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Anybody want to work on Wikipedia?

Started by Scott5114, December 31, 2009, 07:24:33 AM

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Bickendan

Might be simpler for one of us to start a wiki site about highways.


SSOWorld

Why - when we all have sites already? well, most of us :-D
Scott O.

Not all who wander are lost...
Ah, the open skies, wind at my back, warm sun on my... wait, where the hell am I?!
As a matter of fact, I do own the road.
Raise your what?

Wisconsin - out-multiplexing your state since 1918.

hbelkins

Quote from: agentsteel53 on January 01, 2010, 09:52:07 PM

by the way, give me some money, everyone.  I will buy vodka with it.  Vodka is good [citation required].

Unless and until you spill vodka on your Snuggie, and you end up drunk and smelling like Russia.


Government would be tolerable if not for politicians and bureaucrats.

Morriswa

I am a beginner-of-sorts on USRD.  I've been on Wikipedia since at least 2006.  I want to help out as much as possible.

My main areas of focus is Interstate highways, U.S. highways, and state routes (especially Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina).

US71

I suppose I need to go back and see how forked-up the Arkansas Highways pages are these days.  :whip:
Like Alice I Try To Believe Three Impossible Things Before Breakfast

mcdonaat

Quote from: US71 on April 26, 2012, 05:24:27 PM
I suppose I need to go back and see how forked-up the Arkansas Highways pages are these days.  :whip:
The pages aren't that bad... I have added a good number of Louisiana highways (got tired of adding, so I'm revamping the pages to conform them to the rest of the articles), and two or three Arkansas highways, mostly in Southeastern AR.

Mdcastle

I did some work on Wikipedia a few years ago but haven't lately. With the whole thing about citing sources it was too much like writing a research paper for me.

sr641

I've edited several pages about roads on wikipedia trying to improve the sight. Wiki haas really good facts but they also have alot of made up ones too.
Isaac

Scott5114

Quote from: sr641 on May 09, 2012, 07:48:11 PM
I've edited several pages about roads on wikipedia trying to improve the sight. Wiki haas really good facts but they also have alot of made up ones too.

The quality of Wikipedia's vision is, itself, a made up fact.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

national highway 1

I've noticed recently that the info boxes and expandable boxes in Wikipedia articles on Interstates, US Routes and State Highways are now FHWA green. Whose idea was that? I quite like it like that, much better than the default pale blue color. Also a fan of the FHWA yellow highlights for major interstates / US Routes
"Set up road signs; put up guideposts. Take note of the highway, the road that you take." Jeremiah 31:21

bulldog1979

#35
Quote from: national highway 1 on July 08, 2012, 11:56:24 PM
I've noticed recently that the info boxes and expandable boxes in Wikipedia articles on Interstates, US Routes and State Highways are now FHWA green. Whose idea was that? I quite like it like that, much better than the default pale blue color. Also a fan of the FHWA yellow highlights for major interstates / US Routes
That would be my doing in both cases. We had used a different shade of green at one point, but I had it changed to MUTCD green. You'll also notice that the color in the infoboxes on former highways is a gray, under construction is a paler orange (MUTCD orange is way too bright for that application)., and various scenic or historic highways have the brown and white as well. Canada uses MUTCD blue for freeways, the UK uses motorway blue, A road green and yellow or black and white as appropriate. Each country can have its own color scheme in the infobox very easily. The pale blue remains a default for any country that hasn't had its schemes implemented or customized.

I'm slowly converting the various navigation boxes to MUTCD green, and I put the MUTCD yellow in on the Interstates/US Highways navbox as well. I'm happy to hear that someone noticed and likes the changes!

Let me clarify that I'm not solely responsible for all of these as others have contributed in various ways.

US-175

((sorry about the blast from the past/dust bin....))

I have been working for a little while on the US 175 Wikipedia, which has sorely needed some help.  I would add topical photos of various kinds if I could, but I'm in-between cars (and jobs) right now.  There are a few "ref"s needed, but I could get them with visits to 2 or 3 libraries.  Otherwise, I have found many sources so the dreaded top banner of you-know-what shouldn't rear its ugly head, I don't think.

So, would there be anyone who wikis or webmasters that would give the article a once-over (without too many volleys of eggs and tomatoes, please)?

(As with any site, it's not 'done' yet, of course.)

rschen7754

At a quick glance the biggest issue is indeed the sourcing. http://texaspopculture.blogspot.com/2013/03/route-66-detour.html wouldn't be considered a reliable source under Wikipedia rules.

The detail for the Route description section is a bit on the high side - I would suggest removing the speed limits and some of the minor details. External links generally aren't integrated into the main text of the article. I would integrate the "Notable people" section into the rest of the history, and perhaps cut down on some of the details.

If you get the sourcing issues resolved, it could easily be a Good Article candidate.

US-175

Quote from: rschen7754 on March 28, 2017, 09:40:32 PM
At a quick glance the biggest issue is indeed the sourcing. http://texaspopculture.blogspot.com/2013/03/route-66-detour.html wouldn't be considered a reliable source under Wikipedia rules.

The detail for the Route description section is a bit on the high side - I would suggest removing the speed limits and some of the minor details. External links generally aren't integrated into the main text of the article. I would integrate the "Notable people" section into the rest of the history, and perhaps cut down on some of the details.

If you get the sourcing issues resolved, it could easily be a Good Article candidate.

Thanks for the overview and genuine opinion.  I guess my bias shows in some of the passages :D .  Since I've had so much to do with the whole highway over the years, I guess the descriptiveness was just me trying to give the grand tour in words, so to speak.  I know I can source at least some of the remaining parts when I would be able to come upon at least 2 or 3 libraries.  I was kinda torn on the notables, should I tell more about them (since none of them have their own Wikipedia articles), or just leave it at their ties to the highway.  The Route 66 filming in Crandall has precious little referencing it in the web so I guess I was kind of excited to see the blog posting.  One thing besides the sources that is undone is the mileages on the exits-intersections chart.  I'm afraid the TxDOT number of 111 miles for the whole highway is a bit off, but with no mile markers, there really isn't any good way to measure (from an amateur's viewpoint) what the real distance, between towns as well as all together, is.  I would like to do more on the history (I know there is more to do, like where the 'old roads' are, how some proponents in the past wanted the highway to extend further (in both directions), as well as other topics), but that's more far-off library visits and otherwise more unsourced passages.  I guess the only reason there would be links in the article was because the subjects don't have their own Wikipedia articles, but I can do a search again or retype them unlinked if it comes to it.  One thing I ran across a while back is that the US 175 article is on Wikipedia's list of needing a better infobox map.  I'm not sure how well I'd be able to draw one for the infobox.  I think the entry meant that a closer-scale version of the highway on a map would be a good addition.

So, 'Good Article', maybe eventually.  I know it's better now than it was, though.

tribar

I fix inaccurate info when I see it but I don't heavily edit any pages as Wikipedia can be a pain in the ass to edit.

jeffandnicole

When it comes to roads and highways, much of the Wikipedia info is incorrect or out of date.

That's not to say it's the fault of anyone on here.  Often times, it could be people that don't really know what they're talking about editing the stuff.  Or info was updated 5 years or more ago, but just was never improved upon.

jp the roadgeek

I actually did some updates to many of the CT pages and corrected the mileposts based on the CT route logs, even doing the math for "virtual" mileposts for routes embedded within a long concurrency (ie US 6 through Hartford and US 5 along the Berlin Turnpike).  Also spruced up the descriptions a bit for roads that I'm familiar with. 
Interstates I've clinched: 97, 290 (MA), 291 (CT), 291 (MA), 293, 295 (DE-NJ-PA), 295 (RI-MA), 384, 391, 395 (CT-MA), 395 (MD), 495 (DE), 610 (LA), 684, 691, 695 (MD), 695 (NY), 795 (MD)

paulthemapguy

I might jump in to add some data here and there.  When I was in college I took a class where they required me to write a wikipedia article from scratch, so I decided to make one about Orchard Road in Kane/Kendall Counties (IL).  The teacher said the topic was perhaps too parochial, to which I would agree...but anything worth writing an article about already has one!!

I noticed that the page for the Missouri state highways list features a table full of blank spaces for information that ought to be pretty easy to fetch.  It's a whole slew of spots just waiting to be filled with information:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_highways_in_Missouri
Avatar is the last interesting highway I clinched.
My website! http://www.paulacrossamerica.com Now featuring all of Ohio!
My USA Shield Gallery https://flic.kr/s/aHsmHwJRZk
TM Clinches https://bit.ly/2UwRs4O

National collection status: 361/425. Only 64 route markers remain

US71

I pop in occasionally, but the formatting drives me buggy.
Like Alice I Try To Believe Three Impossible Things Before Breakfast

formulanone

#44
Quote from: jeffandnicole on March 29, 2017, 12:08:51 PM
When it comes to roads and highways, much of the Wikipedia info is incorrect or out of date.

That's not to say it's the fault of anyone on here.  Often times, it could be people that don't really know what they're talking about editing the stuff.  Or info was updated 5 years or more ago, but just was never improved upon.

It's a daunting task; just out of the 50 states alone, there must be at least 10,000 pages, once State, US, Interstate Routes, Future, Canceled, Proposed, and other roads of importance are counted.

While some pages have far too much "turn-by-turn" information, and some with almost nothing, there's many others that are consistent, useful, and include interwiki-links.

Like real road work, it will naturally never be fully completed nor perfect...

rschen7754

It is about 12,000 pages IIRC.

It depends on where you look. States like Michigan and Delaware are bound to be in pretty good quality. Less "popular" states (especially ones in the South or northern Midwest) may have articles entirely missing. And don't get me started on Puerto Rico.

California needs a thorough update with all the relinquishments and realignments. Most of the San Diego articles are in fairly good shape but outside that, the quality goes downhill. It's one of the most difficult states (besides maybe Texas) and I'm only somewhat active so we'll see what happens I guess.

Scott5114

That's another interesting wrinkle–some states are "easier" than others. In some states, the DOT happily provides public changelogs with the exact date of every extension, realignment, and truncation. In others, you might get PDFs of each year's state map. Some don't provide anything useful and you have to rely on things like Gousha maps.

You can try contacting the DOT directly, and will get varying results that way too. I've gotten the whole gamut. Oklahoma DOT ignores their email. Missouri DOT gave me a phone call and sent over some internal maps that weren't posted anywhere on their site. The Kansas Turnpike Authority not only answered all of my questions, but edited the article for me to include some stuff I didn't have in there.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

mccunicano

I actually re-found this forum through my Wikipedia editing of road articles. It's really hard to get sources for the Japanese road articles I've been working on, but it's a fun challenge.

US 89

Every so often I get a desire to go work on Wikipedia's highway articles in the inland west region, but I find the environment over there tends to be pretty nit-picky on small details which can be annoying sometimes. The lack of allowance for "original research" can also be frustrating especially when it's a logical conclusion I can draw myself from available sources -- like I probably can't put "This route most likely ran along X Road".

That said, I will fix any errors on sight if I happen to notice them.

US71

I used to contribute a lot to a wiki for the SCA, but like wikipedia I got frustrated & discouraged.
Like Alice I Try To Believe Three Impossible Things Before Breakfast



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