Wikipedia:WikiProject Highways/Assessment/A-Class Review/Colorado State Highway 74
- The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Not promote - stale. --Rschen7754 02:02, 13 March 2012 (UTC) [reply]
Colorado State Highway 74[edit]
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Colorado State Highway 74 (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) review
- Suggestion: Promote to A-Class
- Nominator's comments: After my first successful GAN, I almost completely rewrote this article. I intend to someday (if ever) bring this article to FAC.
- Nominated by: — PCB 07:57, 29 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- First comment occurred: 23:26, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
Comments from Imzadi1979[edit]
I have several issues that need to be resolved before this article can be promoted, especially if anyone intends to take this to WP:FAC at some point.
- Basics
- Taking care of the basics first, the redirects and stuff are good. The photos are all appropriately licensed.
- You might want to update some of the links since they're coming up as redirects on the websites. That could mean that CDOT has reorganized their site.
- Look at the comments the Peer Reviewer tool gives you; some of them are duplicated below, but you might want to look at what it says about redundancies in the prose.
- I think the ALT text needs work to comply with current guidelines. What is the purpose of including the image? That's the question the ALT text needs to answer, not "what does the image look like?"
- The references are all to reliable sources, so the article is good on that account. (I have comments below on formatting issues, but that's secondary.)
- Lead—concerning the prose in the lead, I have the following issues:
- "northwest-southeast" en dash (–) here please.
- What is a "wider segment"? I think you meant that roadway is wider than other sections.
- "The route, which is on the outskirts of Denver, passses through several of Denver's mountain parks, including Bergen Park, Dedisse Park and Red Rocks Park." How about: "The route, which is on the outskirts of Denver, passes through several of the city's/area's mountain parks, including Bergen, Dedisse and Red Rocks parks." (Pick either "city's" or "area's" as appropriate. If the parks aren't owned by or in the city, use area.) You have repetition issues in the prose that inhibit flow here.
- Is the roadway just eligible for the NRHP, or is it listed on the NRHP? According to the body of the article, it's listed.
- "with a 4–6 lane roadway," should be "with a four- to six-lane roadway," since round numbers under 10 should be spelled out, and the numbers are part of a compound adjective.
- "Other sites along Bear Creek, such as a Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp in Red Rocks Park, make the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive, as the section between Idledale and Morrison is called, have given the route a listing on the National Register of Historic Places." A recent change to the article is problematic. You have two verbs in the sentence, which when you drop some details reads as "Other sites along Bear Creek ... make the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive ... have given the route a listing on the National Register of Historic Places."
- Reworded.
- "Newer improvements to the road include widening Evergreen Parkway segment to four lanes and constructing an interchange with the I-70." I think the the needs to be in front of the Evergreen Parkway and not in front of I-70.
- Infobox
- Map notes?
- The map_alt needs to be changed; this is where you'd mention what the map is trying to tell the reader in case they can't see it. ALT text shouldn't duplicate the caption because a screen reader will list both the ALT and the caption.
- I tried my best to use alt text, but it might not be the highest quality.
- Why isn't any history listed in the infobox, a designation date for instance?
- Why isn't the county listed in
|counties=
so that the location shows in the box? - De-link the second El Rancho. It's overlinking, and with that as a redlink, it stands out all the more.
- Route description
- Can you start the first sentence of the first paragraph with SH 74. I'm lost about what you're trying to say from the get-go here. The opening of the section doesn't seem to have any connection to SH 74, which is the subject of the article, isn't it?
- Hmm... US 40's first mention in the text doesn't have a link, nor the full name. Remember, not all of our readers know that US 40=U.S. Route 40/U.S. Highway 40.
- You can clean up how the first set of speed limits reads by combining the templates together: "from 40 miles per hour (64 km/h) to {{convert|50|mph}" becomes "from 40 to 50 miles per hour (64 to 80 km/h)" by using
{{convert|40|to|50|mph}}
. - On the topic of speed limits, I think it's safe to override the template to abbreviate the units using
|abbr=on
. You might do that on the second and subsequent mentions, or all of them. - Since more than one county road is mentioned, why not abbreviate it after the first mention and use "(CR 32)" after the first one.
- "the east side of the parkway becomes Buchanan Park, where several ponds are located." The parkway becomes the park? I think you mean that after that point, the road follows the edge of the park.
- "Entering Dedisse Park, Evergreen Parkway enters the town of Evergreen, passing by Evergreen Lake along the Bear Creek." Another badly constructed, and potentially confusing sentence. Also, you have repetition of the word/name "Evergreen", so it would be nice to break that up as much as possible. As an example, Iron River, Michigan, is on the Iron River, so I'll use constructions like "city of the same name" or "namesake waterway" in my writing to avoid duplication.
- "SH 74 then curves eastward and northward as it winds out of town and enters a mountainous area, now known as Bear Creek Road." The mountainous area is known as as Bear Creek Road?
- "In Kittredge, the route meets CR 120, Myers Gulch Road, .... " Ok you've used the abbreviation, but since the convention was introduced in the preceding paragraph, this would confuse a reader not familiar with roads. Second, but we normally put road names like "Myers Gulch Road" in parenthesis in cases like this.
- "which is a measure of traffic volume for any average day of the year." Look at how the same sentence in U.S. Route 131 got reworded at its FAC. While you've copied some of my style here, it might help to copy a better version.
- "In 2009, CDOT calculated that as few as 3,200 vehicles used SH 74 daily near Idledale, and as many as 23,000 vehicles used SH 74 near the interchange with I-70 as well in Evergreen." I hope that you've used nonbreaking spaces ( ) between the numbers and the units ("vehicles" in this case) and the "SH" and the "74". Second, but you've repeated the designation when a substitute like "the highway" would be better.
- "No part of the route is listed on the National Highway System, a system of roads that are important to the nation's economy, defense, and mobility.[15][5]" you should move the NHS map citation to fall after the link to the NHS article. Second, you need a citation for the explanation since you're copying verbatim wording from a public domain source. See U.S. Route 2 in Michigan, et al, for the citation for the explanation. (Since it's PD text, and short, you don't need quotation marks, as discussed in US 2's ACR.) Last, but your footnotes are out of numerical order, but really, the NHS map can be used alone without a second citation. (This isn't controversial information, and it isn't something that requires two citations like the before-and-after map citation technique we use in a lot of history sections.)
- "meeting an intersection US 40 (Swede Gulch Road)." you're missing a with in front of US 40.
- " County Road 23 (CR 23), known as Kerr Gulch Road." would be better as " County Road 23 (CR 23, Kerr Gulch Road)." You have the parenthetical there, so why have a comma-based appositive as well?
- "which heads southwest" southwestward or southwesterly would be better. I would also alternate between the -ward and -ly forms for variety.
- "before traveling along the west side of Buchanan Park, where several ponds are located." That just reads awkwardly to me. Since the ponds are kind of less than important, I'd just drop the mention of them.
- "The west side of SH 74 becomes Elk Meadow Open Space Park," again,becomes isn't the best verb choice here. "The west side of SH 74 follows Elk Meadow Open Space Park," is better.
- "milepost five." Does CDOT post mileposts along this roadway? If not, you shouldn't mention them. I did mention them in the M-185 article, but the MISPC does erect milepost signs.
- "Here, it intersects CR 74, ..." what's the it here? How about "the roadway" or "the highway" instead if you mean SH 84, or "the creek" if you mean Bear Creek.
- " eastward and northward" can be converted to "east- and northward" to eliminate the repetition if desired.
- "which is a measure the average daily traffic volume on a particular road." it's a measure of the average, right?
- History
- Check to make sure there aren't spaces between punctuation and the footnotes. FN 18 at the end of the third sentence has one. There's also one between FN 24 and 25 further down the section.
- "SH 74 passes through many of Denver's mountain parks, including Bergen Park and Dedisse Park." Two things, but you haven't established at this point that the roadway is SH 74 at this stage of the history. Second, you can reword the ending as "Bergen and Dedisse parks" to remove the duplicate word.
- I was trying to refer to the point that it currently passes through the mountain parks. Should the transition be removed? — PCB 04:41, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- I would drop the SH 74 mention in favor of a generic "roadway" or "highway" reference, but you still have the issue of the repetition at the end of the sentence. Maybe you should call it the Bear Creek Scenic Mountain Drive instead of SH 74, in light of the fact that the roadway carried the SH 25 designation at a later point before it was SH 74.
- I was trying to refer to the point that it currently passes through the mountain parks. Should the transition be removed? — PCB 04:41, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- "Bear Creek, along which the roadway runs along, was stocked with trout.[23]" Why is this even relevant to SH 74's history?
- "State Highway 27, as the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive was designated until 1923, when the number was switched to 74, ...." A couple issues. First, why isn't SH 27 abbreviated? Second, you're jumping ahead of yourself here by talking about the redesignation in 1923. Just use "SH 27, as the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive was known at the time, ...."
- "... known as the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.[2][28][29]" Why three citations? FAC reviewers tend to look on things with suspicion if the sentence has this many citations tacked on the end, unless it's the "before-and-after" map citation technique we use from time to time. Also, this contradicts what you wrote in the lead, as I noted above.
- "The dam, finished three years after the flood, created Evergreen Lake, may have contributed to increases in tourism in the nearby city with the same name.[23] The bit about the tourism increases isn't really relevant to the article. This whole paragraph could be condensed just a little so that it focuses on the flooding, its impact to the roadway, and the solution.
- "From 1923 through the early 1930s, SH 74's designation was from Echo Lake at what is now an intersection between SH 103 and SH 5 east along Squaw Pass Road to Bergen Park." You could recast this slightly to eliminate the possessive, since we're talking about "the SH 74 designation" and what roads it followed.
- Can you find out when the roadway was designated SH 27, and when it was redesignated SH 74? That transition from BCSMD to SH&nbs;74 to SH 74 needs to be clarified.
- "In one of the parks, Red Rocks Park ..." You're repeating "park", can you change the first word to something else, or just drop it to "In Red Rocks Park, ..."
- When was the road and camp added to the NRHP?
- "current ending point in Morrison." The word terminus is better than "ending point", since in a sense, these roads don't have a set beginning and ending per se.
- Major intersections
- How about converting the table to templates?
- How about listing the CRs the are mentioned in the prose?
- How about adding I-70/US 40's exit number instead of just "interchange"?
- See also—this would be a good section to add with portal links.
- Since the link that you added should actually redirect into this article, you should switch {{portal box}} for {{portal-inline}}.
- References
- You're missing publishers on all of the CDOT sources because you've elected to use CDOT as the author. I would recommend using "Staff" for the author and moving CDOT to the publisher field. If you can find a specific office, division, region, etc., that created the source, use that as the author.
- It's also a good idea to include what the section name of the CDOT website as the "work" for an online source. You can also use {{cite report}} for reports instead of {{cite web}}.
- Can you supply ISBNs (books), ISSNs (journals/magazines), or OCLCs (older books) for all possible sources? http://www.worldcat.org is helpful for getting these numbers.
- It's always a good idea to supply the cartography source for a map, even if it's just CDOT (it's ok to abbreviate if the publisher is spelled out and they're duplicating each other.)
- The shortened footnotes to the Highways to the Sky work should have periods after the page number(s).
- Make sure all of your date formats are consistent.
- PDF is an abbreviation for "Portable Document Format" and it should be in all caps, not "pdf".
- FN 15 needs an en dash (–) in "Denver–Aurora"
- FN 19 should be pp. 44–47, not pp. 44–7.
- FN 21 needs a PDF indication.
- FN 22 needs an en dash (–) in "March–April".
- FN 26 needs a publication location and publisher name.
- Several foonotes are using the month(s) of publication as the issue. The
|issue=
field is for an issue number. Please move them to the|month=
field so they are added to the date correctly. If it's a specific day's issue, use|date=
with the full date properly formatted. - FN 35: are you sure that's the publication name?
- FN 39 needs a page number.
- All of the RMN articles need the paper's location added since the paper name doesn't contain the city.
- Now, you have a "Works cited" section with only one work. How about using shortened footnotes with all of the other book sources, and moving the full citations here for consistency?
- CDOT isn't the author for Highways to the Sky; Associated Cultural Resource Experts is. Double check with worldcat.org, but CDOT should be the publisher only since they didn't write it. Fill out the citation like a book with location, publisher, etc.
- In general, make sure as much information about the source is given, and that it's given consistently.
- Do the CDOT maps for Jefferson County and Morrison have publication dates? Can you try to find dates for all of the other CDOT reports like footnotes 1, 3, 4, 5, etc.
- I still recommend that the other books sources have their footnotes shortened and the full citations moved to the Works cited section. Footnotes 16, 23 and 25 are all books, right?
- External links—Can you improve the way this is formatted, say "SH at at <website name>"?
- Images—I mentioned the issue with ALT text in relation to the missing caption for the map already, but there are issues with the photos.
- First, why are the two images for the RD run up at the top of the section? They should be moved to roughly correspond to the text. In other words, when the RD discussions the area that an image is showing, put the photo near that bunch of text so the relationship is clear.
- Second, why are you overriding the default thumbnail sizes, especially with a size that's smaller than the default? There's no need to force them smaller in this context.
- The caption should be used to connect to the text and subject of the article a bit more. Specifically, the photo of the house should focus on the lake and the park in the caption, not the house.
Last thing, but you might want to add this to the "Jefferson County, Colorado" category (or a "Transportation in Jefferson County, Colorado" category if it exists). Double check the NRHP status, and maybe add it to a NRHP category as well.
The article has promise, but it needs a copy edit and consistency check before it can be promoted to A-Class or even be nominated at FAC. Imzadi 1979 → 23:57, 5 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Thanks for the very thorough review. I will try to address these issues as soon as possible. — PCB 00:49, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Content issues
- I would merge Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive into this article, since that roadway is just a segment of SH 74. At the least, make sure that the NRHP information is added to this article before you redirect that title here.
- You've mentioned that there is a National Scenic Byway that follows this highway. It is the Lariat Loop Scenic & Historic Byway, and it needs to be mentioned in this article. There are resources at:
that would be of use. I would avail yourself of that page, and the subpages there, and get as much of that information added as you can.Staff. "Lariat Loop Scenic & Historic Byway". America's Byways. Federal Highway Administration.
Staff. "Lariat Loop National Scenic Byway: Forty Miles of Western Adventure". Lariat Loop Heritage Alliance.
- I was aware of both issues and plan to get to them as soon as I have time. — PCB 01:42, 17 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments from Dough4872[edit]
- In the infobox you list the mileage as 18.110 and in the lead as 18.11. It it possible to be consistent and use three decimal places for the mileage in the lead also?
- In the sentence "The section of the route north of the town of Evergreen is known as Evergreen Parkway and is a wider segment than that east of Evergreen.", it is possible to mention how wide the section north of Evergreen is?
- It would sound better to start the route description with a sentence saying "SH 74 begins at an interchange with I-70."
- More wikilinks are needed in the route description.
- I tried my best to add them, but they are all red links. Are there any specific links that you think should be added? — PCB 06:42, 7 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- "From I-70, Evergreen Parkway, as the route is named, heads southeast through El Rancho, meeting an intersection with Swede Gulch Road, numbered as US 40. ", too many commas, needs to be reworded. Also, rephrase the last part to say "US 40, which is named Swede Gulch Road."
- Do not use "then" in every sentence of route description.
- Is it really necessary to mention speed limits in the route description?
- "Kerr Gulch Road, designated as County Road 23", maybe try "County Road 23 (Kerr Gulch Road)."
- Combine the sentences "Evergreen Parkway then turns westward and passes Fillius Park to the north in the community of Hidden Valley. The terrain in the region is mountainous."
- Change "southerly" to "to the south."
- The sentence "As the route heads south, Elk Meadow Park appears to the west and a residential area appears to the east" sounds awkward.
- "Entering Dedisse Park, Evergreen Parkway enters the town of Evergreen, passing by Evergreen Lake along the Bear Creek.", do not use the verb enter twice.
- I don't see how the sentence "The pavement at this point is aged and in a poor condition." has any meaning to the article.
- Through the route description, you mention county routes as "County Road x" then suddenly switch to "CR x". For the first instance, use "County Road x (CR x)" and use "CR x" for the rest.
- "In Kittredge, the route meets CR 120, Myers Gulch Road, which heads southeast toward Indian Hills.", Myers Gulch Road should be in parentheses.
- The sentence "Where the speed limit is raised to 35 miles per hour (56 km/h), the route again meets Kerr Gulch Road, which bypasses the large curve which SH 74 took." sounds awkward.
- You use the verb enter a lot in the route description. Try to vary the wording a bit.
- The sentence "From here, SH 8 serves as the continuation of the road as Morrison Road toward Denver." needs better wording.
- "toll roads became no longer common", try using were instead of became.
- "and the path became one maintained by Jefferson County, used primarily to access mining camps", remove "one".
- "State Highway 27, as the Bear Creek Canyon Scenic Mountain Drive was designated until 1923, when the number was switched to 74, ran past the Denver Motor Club in Idledale in addition to newly purchased parks.", abbreviate State Highway and add SH in front of 74. Also cut down on use of commas.
- Overall, there are too many sentences with several commas. These need to be reworded.
- The sentence "The dam, finished three years after the flood, created Evergreen Lake, may have contributed to increases in tourism in the nearby city with the same name." sounds awkward.
- "By then, the eastern terminus of the route had been cut back to its original and current ending point in Morrison.", what designation replaced that portion of SH 74?
- I would suggest adding portal links to P:USRD and Portal:Colorado in a see also section. Dough4872 02:17, 6 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I also found a new concern. In the route description, you have two consecutive sentences beginning with "After intersecting." Can you change one of them? Dough4872 00:25, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments from Fredddie[edit]
As usual, these comments read in order. I have only glanced over some of the other comments above. If they overlap, I apologize. –Fredddie™ 04:54, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Infobox and lead
- I'm worried about being over-precise in the article's prose. I would round 18.110 miles down to 18.
- I would say where I-70 and SH-8 meet SH-74.
- I don't think rough curve is a very good descriptor of the route. U-, C-, or even J-shaped would be much better descriptions. You should probably change the alt text of the map to match.
- "The section of the route north of the town of Evergreen is known as Evergreen Parkway and is a segment with a wider roadway than that east of Evergreen." This should be two sentences.
- You don't need to say "the Bear Creek", "Bear Creek" will do fine.
- Passes through several of the city's what? Suburbs?
- Measures were taken to prevent damage? You should say they were taken to prevent further damage. Otherwise it sounds like the road wasn't damaged, but it was fixed up to prevent future damage.
- The descriptions of the old endpoints aren't very descriptive.
- Again, you don't need to say "the Evergreen Parkway".
- Route description
- "...north side and cross the highway diagonally southwestward." Huh? Think about your audience; some people won't be able to picture this when they read it.
- "...southeast through El Rancho..." Don't you mean southwest?
- I'm seeing lots of repetition: "After intersecting..." "...the road/route..."
- I'm having trouble following along on a map. I recommend having a set of eyes not involved with USRD look over this article. (see WP:PR)
- I don't think you talk about Evergreen as much as you should. Maybe it's just me, but the lead seemed to talk up the city, but it's basically a passing mention in the RD.
- I don't like the NHS mention in the last paragraph. There seems to have been a belief created that you can't pass FAC without it, and that's just not the case.
- History
- "Established in 1909 by Colorado governor Robert W. Speer, the system..." What system? Oops, I should have kept reading; you should revise that sentence anyway.
- You should combine instances of {{Convert}} so "7 feet (2.1 m) to 34 feet (10 m) high" becomes "7 to 34 feet (2.1 to 10.4 m) high".
- Major intersections
- You should treat US-40 like it's an overlap, since it is.
- I would have said "
I-70 east / US 40 east" and "
US 40 west to I-70 west" since there is no complete access to I-70 from SH-74.
- Images
- It could just be me, but none of the pictures seem to be relevant to the aritcle. Only two have the road in it, and it's clear the road is not the subject of those images.
If the nominator does not attempt to resolve the issues in 14 days, this ACR will be closed due to inactivity. --Rschen7754 10:28, 11 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
- Going to leave this open until
about mid-MarchMarch 12 unless there's issues that are resolved. --Rschen7754 02:30, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
- The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.