetical order. My reasoning is that geographical order is not especially helpful when editing the template—presumably someone who is editing the template is going to want to change one or two particular counties, and it seems to me that it would be easier to find those counties in an alphabetical list rather than a geographical list (especially if the editor is not familiar with that particular state). The main advantage of geographical order, I think, is that if a bunch of counties in a row all need to be tweaked slightly (the labels need to be moved down a couple pixels, for example), then the corresponding source lines will be together. But this seems a rather rare scenario, it works only for rows of counties going in one direction (west-to-east or north-to-south, depending on which "geographical order" is being used), and complications arise when counties do not form a strict grid (for example, {{Idaho County Labelled Map}}). Besides, using the preview button allows an editor to see the map while editing, so she can cross-reference to find the desired counties in an alphabetical list.

If there are arguments for keeping strict two-letter abbreviations or for keeping lines of the template source in geographical order, I'd like to hear them. Otherwise I'm going to keep doing what I've been doing: changing the labels to full county names when possible, and more intuitive abbreviations in other cases, and sorting the counties in alphabetical order. —Bkell (talk) 23:25, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I gave the counties two-letter codes simply for the sake of brevity, and because the Kansas county template set a precedent. Besides, all you need to do is hover over an abbreviation with your mouse to get the full name of the county. It pops up in a tooltip.

Also, if you want to make the maps more intuitive, use the full name of the county to start with. If it doesn't fit within the width available, there are other solutions:

Use hyphen breaks if more than two lines are available
Shrink the size of the names of some of the counties
Use arrows to point to certain small-area counties
Use shorter "line-height" values
Find SVG county maps and use them to enlarge the map templates

I've changed the labels on {{Idaho County Labelled Map}} to full names as an example. -- Denelson 83 03:05, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it would be best to use the full county name. I think it's slightly clumsy to hyphenate names, but I suppose it's a toss-up between hyphenation and abbreviation. Idaho looks good. However, it's going to be difficult to fit full county names in states such as Nebraska, Iowa, and especially Texas without making the map much larger than it already is. If abbreviation is necessary, I still believe that the method of using the first three or four letters of the county name is better than choosing arbitrary two-letter codes. I concede that Kansas has official two-letter codes for its counties, but I still believe we should use more intuitive abbreviations, both for consistency and because the two-letter codes are difficult to understand. And we shouldn't be making up our own two-letter codes for other states, as I've mentioned above. Yes, the pop-up tooltips exist here, but not in a printed version, and anyway if I'm looking for a particular county it is very annoying to have to hover my mouse over a link, wait a second or two for the tooltip to pop up, and then move on to the next one if I didn't find what I wanted. Ideally readers should be able to see at a glance the names of all the counties—they shouldn't be hidden in a tooltip. —Bkell (talk) 04:48, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Since I still want brevity, why don't we just fit the FIPS county codes into the small maps? -- Denelson 83 22:32, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Template:Climate

Would this WikiProject be interested in take up the use of this template? It is a "request box created in 2006 by an editor who was working to add climate sections to articles about geographical regions", and is currently nominated for deletion due to non-use, but the nominator stated he would withdraw the nomination if someone is willing to take up use of the template. Ks0stm ^(T•C•G) 21:11, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Labeled Maps in County lists

I've started a discussion on labeled maps in county lists here. Any comments would be appreciated. Cheers, Mm40 (talk) 22:09, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Border changes

Should county articles systematically note the time of most recent border changes? The lead might include a statement such as "Abel County separated from Baker County in 1788 and its current borders date from 1886." The table showing population by decade might note "current borders since 1878" or the like. --P64 (talk) 19:14, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Invitation to help with WikiProject United States

Hello, WikiProject U.S. counties/Archive 6! We are looking for editors to join WikiProject United States, an outreach effort which aims to support development of United States related articles in Wikipedia. We thought you might be interested, and hope that you will join us. Thanks!!!

--Kumioko (talk) 15:04, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Is this project still active? --Kumioko (talk) 05:40, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

I watch this page and am a member, but there is not much activity. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 15:43, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, thats great I was afraid knowone was using it. Do you know if anyone else actively participates. The reason I ask is that I am restarting WPUS and I am looking at possibly rolling this (and several other inactive or low activity projects) into WPUS as a topic or taskforce (a topic will be treated essentially the same as a task force but doesnt require activity. It will be used for identifying the scope of whatever the former project was, in this case counties, as a topic within WPUS. I will further develop a bot to tag all the rest of the topic so that all applicable articles are covered. Currentlly there are a lot missing or needing to be created). Before I initiated anything though I wanted to find out which route to suggest. Obviously it would require concensus from the project before any action would be taken. There are quite a few advantages to merging these including reducing the overhead on both projects by sharing member lists, bot tasks, quality content, articles for creation, maintenance lists, newsletter, etc. I would be happy to discuss them if you have any concerns. The transition would be more or less seamless other than the Counties banner would be replaces with the WPUS and a "task force" link under it and the project page would be redirected to a subpage under WPUS. I would archive the existing information under the project name/archive to retain the history. --16:38, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

I owuld be fine with rolling this into a bigger WikiProject. I have been thinking that the project might become more active once the 2010 Census results are published, but I think that would be better dealt with on as large a scale as possible (have one decision for how to update states, counties, and their subdivisions). I think it might be a good idea to contact the users listed as members of the project, plus anyone who has posted here in the past year or so. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 21:50, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Thats a good idea thanks. --Kumioko (talk) 00:41, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

A consideration for cross project consolidation of talk page templates

I have started a conversation here about the possibility of combining some of the United States related WikiProject Banners into {{WikiProject United States}}. If you have any comments, questions or suggestions please take a moment and let me know. --Kumioko (talk) 20:26, 27 November 2010 (UTC)

The U.S. counties topic has been added to {{WikiProject United States}}

Currently the {{WikiProject U.S. counties}} template only has about 135 articles tagged out of over 3000 county related. In an effort to increase visibility of these articles I have added a parameter to the {{WikiProject United States}} project banner for counties as a topic. I have added the WPUS banner to the 135 articles that had the US counties banner (I left the US counties banner I just added the WPUS as well) I have begun tagging the 3000+ United States county articles. It will take me a couple days to finish the rest but I should be done by the end of the weekend. Please let me know if you have any questions. --Kumioko (talk) 22:02, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

All 3141 counties have been tagged. See Category:WikiProject U.S. counties articles for the list. --Kumioko (talk) 04:08, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks so much! Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 04:22, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

No problem, do you think we should delete this template or leave it as a redirect to {{Wikiproject United States}}? --Kumioko (talk) 04:23, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

I would leave it as a redirect. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 04:32, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. --Kumioko (talk) 04:36, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

I approve. Fifteen people may have joined this year but there is little or no counties project activity. Probably the US counties project was practically completed once there were Start-class articles on all counties, and county lists (ie, tables) for all states. --P64 (talk) 21:27, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Historical Ecology of U.S. Counties

Hello! We are new to wikipedia and are working on a wikiproject proposal for historical ecology and invite the folks here at wikiproject U.S. counties to join our efforts. We would like to include sections on the historical ecology of U.S. counties on their article pages. Let us know what you think!

Annadestinmccown (talk) 20:32, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

I have to apologize for my ignorance but can you explain this a little more I don't understand what this is? --Kumioko (talk) 21:11, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. cities

Please consider participating in the Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. cities discussion. Thanks. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 06:11, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Peer review

I've requested peer review for the Warren County, Indiana article at Wikipedia:Peer review/Warren County, Indiana/archive1; as part of the process, if anyone here has suggestions on how to further improve that article, I'd be glad to hear them. Thanks! Omnedon (talk) 03:24, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

US Collaboration reactivated & Portal:United States starting next

Casliber recently posted a suggestion on the talk page for WikiProject United States about getting the US Wikipedians Collaboration page going again in an effort to build up articles for GA through FA class. See Wikipedia:U.S. Wikipedians' notice board/USCOTM. After several days of work from him the page is up and ready for action. A few candidates have already been added for you to vote on or you can submit one using the directions provided. If you are looking for inspiration here is a link to the most commonly viewed articles currently under the scope of Wikiproject United States. There are tons of good articles in the various US related projects as well so feel free to submit any article relating to US topics (not just those under the scope of WPUS). This noticeboard is intended for ‘’’All’’’ editors working on US subjects, not just those under WPUS.

The next item I intend to start updating is Portal:United States if anyone is interested in helping. Again this is not specific to WPUS and any help would be greatly appreciated to maximize visibility of US topics. The foundation has already been established its just a matter of updating the content with some new images, biographies and articles. Please let leave a comment on the Portals talk page or let me know if you have any questions or ideas. --Kumioko (talk) 19:39, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Relationship with WikiProject United States

People from a variety of WikiProjects have had concerns about the scope of WikiProject United States and its relationship with other WikiProjects. We have created an RFC and invite all interested editors to discuss it at: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject United States#Mission statement for WikiProject United States. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 15:33, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Featured U.S. county article

I'm pleased to announce that Warren County, Indiana has just been promoted to featured article status. As far as I can tell, this is the first United States county article that has ever become a featured article. Omnedon (talk) 17:57, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Adding "Popular pages" to U.S.-related projects

A very interesting tool of the Wikimedia Toolserver is called WikiProject Popular pages lists. These lists are similar to project-related article lists like U. S. article lists used for generating assessment statistics. The Popular pages lists include the rank, total views, average daily views, quality and importance ratings for the listed articles. Here is the full list of projects using popular pages lists. An FAQ also is available at User:Mr.Z-man/Popular pages FAQ.

I recently added links to lists of popular pages as shown below to the U.S. Portal - WikiProjects box and the nominations sections for each of the selected articles boxes.

Portal:United States/Projects/Popular pages

Because this project was not included, I am bringing up the popular pages tool here. This tool makes it very easy to track three of four balancing dimensions when selecting articles for showcasing at a portal - quality, importance and popularity. When tracking the fourth dimension, topic, the related article lists tool (such as for U.S. article lists tool) also might be useful by filtering on categories of interest.

If you do decide to use this tool, feel free to update Portal:United States/Projects/Popular pages as well.

Regards, RichardF (talk) 02:29, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Note that by adding the popular sites to portals, we may have perpetuated (frozen) old popularities, maybe artificially. I would think we should rather use these to prune some menus/navigational lists. The number of hits tends to drop off ~~asymptotically~~ sharply after a rather short time. (Which perpetuates the same affect that I was complaining about, but oh, well!) Student7 (talk) 14:24, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Worse, most popular entries have only indirect relation to the Project. They are popular people, bands, tv shows, which just happened to be associated with the place. It is apparent that the readers have little or no interest whatever in the place article. Articles that Project members would consider important are well down the list.

This shows that a lot of young, semi-literate people are using Wikipedia as a reference. Which is good. But to cater to these people would be a serious mistake I think. They need education which this encyclopedia can provide. Looking for articles we deem important may be useful. Just don't expect them to be high on the list. I looked at one for Alabama. I think the top one was "Klu Klux Klan"! Of course, people are looking this up for other reasons, not because they necessarily associate it primarily with Alabama. So it can be instructive, but a bit sobering, as well. Student7 (talk) 13:15, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Aid for census maintenance

I've made a suggestion that might aid census maintenance at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Use_bots_to_maintain_census_figures. Your comments are welcome. Student7 (talk) 13:21, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Article lists

Is it possible to "cross" WP U.S. counties with WP United States quality assessment? To generate a list of Stub-class U.S. counties, for example? --P64 (talk) 19:15, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

May 2011 Newsletter for WikiProject United States

The May 2011 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

.--Kumioko (talk) 02:41, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

July 2011 Newsletter for WikiProject United States

The July 2011 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

--Kumioko (talk) 03:28, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Bot run to auto assess some of the Unassessed articles

There is a discussion here for a Bot to do an assessment run through the 2000+ Unassessed articles that currently fall under WikiProject United States and the projects supported by it. Please post any comments or concerns you might have there. --Kumioko (talk) 18:48, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Naming conventions for Townships in Pennsylvania

The text of the following notice was written by Gerry D on my talk page. I'm reproducing here in the interest of seeking broad participation in the discussion. older ≠ wiser 13:56, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I realize that category talk pages are not the usual place for discussions, but I think this is the best place for this discussion. It covers all of the townships in Pennsylvania. There has been much discussion lately about how township names in Pennsylvania should be titled. Some go for X Township, Pennsylvania. Others want X Township, Y County, Pennsylvania. Of course there are many Washington Townships in Pennsylvania so they and others like it will need to include the county name in the title. The townships in question are the unique ones like Horton Township and Plunketts Creek Township. I think it is best to limit this discussion to Pennsylvania. If other wikiprojects want to do it differently that is fine. The status of townships vary greatly from state to state.

The original place the subject came up is Talk:Horton Township, Elk County, Pennsylvania
A broader discussion of the topic is here Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (geographic names)
The Category talk:Townships in Pennsylvania by county link. Gerry D (talk) 13:20, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

September 2011 Newsletter for WikiProject United States

The September 2011 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

--Kumioko (talk) 03:20, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

County Supervisor Raymond A. Watson

Your attention is called to a proposal to delete the above article at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Raymond_A._Watson. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis (talk) 22:51, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

I am very disappointed that not very many people—maybe nobody—weighed in on this subject. Yours, GeorgeLouis (talk) 02:27, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest

WP:NRHP is having a Fall Photo Contest running from Oct. 21-Dec. 4, 2011. I'd like to encourage anybody who enjoys photography, and anybody who is interested in historic places to participate as a photographer, a sponsor, or both.

One way that an individual editor or a project can participate is to sponsor their own challenge. For example, somebody here might want to include a challenge such as "A barnstar will be awarded to the photographer who adds the most photos of previously non-illustrated NRHP sites to the XXX county list." To sponsor a challenge all you need to do is come up with an idea, post it on the contest page, and do the small bit of work needed to judge the winner(s).

Any and all contributions appreciated.

Smallbones (talk) 02:42, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Suggestions vs template

On the Project Page, the Content suggestions and the Template for a U.S. County do not agree, especially with the geography and the discussion of cities and towns. Any preferences or thoughts? I have been told in peer review that it is better to have the communities (geography) near the front because that helps with the history. I have also been told by another reviewer that discussion about a city belongs in history, not geography.TwoScars (talk) 15:55, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree with what your saying. This project has been around for a very long time and my guess is that the rules on the project page probably have been there since the begginning. Now that most or all of the county pages have been created (I believe) this project doesn't get a lot of activity. Do you have a link to a peer review where that has been said? --Kumioko (talk) 16:15, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Here is a link to the Peer Review. Here is a link to the Featured Article attempt. Here is a link to the article for Blackford County, Indiana. My incomplete work in fixing up the article is in my Sandbox3. I am cleaning up the footnotes before I try to edit text, and I have not loaded in the complete article to the sandbox (yet).TwoScars (talk) 20:39, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Ill take a look. --Kumioko (talk) 20:45, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Happened to notice this, and just thought I'd give my two cents. Sometimes these things come down to personal preference. I don't really feel it's advantageous to have cities discussed primarily in the "history" section; a description of the current settlements seems to fit better in "geography", even though settlements may also be mentioned in the county's history. Omnedon (talk) 20:55, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the current settlements fit better in geography—not sure about extinct settlements, but not sure that current and extinct should be in separate sections. I'll spend the next month making sure nobody can complain about the footnotes and wikilinks, then worry about the text. Maybe I will revert to Warren County as my "template".TwoScars (talk) 14:20, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

On a related note, the article is looking great. I went through my first FA process last year, and it is a challenge to say the least; but I'm sure the Blackford County article will be promoted. Omnedon (talk) 14:59, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Migrations by county

Hi! There is http://www.forbes.com/special-report/2011/migration.html

It shows migration patterns by U.S. county WhisperToMe (talk) 00:52, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the link. That is interesting. Neat to see. Might just be trivia, but it could help add to county demographic profiles. Hmm...Thinking about it, I could see it being used when discussing reapportionment and redistricting on county pages. Just have to watch out for recentism as this only covers the last few years.

I only see a map for counties, though. I know it kind of covers cities, but do they (or does anyone else) have any for cities and states too, or just counties? -- JoannaSerah (talk) 04:13, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I know many of you could figure this out for yourselves, but feel I have to mention this in case there are those who don't know any better: If you link to/cite the info on the page, make sure to choose your counties first, then choose the share link button on the page and copy the address provided there. Otherwise, if you only use the link provided above, you will just link to a blank map. Thank you. -- JoannaSerah (talk) 04:13, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Nomination as a United States Wikipedians' Collaboration of the Month candidate

One or more articles relating to this project have been nominated to be a future United States Wikipedians' Collaboration of the Month. All editors interested in improving these articles or voting for next months collaboration are encouraged to participate here. --Kumioko (talk) 19:50, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

December 2011 Newsletter for WikiProject United States

The December 2011 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

--Kumioko (talk) 01:48, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

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. --Rs chen 7754 01:41, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Blackford County, Indiana

I have put Blackford County, Indiana up for peer review. Please feel free to add comments, suggestions, etc.... My goal is featured article.TwoScars (talk) 16:07, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

January 2012 Newsletter for WikiProject United States and supported projects

The January 2012 issue of the WikiProject United States newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

--Kumi-Taskbot (talk) 18:16, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

U.S. County Categorization

I have made what I believe will be a non-controversial suggestion on U.S. county categorization here. Your thoughts and opinions are solicited. --Andrew (User:90) (talk) 14:36, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

447 counties need founding information

According to this Google search, there are approximately 447 U.S. counties that lack founding information. I hope to track down founding years for some of these, but I don't think I can do them all alone. If anyone wants to pitch in, that would be great. The goal is to have a founding year in the infobox for every single county. --Andrew (User:90) (talk) 03:51, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

It also looks like the following Alaskan boroughs need founding info:

--Andrew (User:90) (talk) 04:41, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

KML outline data for all US counties

Hello guys, there has been a discussion on the Geographical coordinates project which led to the development of a new scheme to add line and outline data to applicable Wikipedia articles. I've been working on a bot to add KML outline data to each US county. These outlines would show up as an area highlight (click the blue globe in the top right of Los Alamos County, New Mexico for an example) and links to Google Maps and Bing Maps can be displayed with the county outline as an overlay. I'm sure you can provide further insight and ideas on the GeoProject discussion page, and you might leave a comment or two at my bot request page for the county job at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests_for_approval/DschwenBot. Thanks! --Dschwen 21:46, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposal for United States A-Class review process

There is a proposal at WikiProject United States to start an A-Class review process for United States related articles. Please stop by and join the discussion. Kumioko (talk) 02:18, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

Question about Missouri Counties

I'm not a member of the Wikiproject and I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this, but I noticed that a LOT of the Missouri counties have a "Political Culture" section that seems out of place. It is repeated over several counties, like Bollinger County, Missouri, Ozark County, Missouri and Butler County, Missouri almost word for word. Could somebody please take a look and let me know what you think? I believe that so much information may constitute undue weight. Also, the phrase "Despite _____ County’s longstanding tradition of supporting socially conservative platforms, voters in the county have a penchant for advancing populist causes like increasing the minimum wage." seems a lot like original research despite whatever actual correlation may exist between populism and southern Missouri counties. It is repeated nearly word-for-word on a very large number of southern counties. I have no strong opinion on the matter but I'd be happy to help clean up if anybody thinks it needs re-worded. Wieldthespade (talk) 10:49, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

List of United States counties and county-equivalents

You may wish to comment on the List of United States counties and county-equivalents at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of United States counties and county-equivalents/archive1. Yours aye, Buaidh 18:17, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Over-disambiguation

It seems like this probably would have come up at some point in the past, but I didn't see it in the archives. Is there a reason that county articles always use the naming convention "Name County, State"? There are many, many examples where there is only one instance of the county name (Barnstable, Saratoga, Los Angeles) but the state name is included anyway. Doesn't this violate WP:PRECISE? I found a vague naming convention at WP:USPLACE, but it doesn't specify a reason. Listroiderbob^talk _edits ^more 15:27, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Please see this discussion. More than half of the counties in the United States use names that are used for at least one other county. Omnedon (talk) 15:30, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

Thank you; that is an informative discussion. Listroiderbob^talk _edits ^more 02:11, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

Nomination for merging of Template:Jefferson County, Kentucky

Template:Louisville neighborhoods has been nominated for merging with Template:Jefferson County, Kentucky. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Thank you. Emmette Hernandez Coleman (talk) 01:13, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Discussion to remove the Automatically assessed logic from the WikiProject United States template

Greetings, there is a discussion regarding removal of the logic used to populate Automatically assessed article categories from Template:WikiProject United States. Most of the categories (over 220 Wikipedia wide) were deleted in February 2013 because they were empty. These categories were previously populated by a bot that hasn't run since 2011 and the categories aren't used. Removal of this uneeded/unused logic will greatly reduce the size and complexity of the WikiProject United States template. Any comments or questions are encouraged here. Kumioko (talk) 18:51, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Lest there is any confusion for people who don't speak the same language, the words "logic used to populate Automatically assessed article categories" refer to the feature that was supposed to allow this WikiProject's template to "inherit" class and importance ratings from other WikiProjects. Kumioko says that there are no longer any bots performing the function that formerly copied those ratings. --Orlady (talk) 23:36, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Former CDPs

Alot of former CDPs are in Category:Geography of X County instead of Category:Populated places in X County, and aren't listed in their county navbox; it that supposed to be the case. I had assumed that this was an oversight, but I'm seeing so many of them that I'm starting to think there's a reason for this.

As for navboxs, I'm not talking about cases where the CDP was annexed to a municipality; in such cases I wouldn't expect to see them on the county navbox. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Emmette Hernandez Coleman (talk • contribs) 18:22, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Do we have a standard????

OK, I tried to start a central discussion with arcane code that really is about as user friendly as a serial killer. so, I will try this here. The current County template is great, in fact, its very good. BUT, it needs to reflect some comments or have some sort of flesh to inform people of what should and should NOT be in a county article. Example, Notable residents, WHERE do they go? I am not going to debate, Notable, OH NO, I am stating, that it needs a section on the template. Also, if the "Notable person" has no citation on the web, in Wiki or in a book, do we delete them?

Second part, its great to have new structures/buildings discussed, but, can we all agree, that the NEW WALMART! or the NEW TACO BELL! should not be in the county article???? ALSO, listing phone numbers and county officials without refs, can we comment the template with something like, PLEASE do not list phone numbers, PLEASE cite the facts and figures discussed......We have new folks here who have NO idea about this, and thats fine, BUT a template that lists this, would be great for the experienced editors and the new person. For those of us who have coded, we called these fime things COMMENTS.

PLEASE let me know what it would take to be an agreement on this? OR should I just edit the proposed template on this page myself and let the world moan and groan about it post fact?Coal town guy (talk) 00:19, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for breathing life into this project. I would advise bringing your changes up one or two at a time. For example, "Notable people," "Government services," etc. What is bugging you the most? Thanks. GeorgeLouis (talk) 00:38, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

I think the worst is, we have a standard WP:LOC, which, says oh, here is a county, in the US, in the US state of x......I get the fact we need to have US for a portion as it is, not cool to assume the whole world knows where Kentucky is, and I assure you, they don't, and I am talking about people in the US, much less in another country..., BUT ITS not concise for the lead, it is for the title, and thats, KIND of OK. Content is virtually unchecked. Wikitravel is a great place to discuss the Walmart, or the KFC or the lovely candy factory.......the first thing would be, get the crap out of the articles that sounds like an agent from the local tourism agency is there. To do this, WHY NOT have comments in the template that say, hey, we dont give a dried shit about the new Walmart or Taco Bell here, how about Wikitravel....The same would apply to a person who has zero notablity. Peggy has a BIG smile, WHO CARES???? Let them go t WikitravelCoal town guy (talk) 00:50, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

The rule I follow for Notable people is that they have to have an article in Wikipedia. Maybe there is a WP standard for that, and maybe there isn't, but so far I have never had another editor quarrel with me when I insisted. As for the Notability of any given new structure, well, that would depend partially on what the WP:Reliable sources say about it and partially on whether editors can agree that mention of the new building in the article is of sufficient WP:Weight to be included. Anyway, if you want to make a few changes in the template, why not go ahead and see if they "stick"? GeorgeLouis (talk) 01:09, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

I will do so and ppace the proposed template here...otherwise, I have zero wish to have every editor in the Wikiverse come out and tell me that I was potty trained at gun point and deserve to be strapped to a chair and beaten with a rusty claw hammerCoal town guy (talk) 01:33, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Different approaches work for different folks, but I find good examples more helpful than fill-in templates. Accordingly, the featured article Warren County, Indiana looks like a goal to strive for -- and a good guide to effectively organizing a county article. --Orlady (talk) 14:48, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Outstanding example, many thanks for pointing that out to me.Coal town guy (talk) 15:14, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Meaningless edit to prevent this conversation from getting broken up again. --Orlady (talk) 18:54, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

A proposed county template

Below is a proposed county template. It is cased upon the rather mercurial editings I have performed in my first year here in Wiki land...I expect rebuttal etc etc PLEASE do let me know.Coal town guy (talk) 02:55, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Meaningless edit to prevent this conversation from getting broken up again. --Orlady (talk) 18:54, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

[[Template:Infobox U.S. County]] (See example use in the [[Prince George's County, Maryland]] article.)

_ is a [[county (US)|county]] in the [[U.S. state]] of [[_]].<!--Change the language here to X is a county in the US state of y-->

Introductory paragraph.


<!--Founding date WITH a ref. A curious fact, or something unique, WITH a ref see [[WP:CITE]]-->


== US county navigation box ==

{{US county navigation box
| template_name = Name of County, State
| listclass = hlist
| county = County
| state  = State Name
| seat   = State Cap
| color  = #F3D161
| map_image   = Map of US State highlighting Name of County.svg
| map_caption = US State highlighting Name of County

| title1 = [[City (State)|City]]
| body1  =
| title2 = [[Town (State)|Town]]s
| body2  =
| title3 = [[Census-designated place|CDPs]]
| body3  =
| title4 = [[Unincorporated area|Unincorporated<br>communities]]
| body4  =
| title5 = Footnotes
| body5  = ‡This populated place also has portions in an adjacent county or counties
}}<noinclude>
<!-- Categories -->

Pretty funny but lots of editors are not going to like the humor. As for me, I could take it or leave it because I would probably just use my own good sense to build a new article. Also, infoboxes should never be required. I happen to hate them. GeorgeLouis (talk) 03:22, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

Interesting, what is your pet peeve about infoboxes?? I have no pro or con for them personally, this is exactly the feedback I would like.Coal town guy (talk) 03:28, 15 March 2013 (UTC)

TONED it downCoal town guy (talk) 01:27, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Infoboxes just repeat information that is already in the article, serving no valid purpose, for the most part. See [[1]]. Quite often the "info" they include is not even sourced. GeorgeLouis (talk) 23:49, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

OK some suggestions

You can use
```
{{PAGENAME}}
```
to populate some of the links
The template {{Main}} is widely used
The navbox will then be just {{{{PAGENAME}}}} - you will want to re-use this in the towns
You might well add the counties in Foo state navbox.

Rich Farmbrough, 23:18, 20 March 2013 (UTC).
Meaningless edit to prevent this conversation from getting broken up again. --Orlady (talk) 18:54, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Please help this infobox and category mess: Fulton County, New York

I tried to fix Fulton County, New York's template etc. but it's a bit perplexing. Could someone here clean up this template and so forth? Thanks. Softlavender (talk) 04:10, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Wiki Loves Pride 2014

You are invited to participate in Wiki Loves Pride 2014, a campaign to create and improve LGBT-related content at Wikipedia and its sister projects. The campaign will take place throughout the month of June, culminating with a multinational edit-a-thon on June 21. Meetups are being held in some cities, or you can participate remotely. All constructive edits are welcome in order to contribute to Wikipedia's mission of providing quality, accurate information. Articles within Category:LGBT in the Americas may be of particular interest. You can also upload LGBT-related images by participating in Wikimedia Commons' LGBT-related photo challenge. You are encouraged to share the results of your work here. Happy editing! --Another Believer _(Talk) 20:55, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:48, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!

Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:57, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Westchester County

You may be interested in the discussion at Talk:Westchester County, New York#Consensus required regarding infobox, where different styles of infobox are being debated. Rcsprinter₁₂₃ (gab) @ 22:17, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Census data

We're more than halfway to the next census, and we still don't have 2010 census data up for every county? This is completely ridiculous. 71.175.243.119 (talk) 02:14, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Please See - Submissions

https://wikiconference.org/wiki/Submissions
--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 00:32, 6 August 2016 (UTC)

WikiProject United States - 50,000 Challenge

You are invited to participate in the 50,000 Challenge, aiming for 50,000 article improvements and creations for articles relating to the United States. This effort began on November 1, 2016 and to reach our goal, we will need editors like you to participate, expand, and create. See more here!

---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:26, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

County Infobox Inconsistencies

Hi, I noticed that most counties use a [Template:Infobox_U.S._county] template and the counties in California use a [Template:Infobox_settlement] instead. Should this be standardized to the county template for infoboxes? Also, are there any other templates I could expect to run into for counties?

Also, I noticed that counties in Alaska do not contain an infobox period. I am in the process of writing a bot for counties infoboxes CensusBot and I would like to add a check in there, so that if it doesn't find any infoboxes to just add one with the parameter that I am trying to add as well as county and state name. Would this be okay?

Another observation I made is regarding population values in these infoboxes. I notice that some contain the decennial census population number and some contain the 2016 yearly population estimate. Some of them contain both as well. Is there a standard that should be followed regarding this? I am inclined to go with only putting the most recent yearly population estimate in the infobox, especially since there are historical census numbers in each county from what I have seen (so it is redundant). My plan was to write these yearly population estimate values for counties just as my bot just did for States. Any input would be appreciated.

Thanks. Sasan-CDS (talk) 21:39, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia has evolved over time. Initially, a generic template might be broadly used because a "specific" template didn't exist. I'm not sure how things evolved back in the day, since I didn't start editing until 2010, but it seems as though some states must have started using the "Geobox" template earlier, such as Illinois, for example La Harpe, Illinois, then later people came back and started converting larger cities, like Chicago, over to the "Infobox settlement", but Illinois editors haven't gone through the effort to convert every community over to it yet. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 03:12, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

@Sbmeirow: Would it be a problem if my bot added the "infobox settlement" template to the counties without an infobox present? I would have it mostly just add basic information (county, state, and population estimate figure). Sasan-CDS (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Not sure, I guess it wouldn't hurt, but others should give opinion too. When I add any type of infobox, I try to fill in everything.

Overall, the design of the "Infobox U.S. county" template SUCKS compared to the "Infobox settlement" template. For example, in the county template, the census is either decennial census or estimate census, but NOT both like in the better settlement template, and this needs to be fixed. Other aspects of the settlement template should be migrated over to the U.S. county template too. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 03:12, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

@Sbmeirow: Cool, thanks, this is good information and that does make sense. This is why I was asking what would make more sense (both or one). So, for now, it sounds like the best approach would be for me to just update the estimate in the "infobox settlement" templates and replace the decennial with the estimate numbers in the "infobox U.S. county" templates? Does this make sense? Sasan-CDS (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

FYI, the ONLY official source for U.S. census numbers is census.gov but some people try to use other sources, which is the WRONG WAY. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 03:12, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

@Sbmeirow: That makes sense. Well, not only am I using official Census numbers, but I am also representing the Census Bureau directly for this bot so you can count on my numbers being accurate. My bot should check over everything and correct anything that is inaccurate (as well as the reference back to the Census Bureau). Sasan-CDS (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

For your BOT, please use some test cases from all of the 50 states, before you turn your BOT lose on 100% of the counties. Thanks! • Sbmeirow • Talk • 03:12, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

@Sbmeirow: Sure, I can do that. I'm assuming I will have to go through another approval process to run this anyway. I can try and link to this conversation in my request and include you for review if you like. Thanks. Sasan-CDS (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Sounds good, include me. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 21:15, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

I am only one person. You need to get feedback from others. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 21:15, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Standardization of State County Lists

While going through the various lists of the counties in each state, I have noticed that the sources of their figures for population and area vary from state to state. For example, some use total area (including water) (e.g. Michigan) while others use land areas (such as most states). To compound the issues, some of the figures for land area come from the 2000 census rather than 2010 (e.g. Florida). On top of that, the population figures come from widely different sources; some come from the 2010 census (e.g. Arkansas, though there the figures are not sourced to census.gov), while others use post-2010 estimates (though many such estimates are severely outdated; North Carolina, for example, uses 2011 estimates). I propose that we standardize such lists so that all of them have population and area figures from the same source. Although it seems obvious that the area figures used should be the land area figures from 2010, I am unsure about which population figures to use. While the 2016 estimates are more current, I question both their credibility and the ability of the Wikipedia community to update the population figures on a yearly basis, so think the 2010 Census data may be preferable. Any thoughts? Us441 (talk to me) (My piece) 20:04, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

I recommend the decade census, but first this template needs to be changed, as I stated on June 22, 2017. The current county template "Infobox U.S. county" only supports one census, where as the "Infobox settlement" supports two census (decade year + estimate year). I recommend the county template be changed to support two, in a similar way as the settlement template. The field names should be agreed upon before making changes. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 22:13, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. However, I was referring to the information on counties found not in their articles, but in the tables in the state lists such as List of counties in Florida and List of counties in Texas. For those tables, do you think it would be a good idea to include two separate columns for the decade population and the estimate population? Us441 (talk to me) (My piece) 11:50, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

LOL, ohhhhhh my bad. If there is a population per square mile (aka density), then I would want all data to come from the same year, unless it isn't possible. You probably should put the year on the 2nd row of the title of each column to make it more obvious which year it belongs too. If the year is in the title, then it's easy to give a reason for reverting changes .... "either change all values in the column or don't touch the data in the column". For me, by decade is fine, but I know that some people can't leave these things alone. I'm just one person. • Sbmeirow • Talk • 14:12, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

U.S. counties userbox templates

The following userbox templates are now available.

Wikitext

userbox

where used

{{Template:User Alabama counties|9}}

This user has visited
9 of the 67 counties
of the U.S. State of Alabama.