User talk:Floydian/Archive/2010a

This is an archive of my talk page from January through April 2010

File:Thedoorssep1968.jpg?

Hi! Hello! Are you planning to respond before tagging my edit further (if that's possible)? Please respond at your earliest convenience on my talk page, or the "Files For Deletion" section you created, or both! Please explain how this image does not pass the 10 points of WP:NFCC, and thus should be removed as "obsolete"... Doc9871 (talk) 04:51, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

FLC

You forgot to transclude the nomination, so I did that for you. I was wondering why I was the only one to happen upon the nomination. I've replied to your comments. Imzadi1979 (talk) 22:24, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I was in a rush by the time I finished writing out the nomination and just hit send. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 23:48, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome

Hello, Floydian. You have new messages at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of numbered roads in Kawartha Lakes, Ontario/archive3.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Imzadi1979 (talk) 19:11, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Shield issue

Please see your talk page at the Commons. Imzadi1979 (talk) 05:42, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

It's far easier to comment here, but I have responded nonetheless. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 06:46, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Replied over there, as the situation is on Commons, not here. Imzadi1979 (talk) 06:55, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

my version of infobox

Floydian, I rearranged and commented my version of infobox road. You can see it if you look at the source here: User:Stmrlbs/Template/Infobox_road. Hopefully that will help you. Sure makes it easier for me. Let me know if you have any questions about what I did. stmrlbs|talk 10:20, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Your failed FLC

None of the replies you made earlier today will affect the outcome. The FLC was closed as a fail this morning. Normally, editing of a closed FAC is very discouraged as it's felt that alters the record upon which the decision to promote or archive was made. I don't know what the opinion is over at the FLC camp though. I'd condense your last round of replies together and remove them from the FLC page into the talk page of the article. A further suggestion, I don't suggest that you nominate this again at FLC for a while. It's been there three times now, and had a peer review. The essential quality of the information in the article is high, it's the details of presenting them that's the issue.

You truly did yourself a great disservice at the very beginning of the nomination. First, you set conditions of what you would not change in the course of the nomination. As a reviewer, that's a HUGE red flag. By taking something off the table like you did, you opened the nomination up to a larger realm of scrutiny in other aspects. There's a "gee, if he won't change X that others advocated changing previously, what else of questionable quality is he hiding in that article?" Secondly, you didn't transclude the nomination right away. By doing so, you cost yourself the opportunity to pick up some of the "gee, that looks good so I'll Support promoting it" !votes. Those votes can build some interest and attract reviewers. Instead, you attracted a negative review with legitimate justifications because of the preconditions, and by the time it was transcluded, there was some significant opposition which scared away some of the more casual reviewers.

My suggestion is to leave this article alone for a while. Realistically, give it 6–7 months or more. Don't edit it, don't read it, just move on. Find other articles to write. Maybe start building some of the articles that will link from this list. If you're planning other similar lists, go ahead and start building the tables and laying out some organizational structure if you wish. I wouldn't get too involved in the minutiae of the other list articles, just build your foundations. When you do return to this article, really take all of the good comments from the review and implement the best feedback you were given. Go through all of the comments from the previous two FLC nominations and the peer review and do the same. Implement some ideas you'll develop creating other lists and articles. Keep an open mind. Honestly, we are all on the same page here with the same goal: to build the best 'pedia we can, one article at a time. After all of that, then go ahead and renominate it if you would like. The pace of your nominations makes it look like you have an emotional attachment to this article or this subject matter. That's good, but if you truly love a topic, you'll want to improve it, you'll want to put it through the scrutiny that is the various F*C processes, and you won't take the criticism too personally. I wish you the best of luck, Imzadi1979 (talk) 05:04, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

P.S. In the interim, I'm leaving my sandbox available. I'd like to suggest that you feel free to edit it instead of the live article to try out ideas and toss ideas off any interested collaborators, e.g. Me. It could be a great tool to compare some formatting ideas side by side without editing all the entries in either table. Imzadi1979 (talk) 06:01, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I never saw any of the changes to the article, its talk page, or the FAC. Let me talk to dabomb and get it extended for a day or two so that I can get Rschen, Dough, and your support. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 08:37, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

He edited it to remove the headers and linked that edit summary to WP:FLFL aka the feature list failure log, and then untranscluded the review from the FLC page. Um to you, but whatever the outcome, please move on to something else for a while. I'm worried when I see the same oppose reasons stated again in a new F*C nomination. Take a look at the sandbox at any rate. I've kept the city roads table in it purposely truncated for demo purposes because the ultimate format will scale up to the full list. Imzadi1979 (talk) 08:48, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Please see my talk page for my reply. Dabomb87 (talk) 14:47, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Replied again. Dabomb87 (talk) 18:39, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I have made my final reply (for now) at my talk page. Dabomb87 (talk) 03:54, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: SOAD pic

The main thing is that the image shouldn't have been replaced. If it is not copyrighted, it should be uploaded under a separate name instead of replacing that image. (Sugar Bear (talk) 01:50, 31 December 2009 (UTC))

Sock puppets

Well thanks. I think a lot of people suspected it but no one could be bothered to do anything about it, particularly since he isn't universally disruptive. I'm kinda surprised the ruse went on for so long though, especially when he was so obnoxious to so many people. I also liked where he talked to himself, but what I like even more was his outburst when he first found out he was being investigated and a checkuser was endorsed. He kind of loses his composure grammatically, it's like he's in a panic/rage at seeing the end game on the horizon. Anyway, hopefully he's dealt with appropriately. Take care, TastyCakes (talk) 16:51, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Some template help

Hi Floydian. You asked at the Village pump about your nasty whitespace and line break problem in your version of "Infobox Ontario road". I checked your code and ran some tests, there is a neat solution if you want to use unnamed parameters. See my response at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Some template help.

--David Göthberg (talk) 01:32, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Just a thought, I ran your sandboxed version of the Highway 401 article through Access Color which checks for compliance with web-design standards related to color-usage in web pages. The link is located at WP:COLOR, which is a subsection of the MOS guidelines on accessibility. I thought that I'd let you know that the sandboxed version fails the test, but the current article passes. Imzadi1979 (talk) 05:26, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately, colours aside, the rest of the current article fails every wikipedia standard in the book. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:06, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Hello, Floydian. You have new messages at User talk:Floydian over on the commons Imzadi1979 (talk) 05:39, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, the parts that "failed" are the blue strips. The contrast is not enough between the white and blue - but that is easy to fix. I can look tonight to find something similar that fits the criteria. However, imo, the rest of your box is much easier to read than the current box with the light gray backgrounds and smaller text - even if the present display meets the standards - as your does. Unfortunately, this tool does not show the values for those areas that pass. If it did, I think it would show that your infobox was more accessible in those areas. I would change only the blue strips to a different blue, but leave the rest as is. It is an improvement as far as visibility/user friendliness. stmrlbs|talk 15:32, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, try #1866FF for the blue, and #ffff32 for the text (yellow text). Believe it or not, this passes. (shock!!) Here is a tool for changing color and calculating those differences [1] and here is a tool addon you can use if you use Firefox.. very handy tool for picking out colors [2] stmrlbs|talk 16:07, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Strange that blue on yellow passes, while blue on white fails. If I change it to your darker blue, then I get a warning instead of a fail... But is that par for wiki standards, or should it have neither a fail nor warning? - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:06, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

I know.. strange is right. I'm having trouble accessing the access color site. But, I was wondering, do you have a sandbox version set up with the blue and yellow? Also, I don't know what I was looking at when i was talking about the light gray backgrounds and smaller text - it was a road page - but not the 401 wiki page. stmrlbs|talk 02:26, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to double check with the community on the extent of conformity required. The yellow text is not the most appealing, and I don't see how anyone who could read could not differentiate between blue and white. The whitest it can go without failing is #FFFF78, which isn't too bad. One must keep in mind that the show/hide link must be blue, and thus if the blue is dark enough to contrast white correctly, it may be too dark to be read. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 05:04, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Well, I've essentially gotten no definitive answer at the village pump. I'm going back to white. If anyone feels that strongly, they can boldly revert the change. Otherwise it's up and running on a few pages to start. No issues yet... - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 19:09, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd should be restored to the Progressive Rock page. Psychedelic/Space Rock is an accepted form of Progressive Rock. They did move beyond Psychedelic/Space Rock after their first couple of albums. Their albums "Meddle" and "Animals" are definitely Symphonic Prog. Rocking The Classics by Edward Macan is a source to confirm Pink Floyd as a Progressive Rock band. He has a whole chapter breaking down the album "Wish You Were Here"! They were the ONLY Prog band (not counting Fusion great Miles Davis) in the RRHOF until this year when Genesis will be inducted! Firstlensman (talk) 18:40, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but the reason I removed them from that list in the beginning is because that list is the bands that started progressive rock. By the time Atom Heart Mother came out (which is the transition album), progressive rock was established. Pink Floyd are undoubtedly a progressive rock band, just not until 1970. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:54, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Symphonic rock page updated

I've updated the Artists section Symphonic rock page. Please review and let me know if it's OK. I've also added references and posted to the WikiProject talk page requesting that the WP:NOR be removed. Thanks. Firstlensman (talk) 20:20, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Coboconk, Ontario

The review of Cocobonk can be found here. Unfortunately, the article really falls short of the GA criteria, and needs a lot of work. It is a good start, though, and there is a lot of information within the citations, and the article contains good notes to build a good article. You might find the Canadian community guidelines to be useful in building the article. Once the article is complete, it can be renominated. But I don't think "on hold" is really the right approach now, since that's really for articles that are very close at meeting the criteria and can be fixed up relatively quickly. Based on your previous comment on the talk page, it seems to me like you nominated this prematurely anyway.

Good luck! WTF? (talk) 19:56, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Undoing the review is not going to help. The article is clearly not ready for GA at this time. If you'd like more input in improving the article, then peer review would be more appropriate -- the purpose of which is to help editors get more input from others in an informal setting. The purpose of GA, on the other hand, is to assess articles against specific criteria. If you'd like further input in improving the article, I'd be happy to give that to you, but the article currently does not meet the GA criteria. WTF? (talk) 20:11, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Actually both the GA and FA process are supposed to help improve the article. I'd like to know, for example, where I can put a governance section on an unincorporated community (ie, the municipality it is in deals with governance). Spelling and grammar can be fixed in under a day (including that sentence fragment, which was because I put a period instead of a comma/didn't read my message on the talk page which mentioned what was going on with Demographics. The landmarks section is small because there isn't a lot of reliably sourced information, which is unfortunately the case with an unicorporated village of 800 people. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 21:16, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Ontario Road Infoboxes

Hey there,

I love your new infoboxes. I will bring up certain ideas about it / ideas to fix it perhaps, as we go along, but I think we should start placing these infoboxes into articles now, starting with the smaller roads and then make our way up to the bigger ones.

I am sort of pre-occupied with real life and also the beginning of the roads project for Ontario on Chinese Wikipedia, so I will be semi-active on the English Ontario roads project, but if you need any assistance, let me know.

Smcafirst the Roadgeek (Road talk) at 23:41, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Cool. I'm slowly rolling it out across the Highways already, starting with 2. I've also uploaded the correct King's Highway shields into a new template you may have noticed, {{jcon}}, which gets rid of the ugly abbreviations, but needs to be set up still for a few more counties. I'm also rewriting Highway 401, if you had any thoughts I'd be happy to hear 'em. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 06:56, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Just informing you, I'm "borrowing" your code over to Chinese Wikipedia (the road template on Chinese wikipedia, the length parameter is malfunctioning and I don't want to bother and fix it). So, if you don't mind, I'll start implementing it right away to the 5 currently existing articles of Ontario roads. If you mind, just message me and then I'll take it down.
Anyways, I have seen you starting to roll out the infoboxes. I will do the same with the roads in York Region, Peel Region, etc etc first (the Toronto people are really sensitive with new things, so I don't want to touch the Toronto ones until the very end...) Smcafirst the Roadgeek (Road talk) at 02:14, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I have added the infoboxes on Bayview Avenue and Highway 401 on Chinese Wikipedia. If you want to see it, here are the links: Bayview Avenue and Highway 401. You might want to see the effects and tell me if I have alternated the code by accident while trying to translate... Thanks! Smcafirst the Roadgeek (Road talk) at 03:15, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

No problemo. Besides, its wikipedia, I gave up the ownership of that template when I moved it from my userspace. I checked your pages out, but Chinese characters show up as squares with four digits inside on my computer. Let me know if you manage to break it (try to) so that I can work out any bugs. So far I've encountered no problems though.

The primary editor of Toronto roads is User:Johnny Au, who has already given me the thumbs up (in addition to the fact that 5 editors currently support it, meaning that a casual opposer may just have to sit tight and deal. By the way, thought you'd like to know that the Road Scholar website (roadscholar.on.ca) has been given the go-ahead as a reliable source (but not thekingshighway.ca). Cheers, ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 04:17, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

inforoad template

Floydian, just letting you know that I fixed that problem with the infobox road templates. Just let me know if you think you will need it and I will see if I can get consensus for moving them to the public wiki. That is, after I figure out where I'm supposed to get consensus since no one seems to watch the infobox road talk page. Anyway.. it will just sit in my user space until you have a need. stmrlbs|talk 05:31, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I do indeed need it. Link me to where you are applying for the consensus (I assume the talk page for the US roads WikiProject since the template talk page is ignored), and I'm there. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢

I won't be able to get to this until next weekend, but I was planning to post something asking for consensus Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Highways or Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Canada_Roads since this is a modification that was requested for Canadian routes. Isn't that the appropriate place? If not, I still think I will ask for consensus on the main ROADS project talk page, and just post "notices" on the Canadian and US roads.  ?? stmrlbs|talk 17:09, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I think they're both pretty dead. I know WP:USRD is active, and patrolled by rschen. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 23:49, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I guess I'm not surprised. Imo, the en.wikipedia.org is very U.S. centric (and I'm a US citizen). So, Floydian, were you able to get that example of a Kawartha road using the standard US jct and infobox road templates undeleted? stmrlbs|talk 01:50, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Yep, and you can compare the page wide effect it has.

Kawartha Lakes Road 8 uses {{jcon}}, and infobox road with a few tricks to add the big shield in the centre at the bottom.

User:Floydian/Kawartha Lakes Road 8 uses {{jct}} and a default filled out infobox road. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 02:53, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. That really helps. Just wondering why you don't use the size option in Jcon for road 36? stmrlbs|talk 04:22, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, I posted about the infobox road change here: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_U.S._Roads#infobox_road_option_to_allow_user_to_specify_shield_size stmrlbs|talk 01:40, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Awesome. I'm keeping my eye on it. Not much I could add at this point at least. In regards to the question you asked above... I'm not sure what you mean. I checked and Road 36 has a size parameter entered as well. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 02:06, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

look at the shield for 36 here: Kawartha_Lakes_Road_8. I was wondering why you don't use the size parameter to make 36 more easily seen there. stmrlbs|talk 04:09, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I've actually just tried increasing all of the shields in the junction list. Even though they are now taller than a line of text, it looks good on both a square and widescreen monitor methinks.

Thanks for helping me out ondoing this by the way. You've been awesome :) - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 04:31, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. My mother was Canadian.  :) I'm afraid that you might need more help than I can give you, as it seems this group is more interested in revisiting past grudges than in trying to find a solution for your unreadable shields when the standard infobox road template is used. stmrlbs|talk 01:24, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, fortunately I've seen the light, and so too will a pair of new infoboxes. One for roads, one for expressways. Infobox road still works fine on provincial highways. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 19:34, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Just a suggestion, why do you need two infoboxes? Why can't one handle roads and expressways, if not provincial highways as well? Imzadi1979 (talk) 19:37, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Mostly because they have different needs, and because I plan a slightly different colour scheme for each class of road. Both would be called from the same template, but they'd have different colours. It's much the same as how album infoboxes use a different colour for studio and live releases. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:33, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

It's interesting to note that {{Infobox album}} is similarly locked down; I wonder why that is. There is an incredibly easy way to handle browse issues while using {{Infobox road}}, but I'm not sure if I want to tell you. I can't speak for everybody, but we at WP:USRD have, at one point or another, tried to offer advice or suggestions on how to make the encyclopedia better and instead of listening to what we have to offer, you've taken the bull-in-a-china-shop approach. It needs to stop. Believe it or not, there are a few of us who are willing to help but are put off by your attitude. --Fredddie™ 21:32, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I've simply been taking the "I need a feature, please add it" approach. Your team has been taking the "But we don't want that feature, so lets try and come to a lesser compromise." I don't want a compromise, because there is no need to compromise (except perhaps laziness and being unwilling to bend). I need a feature, your group refuses to accept that (but will just go and change the template to whatever they need), and thus I will make a new template. No more arguments, no more bickering, problem solved! - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 21:40, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

In the interest of full disclosure, I asked for parishes to be added. 48 of the 50 states are divided into counties, Louisiana is divided into parishes, and Alaska kinda does its own thing. {{Infobox road}} didn't have support for parishes, so using |counties= would be legally incorrect. This isn't a stylistic issue at all. So, for you to say that "we" change the template to whatever "we" need is really irritating. The template was actually wrong, so I asked an admin to fix it, which he did. --Fredddie™ 21:51, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

So, I will assume there was no posted request or discussion. stmrlbs|talk 06:28, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Please take it to WP:ANI if you wish to accuse admin abuse. --Fredddie™ 07:30, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

What is with this group? I never said anything about admin abuse - it is Rschen who has continually brought it up during the whole discussion - and now you are following suit. I asked where the discussion for your change was. I will assume from your reaction and others that there was no posted request or discussion, just a private request. Simple question. Should have a simple answer. Yes, it is at xxx or no, it wasn't posted anywhere. stmrlbs|talk 01:42, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

well, that was fun

I am not surprised at the outcome, it was what I expected. But, I thought I might be wrong.. never hurts to try. I think the consensus was made before I ever posted. Floydian, one thing came out of it though.. I think you should try redoing a few of your shields in the SVG and see if that makes the lettering clearer. It might help. I would be interested in seeing it. As far as infobox template, I agree with you that it is time for a new template - perhaps one with a smaller scope. anyway.. talk to you later about it. stmrlbs|talk 05:53, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I knew that was coming from the get go, but I decided to assume good faith. Fortunately that discussion resulted in the best possible outcome - The freedom to not be under the jurisdiction of another project. Hopefully WP:USRD will stick to US roads from now on.

yes, I agree. I've done what they asked, and think it is time to move on. So, what did you have in mind to work on? I saw your idea of using a color. I think that is a nice idea, or something to visually differentiate the Canadian road articles from the US. If you have that SVG creator, why don't you redo a couple of your shields and see if it makes it any clearer? stmrlbs|talk 03:34, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm in the process now. I'm also remaking the King's Highway shields, as I've discovered from a photo[3] that the current svg's use an old version of the marker, and that the bullet shaped sign with a detailed crown is the correct current marker.

I was thinking of doing it coloured, and in a similar fashion to some European countries. Italy has a nicely shaped infobox (example), and Germany's infobox has a nice colour scheme (example). However, I think I should use what is most familiar to the readers. MapArt books tend to dominate the market, at least in Ontario, far over Rand McNally and Perlys books. The colours they use are blue for freeways, a crimson orange for provincial highways, and yellow for county and other major roads. I figured I'd start with that using the code for Italy as a basic building block. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:59, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

yes.. I see they have something different for each country. I like the color/shape idea. So, are you going to keep any of the old infobox road concepts? Like the browse route? The reason I ask is because I did do some work organizing the code in the inner templates, which you can see here:

• User:Stmrlbs/Template/Infobox_road/browse
• User:Stmrlbs/Template/Infobox_road/browse_route
• User:Stmrlbs/Template/Infobox_road/ON_browse

but not infobox road, because I didn't want to take the chance of breaking something again with a misplaced, missed, or extra whitespace - which can happen when you miss something restructuring a template. But if you are going to use some of the basic structure, I can go ahead and reorganize my sandbox infobox, too, so it is easier to read, and you can change it easier. Also, I was going to try to use JCON in the browse routes, so that you wouldn't need to input a size parameter. Easier to change the code and show you than to explain - plus, I would want to make sure it works. I also had an idea for the shields in general - for size. But, if you are going to go with something completely different, I don't want to bother doing that work. Or if you just want to do it on your own, because you know what you want, that's fine, too. So, let me know. stmrlbs|talk 04:26, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I could always use the help :) I'm going to hold onto most of the infobox road concepts, just simplifying them to more basic needs and not branching it out so much. I definitely hope to keep the browse route stuff too. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 08:10, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I made it about 12 hours on my own. Already having trouble with getting the template to switch the border colour depending on the route type. It just makes no border show up whatsoever (even though every possible option, including the default, should make some sort of border show up). Any thoughts? - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 17:49, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

are you talking about the template in your user space? What template did you base this on, and what are you trying to do? stmrlbs|talk 03:22, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, User:Floydian/Infobox Ontario road is the template, and it's based on {{Infobox_Bundesautobahn}}. I've made it work after a lot of trial and error, but I'm sure it could be done in a more clever way. I'd like to have the subtemplate User:Floydian/Infobox Ontario road/colour spit out a different hex colour code depending on what road type is chosen (nameless parameter 1). Ideally I want it to only spit out the colour code ("#069" for example), and none of the accompanying css ("border:" and ";"), the idea being that A) I can reuse it further down the template to set the background colour of the bars, which are currently blue, and B) I'm not needlessly repeating code. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 04:01, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

EDIT: Nevermind, I just got it! Placed the # outside of the subtemplate, and all the pieces fell into place. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 04:11, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Template stuff

Ok, so here is a good one. Is is possible to make the sections in the infobox be collapsible in the same way as the navboxes at the bottom of many articles, where the info in the section can be hidden, but the title remains? - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 08:32, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, I'm sure it is probably possible - but which infobox template are you referring to (there are a lot of infobox templates)? and can you give me an example of the page which has the navigational boxes that you are interested in? Thanks. stmrlbs|talk 02:30, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

The template is the one I'm working on (User:Floydian/Infobox Ontario road). The collabsible navboxes are on many pages, but Here is a good example of them collapsed. I was wondering if I can apply that same coding into the infobox I'm making, so that the white sections can collapse into the coloured bars above them? This way I can add lots of info to the infobox, but only have some of it show when an article loads (so that it's not 3 screens tall). - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 05:54, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, try {{hidden begin}} and {{hidden end}} to make an area collapsible. I've used them, and they are nice. I see that David is helping you - he is a great resource for questions about templates (much more knowledgeable about templates than me). He has been at Wikipedia a long time and done a lot of work with templates, creating some of the templates that you see all over Wikipedia - if you look at his user page, he lists them. He also takes time to explain. I started talking to him after some confusion with the "undefined" vs null, but defined, and the default conventions for templates and nested templates. He knows his stuff.

On another note, I see what you are trying to do with the collapsible sections. But sometimes you have to be careful about getting too "slick" on a page. I have found that the internet audience puts a high priority on "speed". If a person has to open a lot of boxes to get basic information about something they are looking for - they won't. However, I am speaking from personal experience - contrasting what I learned designing pages for a website, versus designing pages for a more technical narrower focus type group of people that used the pages for business. I learned to step back and try to look at it from their point of view. If I were you, I would design a couple of pages with the boxes, and then run it by a couple of your friends who know nothing about wikipedia except as a site where they go to read about something for whatever reason. See what they think of the boxes and if they know what it is and how to display it. There is a need for standards on wikipedia, but I think it always helps to see what opinion a non-wikipedia editor has. I would also show these friends some of the U.S.Roads pages with no comments of your own to influence them, and see what they say they like or don't like, what they find helpful, what they think is missing. You might get some good ideas for your area pages that way. stmrlbs|talk 04:10, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Haha, I don't know anybody that could actually form an opinion in that sort of way that has any knowledge or interest in roads. My idea is that only the lesser information would be collapsed, as I imagine if people are interested than they will look a bit more closely. Those that are skimming by get all the important information without having to scroll down the page, even at 1024x768. I'll honestly present it to the American roads project just to know what they can find to criticize. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:02, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't think a person has to be a road geek to be able to give an opinion about an article on a road. But, why not just try it and see what it looks like? It isn't hard to do with {{hidden begin}} and {{hidden end}}. I look forward to seeing what it looks like. Did my reorganization of {{infobox road}} (here:[4]) help at all? stmrlbs|talk 18:51, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I tried using those two, but it would not let me customize the title bar, even using the titlestyle parameter. I switched to one used in some European infoboxes, which I've mostly got to work the way I want it to. I have been looking through yours and using it as a reference, but I am coding it with the German Autobahn template. Same thing but more style changes. Most of the things seem to be in order so far, I've just got to recreate the browse stuff. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 21:25, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

and.. talking about adding color to the infobox road templates, you might this discussion interesting this. stmrlbs|talk 15:38, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Ha! I never knew colours were unprofessional. Must be newspaper readers :p

Oh well. I use colours for identification, whereas this seems to be adding colours for decoration (lack of consistency across the board). - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 17:01, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Color is a powerful tool in a visual medium - the internet is a visual medium. What is interesting in the infobox road discussion is that the standard infobox road template does not pass the accessibility standards according to this tool. I copied over one infobox road template call for Michigan 15 [5], and ran it through the color accessibility tool, and it has errors. I kind of thought this before with the gray background and blue links, but but the tool kept hanging when I would try to use it. When Imzadi pointed this out in the infobox road discussion (which makes me wonder if this is the first time he has run the US infobox road template through this tool) - the fact that it had errors didn't seem to matter much to the US group - because the group for the most part doesn't want colors or change. So, I wouldn't worry about your template - it seems to have done better than the standard one. I do think enough contrast is important so people can read it easily - so I would try to tweak it so it gets close or passes. I also like the idea that you are using the color in a meaningful way. stmrlbs|talk 20:27, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

It comes pretty close now with white text on blue, and I tried to start a discussion at the village pump and only got pointed back to the unspecific guideline. I only wish I could modify the javascript in hidden begin so that the 'show' link could be white instead of blue (fortunately the tool doesn't check that). - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 23:00, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

In response, I have run the regular infobox through that color accessibility tool before. It came back ok at that time. Now, it is not ok in my sandboxed version. (Actually, even my protoypes, which aren't functioning templates but rather hard-coded tables, produce some of the same error messages because my demo still calls the Length subtemplate unaltered.) The fact remains that my proposal would be consistent across the board. By not hard-coding the color schemes to any type/state/country parameters, each project internationally would be free to specify what schemes, if any, to specify. If implemented, WP:MSHP would be free to specify in its article standards that the green scheme is to be used across the board. The orange scheme, would be available for future/under construction highway designations that are not open to the public yet, like M-231. The other schemes would have no usage to the project at this time. WP:UKRD could standardize on the blue scheme for their motorways, matching the BBSs in use on the motorways now. Other classifications in the UK use white signs, so those types of articles would standardize on white. WP:WISH for Wisconsin has a use for the brown scheme for their Rustic Road articles, Green for everything else. If the project chose not to implement any color, the default would be in place.

I figured there would be some reluctance to colors, after all USRD consensus was to remove colors from junction lists/exit lists. I argued, unsuccessfully, that anything that helps to create visual appeal is a good thing. I'm all in favor of anything that breaks up long blocks of black and white, whether that is black and white text or graphics elements. Since WP:ELG is part of the MOS now, one project can't override that style guideline to reimplement it, but infoboxen are not in the MOS, at least not in a way that speaks to how colors are or are not used. By not specifically tying the colors to classifications in my proposal, the designs are not in violation of WP:COLOR either. {{Infobox Ontario road}} doesn't violate WP:COLOR either because the hard coding that produces its color schemes is also hard coded to display the road classification. I only pointed out that tool to you, Floydian, because if you were going to implement colors, you should do so fully informed of potential issues and work through potential solutions before taking the template live. Imzadi1979 (talk) 02:03, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

P.S. I'd be tempted to create a Michigan-only/colorized geography-neutral infobox in my user space based on my sandboxed, hard-coded samples as more of a proof of concept, but I'm not good at that level of template coding. Once upon a time, many of the state projects had separate infobox templates, but they were consolidated into the one we have now. Some of the remaining templates were recoded to pass their parameters to the current template for display. In standarizing them, they also standardized display elements, stripping the templates of any varying color schemes resulting in today's light-grey and light-blue blandness. Imzadi1979 (talk) 02:12, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

The main reason I hardcoded the colours in was to prevent people from varying the colours. The colours come to identify the type of road in a way. The yellow and blue is based upon MapArt books blue for freeways and yellow for arterial roads... I would have done the highways in the same colour scheme, but it would make them difficult to distinguish from the selected road, being orange. I think WP:COLOR also needs to be rewritten to specify exactly what the guidelines is. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:00, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Which is fine for a template that restricts itself to one province or country. For internationally-used templates though, some flexibility is needed. Also, since the green background would replicate a guide sign thematically, until a guide sign variation of the shields were uploaded for use at the top of the template, a white, default background would not change much until the graphics were uploaded (which would be an afternoon's work or less.) Imzadi1979 (talk) 03:04, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Imzadi, how long ago did you run the color accessibility tool? I agree that color can be an asset and add interest to a page - it is a major component of web design, but I don't think that the U.S. group wants color. I restructured/commented the infobox road template in my user space so it was easier to modify [6] [7] [8] [9], but I don't know if that would help you. stmrlbs|talk 03:13, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

I ran it back when I first commented to Floydian here about his test pages. I'm not sure why the tool is returning different results, but I had compared his version of the Highway 401 page and the mainspace version. *shrugs*. Imzadi1979 (talk) 03:28, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Question re. Coboconk, Ontario

Hi. Sorry for the delay, I very rarely edit or access my account. To answer your question, the information on the naming of Coboconk came from one of two books about Ontario place names (Place Names of Ontario and Ontario Place Names). I believe I updated a number of articles using these sources. As for highways, most of what I know comes from sites like [www.thekingshighway.com]. The original wording I changed read Highway 48, which didn't seem apporopriate given the downloading. I don't know if there was a Highway 48 article at that time, but the current wording / reference looks much better. Best of luck with the GA / FA designation. Blotto adrift (talk) 19:51, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Canadian Transport Wiki

Hey there,

I'm planning to start a new wiki on Wikia, namely the Canadian Transport Wiki, and I thought you might be interested. The wiki will cover all forms of Canadian transport, from streets, roads, to highways, and to water-based transit, and air-based transit. Public transit is also included in the wiki. The objective of this wiki is to create like a sort of a handbook for travelling for Canadians. It will host contents that might not be unacceptable on Wikipedia (that's why I have to start a new wiki).

I'm also planning to include CanTrans DriveView (sort of like street view, but it will be video-based, and will include the traffic conditions of each roads at specific time of the day).

The wiki has just started, and it has a lot of work to do, both in the background stuff and the articles. So if you are interested, please join us!

The link is as follows: [10]

Smcafirst the Roadgeek (Road talk) at 03:48, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

System edits

I am getting annoyed that you are continually removing my edits to the System of a down page due to "speculation". It's not speculation if the album HAS been released it is available, it is therefore a fact that a new System item appeared on itunes on the 9th of February. Go back to the old revision and stop saying it's speculation when it's not. I would also like to quite clearly state that there are references on System related pages that are in fact from www.soadfans.com and are reliable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Michaelprice25 (talk • contribs) 16:50, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

It is speculation that they are releasing a new album because a new track has appeared only on iTunes. soadfans.com is not a reliable source (its a fan board), and itunes isn't a record label. Niether are acceptable sources. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:50, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't saying they were releasing a new fucking album. So it is correct information. I was saying that a new ITEM/Song appeared and that it is a 42 minute mash up of System of a down songs. I then could have said that "it has lead to speculation and questions about the bands up and coming future" which would also be a fact as it has. I'll continue re submitting this information as it is valuable and factual.

Then you'll be blocked from editing. Biographies require sources that are reliable according to Wikipedia's criteria, and using a primary source such as iTunes to speculate is known as synthesis. It is speculation because nothing has been announced from an official source, such as the band members themselves or a representative for them. Why is that song on Itunes? Who put it there? What does this mean? These questions cannot be answered by the simple existence of a track on iTunes. As for the appearance of the track, it is not noteworthy (WP:NOTNEWS), it just appeared.

When a reliable source posts something (even if THEY are speculating) with regards to the appearance of a track on iTunes, then Wikipedia will follow. We do not break the news though. For this reason I ask that you respectfully not insert it. If it's important, its' time will come very shortly. - 23:46, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Highway 2A

I'm not really fearsome concerned about it. I do think deleting old talk page discussions (or whatnot) is generically bad form; archiving, or better, a response noting the complaint, that it's been investigated and found baseless, would be better. The last is probably best - seeing someone restore the context and remove a copyright violation allegation made me reflexively check to see if the complaint was merited because it comes across as sketchy behaviour. (No offence; you're right that it's not merited.) Keeping a record of everything is always a good idea, though. Cheers, WilyD 18:04, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

• Sounds reasonable. It'd be good if you annotated it saying the complaint was investigated and found to be baseless. Cheers, WilyD 18:36, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Barnstar

		The Minor Barnstar
		For consistently keeping the genre consensus and false/speculated information out of the System of a Down article. Here's too one day getting it featured. SKATER Speak. 01:58, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

One day, eventually... :p

Thank you :) - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 02:11, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

IRC

Come join us sometime. See Wikipedia:HWY/IRC for details. Imzadi1979 (talk) 23:34, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Will do. Thanks :) - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:14, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

401 exit list

I come with a white flag on this issue. I was looking at the exit list for Highway 401 and had a couple questions for you. --Fredddie™ 19:19, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Divisions, Counties', Regions, etc.

Is it necessary to display the full name of the division? Would there be any information lost if the divisions were pipe tricked? Examples: Essex, Waterloo, Peel, etc. Ideally, the Division header would have a link to the page that has all the subdivisions listed, but that page doesn't exist. There's a navbox, but it's not the same.

County road names (again) (not abbreviations)

In the spirit of reducing redundancy I ask this, would you consider removing the county names from the county road links, again with a pipe trick? Seeing the county in every county road entry is a bit of overkill. Currently,  County Road 42 is used where County Road 42 conveys the same information. It's particularly an issue with longer county names. Example: Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry County Road 44 (Boundary Road) could be shortened to County Road 44 (Boundary Road)

Building on what Freddie is saying, having the county name in the table also makes this redundant, meaning it can be shortened that way without loss of information. In other words, if the Essex County Road 42 example above is clearing in a section of the table devoted to Essex County, the meaning is clear that County Road 42 isn't Waterloo Region Road 42. Just my thought. Imzadi1979 (talk) 21:03, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

I was thinking of only displaying the first numbered road in each division with the full name, and thereafter as Road X. As for the names of the divisions themselves, in many cases even the current names are incorrect, and the legal names of the divisions should be used. In some counties, this may be County of X, and for others it may be X County. For example, Waterloo should be Regional Municipality of Waterloo, as this is the actual name of the corporation (I recently moved Ministry of Transportation (Ontario) to Ministry of Transportation of Ontario in the same light). - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 23:11, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

In an effort to be technically correct though, you potentially sacrifice readability. Under that concept, all of the Michigan lists could need to be updated to "County of Marquette" and "City of Negaunee" or "Charter Township of Chocolay" when the common names are just Marquette County, Negaunee and Chocolay Township. Even though it is technically incorrect, except for article titles themselves, there's no harm in using a simpler, consistent form instead of complex, inconsistent forms in the table. Just my CAN$0.02 (Yes, I live in Michigan; we have plenty of Canadian coins floating around here.) Imzadi1979 (talk) 23:31, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

P.S. In article prose, I have used "City of Marquette" to refer to the municipal government in reference to transfers of roads between MDOT and the city. If I were referring instead to a road passing through the city, it would just be Marquette, even though there is a charter township of the same name.

You make a good point. When the link is clicked, the article itself should be titled as the corporation is (it may be time to recraft the naming guidelines for Ontario divisions). It may take me a day or two to get all 160 odd entries out. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 23:39, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Use common names. --Rschen7754 00:51, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Usually the correct names are the common names, with exception to regions. However, to do that would be to title York Region as York (Ontario region), as most people just say York, which was also a historic county, as well as a former borough of Metro Toronto. On maps (both the official MTO atlas as well as the endless variations of MapArt map books) the correct names are shown, and are recognized almost equally to their shortened names. The link you gave seems to give the green light to using a unique name when available, so long as it isn't outrageous. If I use the correct names (County of blah / Regional Municipality of blah), the articles seldom need disambiguation with ", Ontario" - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:29, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Alright, I rebuilt jcon with this in mind (which also served to make it far simpler than I had it). It now won't display the county name in the link. I'll amend it later tonight to have a manual override for odd occasions. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 17:04, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

Usually if I'm going to "manually override" a template, I just type out the wikicode by hand. Templates are only good short hand to a certain point, after that, if they don't work, I don't use them. Besides, the "pipe trick works wonders" I can have City of Marquette just by [[Marquette, Michigan|City of Marquette]] It's just easier sometimes to do it by hand in the odd situations than to remember how the template might have provisions for exceptions that aren't common. Imzadi1979 (talk) 17:46, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

One thing I noticed regarding {{Jcon}} links that don't have shields, it appears that there is a space that shouldn't be there if no shield is being displayed. In Middlesex County, compare Veterans Memorial Parkway to County Road 74. They're in consecutive rows, so it's easy to show. --Fredddie™ 20:28, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I noticed as well, but haven't had time today to fix it. I'll get to it by the end of the day.

And that's true. I've simplified it a lot over the past 24h. No reason to go dummy it up again with overrides that are essentially only going to be used on long exit lists such as the 401, 400, and QEW. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:39, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I would look at it myself, but in a bit of irony, I can't find my way round your code. I'm sure it's easy to follow, I'm just not seeing it. --Fredddie™ 22:00, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I'll be adding more comments to make it clearer, but its basically as follows:

1. If OT is entered, skip to the section for OT, if NOSH is entered, skip the next step
2. Check if the shield exists, display it if it does. If CON is entered, repeat this process for it
3. Create the fully named link
4. Create the shown link
5. Repeat the last two for CON
6. OT stuff here
7. Road name, city, city2, town, town2

Let me know if anywhere in particular is confusing, I want editors new to templates to have little difficulty understanding it. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:40, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

DYK Nomination of The Middle Road

Hey there, I've nominated The Middle Road to appear in the "Did you know" section of the Main Page. If you'd like to make any adjustments or suggest an alternate hook, you can do so at T:TDYK#The Middle Road. Good work on the article! Jujutacular ^T · C 00:37, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Cool. I changed the hook slightly to tighten the grammar, and to add the date. Otherwise, looks good. Hoping I can find a bit more material to get a GA or FA out of it, alongside my rewrite of Highway 401 and in the near future, Queen Elizabeth Way. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 00:42, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Moves

In the spirit of BRD, I have reverted your bold page moves to Canadian highway articles. This scheme is inconsistent with the way Canadian articles are disambiguated and also with how they are referred to. Please gather consensus at WT:CANADA before conducted mass-moves of this nature. –xeno^talk 03:13, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Page moves have been discussed at WT:ONRD along with many WP:USRD editors. Please revert your changes, as they are consistent with the State Route Naming Convention (WP:SRNC), as well as WP:Use common names. These titles do not need to be disambiguated, and all the sources indicate that these are Provincial Highways. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:18, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

While the SRNC was a US issue, the principals are applicable. The previous names were being kept as redirects, meaning no harm was caused. The issue was discussed already, and a concensus formed to make a change. Imzadi1979 (talk) 03:23, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

The issue was discussed on a lightly-trafficked task force talk page [11] (so lightly trafficked, you actually proposed it be deleted last month!). I'm not sure why a State Route Naming convention would apply to Canadian provincial highway. I moved the discussion to Wikipedia talk:CANADA#Proposal to rename all highway articles and think we should give other editors at least a week to chime in. Thanks, –xeno^talk 03:26, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Alright, but also consider that British Columbia roads are titled in this new fashion. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:28, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

They don't have the word "Provincial" in them. I see you've been doing tonnes of work on these articles. Thanks, and keep up the good work.

I don't mean to step on your toes - I just don't think that emulating the US example is a good idea. Expanding it to all provinces would be a nightmare.

However, if consensus develops at WT:CANADA for this, I will perform the moves myself. –xeno^talk 03:46, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

You forget a few things. US states are roughly equivalent to Canadian provinces. At least in the sense that both are the highest subdivision of their respective nations. The name was picked as <Province> <Type> <Number>, where the type for Ontario is "Provincial Highway". The fact remains that a huge mess started in USRD-land over naming conventions, something that ArbCom had to settle, resulting in SRNC. The result of that was the naming convention (P1) used today, with the P2 alternative as redirects. Imzadi1979 (talk) 03:55, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

And what is the U.S. equivalent of a territory? Canada is a different country, not subject to the arbcom ruling (I doubt many Canadians even participated), and strict consistency is not required nor ideal. I could probably warm up to the idea of "Ontario Highway 427" if only because all the other provinces (except PEI) do it that way. The word "Provincial" is not needed. "Highway 401" (or when disambiguation is required, "Highway 427 (Ontario)") still makes the most sense to me from the way almost all other types of article are disambiguated. –xeno^talk 04:12, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Please let's not continue this here, I've copied most of the above to WT:CANADA, let's keep it together. –xeno^talk 04:12, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

I've declined all the {{g6}} requests until there is consensus as the move will prove controversial. I've also commented at WT:CANADA. -- Flyguy649 ^talk 05:09, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

question about jcon

Floydian, just curious. What is the purpose of the options called for example 8 in the Jcon documentation? thanks. stmrlbs|talk 08:32, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

ot (onlytext) is supposed to just display plain text in the standard format. I had placed closing brackets in the wrong place, but I've fixed it and it's working now. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 17:02, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Floydian, I added indentation and some comments (dividing the major sections). User:Stmrlbs/Template/Jcon is probably a bit of overkill, but you can change it to however you like seeing it. If you want to do a lot of text manipulation, I would recommend downloading a better text editor like Notepad++ (a free opensource editor). You can indent blocks of text, find matching braces, etc. in most of the text editors. A lot easier than trying to make any major changes in wikipedia. Then just copy/paste it back to wikipedia when you are done and test it. The way I try to remember the wacky (and inconsistent) Wikipedia rules about newlines and spaces in templates is you don't have to worry about spaces and newlines between parameters in parser functions and for some of the parameters in templates called within a template. For the rest of it, you have to put the (template comment) to connect successive parts of the template where you don't want newlines or spaces. Kind of a pain, and it makes templates hard to read if there are too many. This is a good page to read about how whitespace and newlines are treated in templates, and in particular, this section on parser functions and templates. David Gothberg has created some nicely laid out templates. Another nice tool is User:ais523/bracketmatch.js. This allows you to see matching braces in a template - It colors the matching braces matching colors, and if you highlight a pair of braces, it will highlight the matching pair of braces. REALLY USEFUL -it can help you figure out where an if statement (or any parser function or template) begins and ends in a complex template. I have a modified version User:Stmrlbs/bracketmatch.js where I increased the time the highlighting lasted from 3 seconds to 20 seconds. Hope this helps, and good luck, Floydian. I'm glad things are going well.  :) stmrlbs|talk 04:57, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Looks amazing! Thank you very much :)

I tried adding the bracketmatch code to my custom js, but it didn't work. I'm going to try your variation to see if it does the trick. Thank you again for all the help :) - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:03, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

hmmm... wonder why it didn't work for you. What browser do you use? Perhaps you didn't see it - 3 seconds isn't very long, that is why I increased the time. But that's all I did, so.. I'm not sure my version will work for you if the original bracketmatch didn't work. Let me know. stmrlbs|talk 01:02, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Ontario roads

Wouldn't it make sense to have Ontario Roads use {{WikiProject Canada|on=yes|road=yes}} instead of a separate banner? –xeno^talk 19:21, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

I'd agree, but then the grading scheme has to be consistent with Canada as a whole. Just for the purposes of tracking changes and organizing things, it's nice to have an independent importance rating. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 21:14, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

What some projects do is have separate params, E.g. ontario-roads-importance=???. Task is already done but maybe something to consider for future. –xeno^talk 21:34, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Will do. I'm sure everything can be rearranged at some point in the future though. Any chance of doing the moves tonight (it's gone the weekend without much input)? - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 22:26, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

Just a comment from an outside voice... why doesn't WP:CRWP have its own banner instead of relying on WP:CANADA? Then as subprojects or taskforces like WP:ONRD are recreated, they can have a province= parameter sort them. WP:USRD has a unified banner that sorts by the 50 states, the 6 territories and the type= parameter will sort the Interstates, US Highways and auto trails out as well for tracking purposes. It might be a little overpowered at the moment for your needs, but it helps to have all of the states' articles sorted individually by assessment categories. That's what makes things like WP:USRD/A/S work. rschen has a script program that will parse the tables from WP1.0bot to update the master table, and calculate the WikiWork figures each week. Imzadi1979 (talk) 01:39, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

DYK for The Middle Road

On March 31, 2010, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article The Middle Road, which you created or substantially expanded. You are welcome to check how many hits your article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check ) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Materialscientist (talk) 11:41, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the comment on my page. I was planning on (briefly) replying and then putting your comments and my response to them at the bottom of this section. Is that OK with you? --Antigrandiose (talk) 10:07, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Yep, no problemo - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 10:43, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

401 "bumpy"

The word "bumpy" to describe rolling hills is misleading and inaccurate. Just because someone was quoted saying it, or it was in a newspaper article doesn't make it even remotely accurate. I commend you for changing the wording, and please refrain from misleading wording in the future. Thanks. Po' buster (talk) 23:55, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps, but bumpy to describe non-flat terrain? I will use the words used by sources whenever possible, as unlike me or you, they have an expertise in the subject matter. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 00:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Leaderboard comparison

Compare this to WP:USRD/A/Live. Both of these update live (you may need to occasionally). —Fredddie™ 01:57, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Floydian. You have new messages at Dabomb87's talk page.
Message added 21:14, 6 April 2010 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Dabomb87 (talk) 21:14, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

West Highland Creek - Signs

Floydian, I've been by a large number of the road crossings of West Highland Creek in my travels over the past few days, and there have been no signs at all, let alone ones that said "Highland Creek" (instead of "West Highland Creek"). Where did you come across the ones that said "Highland Creek"? Best regards. --papageno (talk) 02:50, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I do remember somewhere, but I'll have to go for a drive myself to find out. I want to say Brimley north of Lawrence, but I say that without checking. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 07:50, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

401 article

So you want to make the 401 article a featured page? That's a big task.

Let me know if there's something I can do to help you with it. For example, do you know what's in more need of additions/changes than others?

The overall layout and pictures have been improving over time. However some of the pictures are still a little dull and not overly expansive.

If the Basketweave picture of the 401 you recently removed was editied it would also help.

Also, I think this image needs to be added sometime: http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/9599/highway401missqj6.jpg (may need to be edited too) -Or at least another image of this section is needed. Its the 401's widest point and thus is a very interesting and useful image to put in the article.

Signature Haljackey (talk) 18:46, 18 April 2010 (UTC)Haljackey

Hey, thanks for the help :)

Many of the free pictures we have now are taken from a car or with an older camera. They have a blotchy appearance because of the way jpeg compresses colours. I'm hoping to get out with my camera and get some more pictures (though I tend to only get out at night, so all I've added so far is the grey Hogg's Hollow picture and the night shot of the lights streaming by). Are you in Toronto or elsewhere around the province? Perhaps if you have a chance, get some photos of the highway so it's not a case of too few pictures for too much text. I've made some requests with people in Windsor to get pictures of the start of construction on the Windsor Essex Parkway as well, but that may not be for up to a year..

My focus now is any information that can be found regarding widening from four lanes to six (beyond the Kitchener–Bowmanville section). Also, any work done in the seventies to nineties would be good, as I haven't been able to find very much. Waiting for the chance to visit the Toronto Reference Library to get access to historic maps, maybe get some information on anything east of Kingston.

That is a great image, but where is it from? It looks like it may be one of Cameron Bevers aerials. If not and its free to use, I'll take it over and see if the image team would be able to clear the haze in the background and clarify it a little bit.

Cheers, ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I live in London.

I have no idea about the origin of that image. I don't think it came from Cameron Bevers' site.

As for older info, there's a site called http://www.vintagekingshighways.com/ where you can get some info and pics, such as this one: http://www.vintagekingshighways.com/401/1989/North_York/Malecki_401_1.jpg

Haljackey (talk) 21:25, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

401 photos

Here's a large collection of 401 photos I found on Flickr with a creative commons search (some rights reserved)

These might be very useful if some of them can be uploaded with fair use rationale. They can add a lot to the article or replace some existing photos.

Feel free to upload them to the commons or whatever as well.

Here's the list:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/25172016@N03/3402427231/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bob406/3861204622/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dougtone/4118730490/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielle_scott/4448005841/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kwl/2743788633/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wyliepoon/832911753/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cheukiecfu/3198817220/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28771250@N00/541505335/sizes/l/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielle_scott/3605157130/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielle_scott/3604346027/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/loneprimate/3267598059/sizes/l/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielle_scott/4402824098/sizes/l/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/loneprimate/2751249415/sizes/l/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/markselliott/2685879025/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/christinamatheson/2930466020/

Hope they prove to be useful to you!

Haljackey (talk) 22:01, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)All the photos from vintage king's highways are ok to use. I've spoken with the site owner (Mike) and the photographer (Averill), and they were happy to allow the use with proper credit to Averill Hecht (and a link back to the image on VKH).

The photo with an unknown source however, is unusable. It would be a copyright infringement to claim the photo as free to use. If you can get any photographs yourself from overpasses or the side of the highway, they'd make a good addition. I'll take a look through those photos, thanks :) - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 22:09, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're referring to, perhaps changing the images at the same time of removal would avoid confusion with other editors. Po' buster (talk) 03:06, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Backseat editing is annoying. Participate in the topic, or wait until there isn't ongoing editing before picking things apart on a personal preference of what is and isn't excessive. It's a common courtesy to not pick straws from the nest that is being built (ok I made that terrible saying up right now, but you understand I assume). What image wasn't removed? - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:21, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I have been participating in editing of that article on a few occasions and constantly look at updates. All I did was remove one image which was added to an already overcrowded section in an article littered with images. Another editor went on the image changing/removal spree. So I reverted one removal of an image which I felt added positively to the article. Once again I will remind you that it is not "your" article. Other editors are free to edit it as they please. And perhaps a less confrontational attitude towards other editors is needed. Po' buster (talk) 12:55, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

My idea is discussing rather than being bold. I would hate to fail on the basis of instability. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 15:43, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Hey What's Up

Hey Pink Floyd guy, I started editing on Wikipedia just to keep my mind occupied, I'm going through deep shit, when I started reading the factual errors and the sick shit like mentioning mortality, dying and suicide on the prognosis section of anorexia nervosa, I started contributing out of altruism.

Wikipedia occupies the first spot on most searches, for self righteous, incompetent dickheads ( can I say that or am I violating WP:Dickhead?) to claim ownership and disseminate bullshit is wrong, it makes Wikipedia look bad and more importantly people are getting bullshit information. There is one particular individual who seems to clamor for attention, his 15 minutes of fame went to his head. All the articles he created are one sentence to a paragraph long. To up his "look at me" count he merely transferred sections that other people created to make it look like an article he started. I read extensively about him, he is a publicity hound and I find his behavior pretty frigging disturbing. Soooo I'm not going anywhere. I just have to cool out with my childish hissy fits and use the WP:Blah Blah and according to WP:Yadda Yadda B.S.

My life is a bit of a horror show right now, so I might not be able to edit anything after tonight, but don't let a dickhead screw-up what could be meaningful information for other people. Proper knowledge can help people, like your information on Rumination syndrome. Whether or not some dick (WP:Dickhead?) has a college degree or is a physician means squat. I'm going to undue some damage tonight, I think there was useful information on some of those pages if I can't get back for a while don't let dickheads fuck it up. (Can I say fuck it up?)7mike5000 (talk) 03:24, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

You can rant all you want. Just don't mention names or point the finger at a specific editor and you aren't personally attacking a person, just an attitude. In all reality, nobodies profession matters on wikipedia. We're all anonymous internet users after all. Hope you come back with time :) Cheers, ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:31, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Just thought you would find this article I did interesting. Lepore syndrome. Check the history and the talk page.7mike5000 (talk) 08:29, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks good. I love how Doc's version was essentially "Lepore Syndrome is a syndrome caused by Lepore in your blood." - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 15:48, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

401 photos take 2

Ok, I'll leave it up to you then. I won't do anything more to the article photo related. These are the photos I've uploaded to the commons that don't have the dollar sign on them:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MC401.jpg (Real picture to replace the generic MC sign picture on the article)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Highway_401_Night_Lapse_Busy.jpg (Replace night lighting picture)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Busy_401.jpg (Could be useful but if its not use that's ok)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Highway_401_Busiest.jpg (Busiest spot on the 401. High res)

Feel free to do what you want with them. I highly recommend using the last one on this list because it shows the busiest stretch of highway in the entire world.

Other than that there needs to be a good picture of the widest spot on the highway in the article like this: http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/9599/highway401missqj6.jpg

And one for the Highway of Heroes section of people on the overpass like this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/christinamatheson/2930466020/

Hopefully these will help make the article better! A picture says 1000 words, and if we have a bunch of good, high quality images, those 1000 words will say good things!

Haljackey (talk) 04:50, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Will do. I'm trying to get a picture of the Highway of Heroes bridge ceremony (as well as this photo). Haven't had a good chance yet, and you never know ahead of time when it's going to happen (unless you watch the news for fallen soldiers). Cheers, ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 15:41, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

And by the way, don't feel as if though you can't contribute. I'm just being assholishly picky leading up to this nomination. I'm sure it'll get torn apart there. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 15:49, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Did a bit of work with the images and text. Feel free to change it though. I'll continue to watch the article over the next little bit.

Also, there's a couple cool HD videos of Highway 401's collector/express system in Toronto. They are also informative and educational and may be useful to link in the article somewhere. I'll leave that up to you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIMEg4PxRaA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-vLmdfuTNY

Haljackey (talk) 18:21, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

---

As for using too many photos, this is an article that will benefit considerably with a good collection of high quality images.

Photos should be placed along the route description where there is need to do so.

• Windsor to London: Highway begins, new concrete surface for a bit, then 4 lanes and boring. No photo for this stretch is needed except maybe one of that Labour Day Pileup in 1999. (Slideshow of images from the Windsor Fire department: http://www.windsorfire.com/ecom.asp?pg=history-major-incidents-401-incident-slideshow (not sure about copyrights of these)

• I'm discussing this with their legal department. Apparently nobody has claimed credit for them, and they do not own them. I was thinking of uploading them and seeing if it brings someone out of the woodwork.

• London to Woodstock: slightly more interesting. 6 lanes east of 402 with curves and hilly section. A photo of the route going straight through the Dorchester Swamp would be cool (that's the one that's currently in the article)
• Woodstock to Kitchener/Waterloo Region: Ongoing construction widening it to 6 lanes. Would be useful to include a construction photo somewhere in the article and this might be a good place for it.
• Kitchener to Mississauga: 6 lanes, curves, but boring for the most part. Decent through the Niagara Escarpment isn't worth a photo because its so gradual.
• Mississauga to Toronto: Route swells to 18 lanes by the airport, its widest point. Definitely worthy of a photo to show the scale and scope of the highway.
• Toronto area: Bottleneck between 427 and 409- could use a photo here of a gridlocked highway showing the need for improvement. 400-Weston is the busiest section of freeway in the world and includes the basketweave- that's worth a photo too. Allen-404 has a nice curve and warrants a photo- there are already 2 of them in the article (the nightlighting one and the closed one).

• As it is, there is one daytime congestion photo, one night time. I'm going to talk with some building superintendents near Weston/Albion and see if I can use their roof to get a nice photo of the whole 400/401 junction, splattered with congestion at 5:30pm. There isn't a good reason to include another of the C-E system, since to most they don't show anything too exciting beyond the first, so I'd like to find a replacement for the Basketweave shot that conveys the same information, plus more.

• Toronto to Oshawa:Collectors end and might be a good place to show bottlenecked traffic/congestion/gridlock. Highway is tight through Oshawa but old/historic photos show this too.

• I'm awaiting the start of construction here so I can get a photo of the widening from 6 to 12 lanes. Either in Whitby or in Mississauga.

• Oshawa to Kingston: Mostly Boring, no photo really needed.

• I was thinking of driving out and getting a photo near Cobourg where the shield comes out of the ground.

• Kingston to Quebec boarder: photo here could show the wide grass median and light traffic volumes past Highway 416. Provides good contrast to the monster in the Toronto area.

• I love the colours in the current Eastern photo. Really captures the crimson of August in Ontario.

Other photos

• MC-401 sign
• Highway of heroes billboard/sign
• One or two historic photos
• One construction photo might be good to include
• Maps (route and completion images are good)

• Trying to get dates on the sections east of Gananoque

• Hoggs hollow worth mentioning, not sure if photo is needed that badly because the actual bridges are nothing special

• Don't forget it's busier than the Brooklyn bridge

• Need to show bottleneck/congestion/gridlock at least once

• Thats just a matter of being in the right place at the right time. See above wrt taking a photo of the 400/401 junction

• Good overview of the collector/express lanes to go with the explanation of how the system works
• Completion plaque

• Iffy on this one. It's at the bottom of my "I care" list for the current photo's. Anything it says can also be said in the prose, providing an extra image location

• Other roads like the 2A and Middle road aren't really needed if there are other historic photos of the highway

• Completes the story. 2A was the 401 (and hasn't changed since it was in 1955), Middle Road is what led to the 401. I haven't been able to find any photos of the Toronto Bypass under construction, but the archives (whenever I get to them) should provide.

• Night shot in Toronto
• Service centre/service centre reconstruction

• Shouldn't be hard to find :p

• Air photo of a major interchange

• This is going to be a tough one. Not many air photos are freely released.

So that's around 15 images with 2 maps.

That's what I can think of. A good restructuring of the photos will significantly add to the article. What do you think? Haljackey (talk) 16:38, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

• Looks good. I'd like to weigh towards more historic photos, as they are unique and insightful. The modern day photos should show the extremes of the highway. The width, the traffic and the opposite in the rural areas near Brockville, then perhaps two or three also to show the contrast in terrain between the flat Essex area, hilly Dorchester swamp, and rocky Canadian Shield. One photo of a nice big reconstruction, a few photos of signs (do we need the MC shield since they aren't posting it anymore?), and a few photos for the extra details (COMPASS, service centres, night shot.

• Sure, go ahead and do what you want. We can always sort it out later after they are added and arranged. This is a type of article that requires a lot of photos since they highway is so long. Its also very diversified in its width, urban/rural setting, geography, volumes, etc and they are all worth noting.

Haljackey (talk) 18:06, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Exactly. You may wish to join WP:ONRD if this roadgeek interest extends in any form beyond the 401 (given all the highway stuff at sc4devotion, I'd assume you are into highways/interchanges in general). After the 401, I'm tackling the DVP (its at User:Floydian/Don Valley Parkway right now), then the 400, 404, and 402. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Po'buster

I replied on my talk page, but yes it's starting to look more and more like you could be right. Canterbury Tail talk 18:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Image move

Hey I just saw you moved the picture of Highway 401 in Eastern Ontario to the right. This is what it has done to my screen.

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/3003/clipboard01gb.png

That's why I moved it to the left side. I would recommend leaving it on the left.Haljackey (talk) 20:05, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The right aligned TOC is causing some issues, but it appears much different to me at 1024x768 (the more common resolution). I'm going to try and see if there's a technical way to get around this so the photos can still go back and forth from left to right... Because I'm not a big fan of them all being stacked on the left. I've got to take off for the day though, so I'm going to post the question to the village pump and work on it when I get home tonight. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:10, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't like all the images on one side either. Hopefully we can still get it to work with the TOC to the right. If not its not that big of a deal moving the TOC back to where it was.Haljackey (talk) 20:29, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

New section for Collector-Express lanes.

Here's what I was thinking: add a subsection for the collector-express system in the article. It would go right below the Greater Toronto Area section in the Route Description.

Here's a base of what I have so far. Will expand it if you agree to adding it in.

Collector-Express System

Main articles: Local-express lanes and Collector/distributor road

Bla Bla Bla. Describe the 401's system in some detail here. Its actually in two sections. A short spur from 403/410 to 427, and the main system from 409-brock road. Use some info from the "main articles" linked to briefly describe/explain how the system works, its strengths and weaknesses, etc. 401 at weston road photo can be used here to show the viewer the collector lanes in detail. An overview of the whole highway isn't required because there is one at the top of the article and the express lanes act like any standard highway moreorless.

Haljackey (talk) 00:44, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

This seems like it might be the best way to divide the wealth of knowledge. A sub-sub-header (with 4 = ) would allow it to be part of the GTA subsection, rather than as its own. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:59, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

All right, I'll start the creation of the subsection. Shall I add it into the main article or post it here first? Haljackey (talk) 02:05, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Do it at Talk:Ontario Highway 401/sandbox so that it can be polished off before being put into the article. It needs to flow with the article in context as well. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:28, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok it's there now. I also included the Greater Toronto Area section because some stuff is repeated in the collector-express subsection. I have chopped part of that out of the GTA section. Have a look and feel free to make any edits to it you wish. Is it too long? Check the sources too, I took a couple from other articles but they're basically a couple links from Google Maps. Could you look into that?

I hope you like it! Haljackey (talk) 03:47, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

More Photos, Commons Link Problems and Other Stuff

Ok, I have now uploaded some more photos of the 401 to the commons, including a good picture showing gridlock/congestion (due to the discontinuation of collector lanes near Brock Road).

Here are the links to the new images. I've learned about the copyright stuff now, and these should all be fair game.

• 12 lane, 3x3x3x3 cross section: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_3x3x3x3.jpg
• Changable message sign: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Changable_message_sign.jpg
• Good view of both green and blue signs: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Green_and_Blue_signs.jpg
• Gridlock: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Gridlock.jpg
• Tight route through Oshawa: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Oshawa.jpg
• Speeding warning sign: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Speed_Sign.jpg
• Big curve sign: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_curve_ahead.jpg

Hope they are of good use to you!

Also, I noticed that the commons link in the 401 article didn't go anywhere. I fixed that up a bit but it needs more attention. Can you look at it when you get a chance? Thanks!

I'll check out the DVP link, but I don't know too much about the route (I haven't even driven on it lol!)

And yes that's me from Simtrop/SC4D who made the GTR and other highway stuff.

I don't know if I'll be contributing much on other articles so I'll put off joining that group at least for now.

Also, are those videos good to include? (Mentioned in 401 photos take 2) Haljackey (talk) 19:03, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I like the picture with the blue and green signs. Maybe cropping it to the sings themself, and making it a long and short image that crosses the page?

Haven't had an ample opportunity to watch the videos just yet, but I'll let you know in a day or two. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:38, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good. Do you like the gridlock picture too? I do. Do you feel this article is ready to go from a B class to GA or A? Haljackey (talk) 23:47, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I like both the gridlocked pictures, as well as those desolate empty highway shots. I've skipped GA, as it most likely would be a one month wait and automatic pass. It's at A-class review in the US Road Wikiproject (WP:USRD/ACR). Once I get citations in the Route description, it should be about ready for FA (minus my terrible grammar). - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:43, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I have acquired a photograph of the 18 lane section of the 401, it's widest point. Although this photo is taken on the ground level rather than a overpass, its a start and it's quality is good. I didn't add it into the article because I'm not really sure where it should fit. The photo is on the commons and the author is fine with having his image on Wikipedia. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_widest_point.jpg (EDIT: I found a spot for it to go) Haljackey (talk) 04:10, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

• A high quality image of Highway 401's collector lanes at Weston road is here (also from the same author who recently gave me the photo to upload): http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hghway_401_Collectors_at_Weston_Road.jpg
• Also I wanted to let you know that the old 400/401 interchange photograph is nominated for deletion.

Haljackey (talk) 16:32, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I like the Weston photo instead of the Pickering photo to show the cross-section. I know the 400/401 image is going. Some Mickey Mouse copyright act that makes it public domain in Canada, but copyright in the states. I'll reupload it as a fair use image.

Careful in some of the details you add. With such a massive topic as the 401, we have to be comprehensive, but not distracting. The Air France stuff was a major event in the history of Pearson, Air France, and Etobicoke Creek, but rather minor in the thousands of incidents that have plagued the 401 since it opened (I read one about 4 nuns dying - Too much junk in the trunk, literally!).

I want to get down to Pearson and get a photo of the wide spot from an overpass. The ground level shots from a car show too much tall wall.

Also, I watched those two videos. The first one is good for its full overview of the one stretch of c/e system, and I think deserves an external link. I like the HD of the second one, but it cuts it all apart, and it almost appears digital because of the epic camera movements. If it was like the first but in HD, that would have taken the cake. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 16:53, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

The Weston Road photo provides a good overview of the collector lanes but not the whole collector-express system. What would be best is an overhead shot showing the 4 carriageways in detail, but until we have one of those, the Brock Road photo shows an overview of the system better than Weston Road, at least in my opinion it does.

• Maybe creating a section in the article dedicated to the collector-express system would be best? That way you could break up the rather lengthy GTA section in the route description.
• Ok, I'll run new additions to the article by you first before it goes in.
• Glad you liked the videos! They are both HD, but the first one is sped up a lot more than the second, yet both contain facts and good overviews. An external link for one or both of them would be good with me.

If you need more photos, the author of the Weston and 18 lane section photos provided me with a detailed album of 401 photos from last summer. Here are the thumbnails:

• http://www.speedcam.co.uk/d70/401thumb1.jpg
• http://www.speedcam.co.uk/d70/401thumb2.jpg
• http://www.speedcam.co.uk/d70/401thumb3.jpg
• http://www.speedcam.co.uk/d70/401thumb4.jpg

If you would like some more of these photos to be added to the Commons, let me know the name/number of the photo and I'll ask him to send me the full versions. Some are blurry full size, but some are also very good quality. Haljackey (talk) 17:50, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

He'll need to fill this out and email it to the otrs address to give his permission to use images on his website. I'm trying something on the article btw: Floating the TOC below the infobox. Will see if that helps things. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 17:55, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok I sent him that link. I like the new layout too! Found a spot for the Weston Road image. Won't edit again until you're finished what you're doing.Haljackey (talk) 18:10, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm done for right now. Going to my parents for the evening. All I was saying is to post your plans when they're big changes. Rearranging a photo here and there is fine, and I revert it when I disagree (and other may do the same to me), it's just adding or removing big sections that should be approached with caution. The article as it was before was crap, and I don't want it to slip back to that. I explain the Toronto-Hamilton Highway and Middle Road (which will have their own detailed articles soon) because it was instrumental in the political progression towards freeways. On top of that, Ontario led North America in the design of the freeway, so it makes an interesting read to go back a bit before the actual construction of 2A. The picture of 2A is important, because that is the 401 from 1947, untouched (essentially), with the same median and shoulders that it has had since. It was never 'Highway 401', but it was the first piece of what would become it. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 18:54, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough. I've also added a image near Hurontario Street in the commons. Might be useful in describing the construction that's going on there. It's a pre-construction photo. Haljackey (talk) 19:06, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok, he filled out that form and the two images I used from him now have that ORTS attribution. Let me know if theirs other photos in the those thumbnail links that you would like to have. (3 of them show blue/green signs.. could have more detail than the one we cropped. I've asked him for one of those.) Haljackey (talk) 19:55, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Winter Driving

I think we need to talk more about winter conditions and whatnot in the 401 article. Perhaps having a photo of the 401 in a snowstorm may be good too.

I have a picture of the 401 in winter on my hard drive, but sadly I'm not totally sure where it came from. I think its from a desktop background site, open and free to download, so it may be fine to use. Here it is: http://img718.imageshack.us/img718/4029/23208136036624e24209o.jpg

EDIT: I found one that's fine to use, but the quality isn't very good. In addition, it is in a similar spot where the collector picture is. I uploaded it to the commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:401_Winter_driving.jpg

Haljackey (talk) 19:52, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't think there's anything spectacularly different between winter driving on the 401, and winter driving on any other highway. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:21, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

I guess you're right. Still, I think it's interesting how all those snowplows join a formation to clear the 401 in one swift stroke. :P Haljackey (talk) 20:24, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, that would definitely be worth a picture! Wasn't exactly an opportunity to this winter, but if nothing free is kicking around I'll definitely aim to get one next winter. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:29, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Also, the discussion at the village pump]] ended up focusing on right aligned TOCs being a bad thing. After some fiddling and violining, I think I've struck a balance using the left aligned TOC. The collector express picture near the top may need to be integrated into this new section to make everything pretty. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 20:49, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok, sounds good. The collector / express section is just about ready to go too (just need to cite that 10-12 lane longest in the world thing and whatnot). I also mentioned above that the guy I got those images from filled out that form and now have that ORTS attribution. Let me know if there's other photos in the those thumbnail links that you would like to have. (3 of them show blue/green signs.. could have more detail than the one we cropped. I've asked him for one of those.)

I won't be on for the rest of the day but go ahead and move the collector / express section the article when you think its ready. Haljackey (talk) 20:54, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Pic2505 looks best. Can he convert them to png (I've never heard of a .nef file)? Also, we still need more citations (lots more), but its at about the same level as the rest of the route description. I should have it merged by the end of the night. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 01:28, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

I asked for the best image between 2503-2505 as some come out blurry or whatnot. If they all come crystal clear, 2505 would be the best one for sure! I'll let you know when I get a reply. Haljackey (talk) 05:36, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

If you need to get in contact with me, my MSN is haljackey@hotmail.com, just so you know :P Haljackey (talk) 15:35, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Ok the new photo is here. I uploaded it and a cropped version to the commons and replaced the image in the sandbox article with it. Feel free to edit the cropped image with an external application like photoshop to make it look better. 18:49, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Kawartha Lakes

The standard for inclusion of an unincorporated community in Wikipedia is not "it exists"; it's "the article is properly referenced to reliable sources". An unreferenced topic may be redirected or deleted at any time; the fact that the place exists does not confer an entitlement to be kept permanently without proper referencing.

You always have the freedom to create proper new articles about the communities any time you want; but they must include real references, and cannot be just abandoned in the state they were in before I redirected them. Bearcat (talk) 03:17, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, and those redirects can be undone at anytime. WP:BRD applies here, just the same as anywhere else. I could quickly and easily reference ALL of these articles to:

1. A mapbook
2. The Canadian Topographical Atlas (including elevations)
3. Canadian Postmasters Database
4. History of Victoria County

Just like at afd, the process means searching for sources before deleting, not deleting because you can't be bothered to look up sources and feel this is a quicker form of maintenance. Several of these communities were also incorporated places. These are not biographies. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:22, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Firstly, mapbooks, topographical atlases and the postmasters database are not valid references to prove a place's notability; they only demonstrate a place's existence, and do not count toward WP:N at all. Existence does not automatically equal notability in the absence of sources that actually meet WP:RS. The "history of Victoria County" may be a valid source, if that's a published work, but it still has to actually be cited in the article.

Secondly, redirection is not deletion, and is not subject to the same level of standards; any article can be redirected at any time, by anybody, with no process that needs to be followed first. And the rule that articles need to be properly referenced applies to all articles, not just BLPs; the only difference with BLPs is that they can be deleted if the references don't show up.

And finally if you want the articles to stand independently, then the onus to add real references is on you. It's not my job to hunt them down; if you want the article kept, then it's your job to make the article keepable. Bearcat (talk) 03:29, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Places are inherently notable. Not because they are places, and not because wikipedia determines places to be notable, but because if a place exists, it has a notable history and a reason for its existence. Every community in the world has a tale to tell. If you tried to afd these articles, you'd fail.

But if your idea of improvement to the encyclopedia is lazy backtracking, then I'll just have to be your custodian. Have fun! - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:39, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

"Inherently notable" does not mean that the place is entitled to a permanently unreferenced stub; it means that a place is a valid potential article topic if proper references are provided. It isn't an exemption from WP:RS and doesn't mean that a poor-quality article still has to be kept; it just means you can write an article about the topic if references are available.

Kindly also note that (a) I didn't redirect any place that had any valid references in the article at all, even just one, and (b) I fully intended, and still do, to provide a proposal at Talk:Kawartha Lakes for a better way to handle communities within Kawartha Lakes instead of having sixty different unreferenced and unreferenceable stubs. But I need the chance to actually do that. Bearcat (talk) 03:48, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Generally you should do that before acting, especially for such a big net loss of information such as this. I've been focusing on highways at the moment, but I intend to reference and write all 60 places local histories. I think it is a loss to toss away even the simple geographic information, so that when somebody hears about Boonies, Ontario, they can find out where it is at the very least. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 03:54, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

If you think that redirecting Community X to City Y is somehow losing geographic information compared to giving Community X an independent article that says absolutely nothing except that it's part of City Y, then you're clearly not using the word "loss" the same way most English speakers do. No geographic information disappeared; in fact, in some cases the redirect resulted in more geographic information being made available to the reader, because the redirect target had more of that in it than the stub did. And there's not a single article where it resulted in less geographic information; the only thing we lost, in some cases, was unreferenced trivia that we don't want anyway, such as where the gas station is in relation to the corner store. But I digress. Bearcat (talk) 04:23, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

And besides, a separate article can always be reinstated when real references are added. That's one reason that I redirect instead of deleting; it means that the edit history is still available. You'll never see me delete (or even try to delete) an article about a place whose existence can be verified. If the article isn't properly referenced, I'll redirect it to its parent topic. But that isn't the same thing as deleting it, because the information can still be retrieved and rescued quite easily. I've never deleted an article about a community unless it (a) was verifiably a hoax, or (b) contained WP:BLP violations. If you've got good references, then yeah, by all means, work on the articles — a redirect doesn't prevent you from doing that. But they're just not entitled to stand alone in perpetuity if they aren't getting worked on, that's all. Bearcat (talk) 05:26, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

New subsections- Future Projects

I was thinking of creating subsections for the future projects along Highway 401 for specific cities. The southwest/central/eastern sections will remain with Windsor/London/Waterloo Region/GTA/Oshawa/Kingston areas being subsections.

That way we can go into detail explaining what work is proposed/upcoming to take place in specific cities.

I have sort of started it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Ontario_Highway_401/sandbox

What do you think? Should I go into more detail or scrap it? (I'll need help on this one) Haljackey (talk) 18:50, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Galaxy Quest

Galaxy Quest couldn't -be- more about redshirts if it tried. But as always, an outside ref helps. Lots42 (talk) 19:54, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Don Valley Parkway

There is no reason to 'take your marbles home'. While you might like the article to go 'your way', this is Wikipedia. Any article you write in your sandbox, will still get read and criticized. I've worked on the Gardiner Expressway and Spadina Expressway articles as well as the Cancelled expressways in Toronto article. I am knowledgeable about the DVP. I also drive on it every day. ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 15:07, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Then you should know even before I finish and put all the sources in that the congestion every day ends at the top of those hills in both directions. It's not a coincidence, they are the root cause of the backup on the dvp. There is a second bottleneck coming south at the 401. That aside, take one look at the old article. It is entirely bogus and unsourced. Can you at the very least give me a few days to finish without picking out unsourced statements? Do you have books on the topic at all (driving on it is not a source)?

Also, the lead shouldn't contain unique information. I haven't rewritten the lead yet, so please don't rearrange something from the route description to the lead (If you check out Highway 401, I did the same thing there with the Route Description).

Finally, the route description is more than a literal interpretation of that. It should contain what doesn't logically fit in the History or Future section, ie. landmarks, number of lanes, congestion areas, traffic management systems, etc.

It's not about 'taking my marbles home', it's more akin to quitting the game to go get more practise before returning. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 15:15, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I can recognize opinions and unsupported theories. It's not about what -you- think, it's not an essay. The parking lot nickname is fine in the lead. It just has to be cited. I'm sorry about interrupting your plans. ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 15:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You clearly can't listen, so I'll stick to my sandbox. It is cited - In the route description, where it will stay since the lead should not have unique information. The lead meanwhile will be rewritten after the rest of the article. - ??o??ia? ^t _¢ 21:11, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You reverted all my edits

Floydian: If you have a better infobox for streets, then I'm all for it. But you reverted all my edits yesterday in adding that infobox to the St. Clair Avenue article, so I've reverted your destructive changes. (I assume it was accidentally.)A.Roz (talk) 15:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing that. A.Roz (talk) 16:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)