Talk:Greater Victoria

Victoria, Greater Victoria, and the CRD
Why shouldn't this article be merged with Capital Regional District, British Columbia? Then a redirect could be used. Quite frankly, the conflations of these two pages and the Victoria, British Columbia page are a mess. Any objections if I go ahead and fix things? Fishhead64 07:47, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
 * No objections here to substantive relocation of information, but I wouldn't describe the CRD and Greater Victoria as being coterminal geographic spaces. The Gulf Islands and the westward extension of Hwy 14 towards and including Port Renfrew fall under the administrative auspices of the CRD, but are never described as part of Greater Victoria.  And in some cases, an even more reductionist definition of Greater Victoria is used, which puts the northern and western limits at Elk Lake and Fort Victoria, respectively--IIRC, that's where these days there are highway signs with seagulls or somesuch on them saying "Welcome to Greater Victoria" The Tom 04:10, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, things have since been kind of fixed. There's always room for improvement though.  For instance, I put the non-City neighbourhoods and some attractions in Greater Victoria, British Columbia.  But I'll continue to be vigilant. Fishhead64 04:41, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Regional material
(cc'd to Talk:Victoria, British Columbia and Talk:Capital Regional District)

1. Establish as definitively as possible what is considered Greater Victoria.

2. Then decide whether its article is necessary or whether its theme duplicates much of what is in its component parts/CRD articles. I haven't done a thorough enough analysis yet. If anyone has any cites or thoughts, feel free to share them.

3. If it's established that the Greater Victoria article is close enough to the Capital Regional District article by geographic theme-- beyond noting the Gulf Island differences &etc-- then I wouldn't hesitate to suggest a merge. This would create an article in the vein of Greater Vancouver Regional District which, one might note, mentions the term 'Greater Vancouver' prominently. A merge does not mean that the material within the Greater Victoria is gone, but that non-duplicate material would be incorporated, into the CRD article. An automatic REDIRECT would be created, thus allowing the term 'Greater Victoria' to forward to 'Captial Regional District'. Also, for added emphasis, an explanatory note within the final article would state the differences.

4. If it's established that the Greater Victoria article isn't primarily duplication that could be included in the CRD in the same manner as Greater Vancouver is forwarded/included in Greater Vancouver Regional District, then it should be kept on its own merits.

5. This whole thing will probably take many days and weeks. That's just the nature of the beast.
 * My first impression is that Greater Victoria is mostly a list, that could be merged with the differences noted.Keefer | Talk 00:27, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
 * My own feeling is that the CRD and Greater Victoria are sufficiently different to warrant distinct articles - the exclusion of the Gulf Islands and Sooke and east being the key issue. Your point on the GVRD is noted, but also note the existence of a parallel article to Greater Victoria, namely Lower Mainland. Fishhead64 16:26, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

My contention is that RD articles should only be about the administration of the RD, i.e. of the government and its services/facilities and that they and their categories should not be confused with bona fide regions. A lot of the geographic material that's in the CRD article properly belongs in the Greater Victoria article, and the distinction between Greater Victoria not including the southern Gulf Islands is a big distinction, as is the notion that Indian Reserves are not under the jurisdiction of the regional district, nor are provincial parks, nor is CFB Esquimalt. I haven't looked closely at the land boundary towards the CWRD and I"m not enough of an ex-Islander to be able to say whether or not Bamberton, Mill Bay, Shawnigan etc are Greater Victoria or not. Another consideration is that geographic regions have their own category-hierarchy, regional districts have a separate one.  If a merge of a region with an RD is done here, it has implications elsewhere, and contradictions.  The solution, to me, is to stop treating regional districts as if they were useful geographic subdivisions of BC and instead use them only to discuss what is in the parameters of a regional district, which as is well-known is extremely limited in comparison to other branches of government.  They began to be used for Wikipedia largely beacuse they are coterminous with StatsCan's census areas, or rather StatsCan has chosen to use their boundaries for census purposes.  This places an undue importance on them and hte mistaken assumption that they are regional govenrments in a stronger sense than they are, and they are utterly useless for categorizing where lakes, mountains etc are, and improper when used for First Nations material expressly because the latter are excluded from the municipal system of government (the exception between in Sehcelt and, presuambly, Nisga'a lands and other more recently-signed treaties). Another similar boundary-vs-reality parallel to Greater Victoria/CRD is just north - the Cowichan Valley Regional District includes lands on the Strait of Juan de Fuca that are not part of the Cowichan Valley region. Similarly the Fraser VAlley Regional District only includes about half of the Fraser Valley, and includes areas expressly not in the Frser Valley. The solution in the latter case is to treat Fraser Valley as the locus of geographic/cultural/historical information, and treat the FVRD article as it should be - an explanation of the Regional District's member governments and constituent EAs and any facilities of parks operated by the RD. And again, it is extremely unseemly to include First Nations material in Regional District articles and categories; provincial parks articles shoudl be categorized with by geographic region categories, or in a perhaps-worthwhile MoE/BC Parks regions category system. Placing a lot of things in RD articles adn categories that don't belong is like placing things in the Diocese of Kamloops or Diocese of New Westminster articles simply because they fall within that boundary. Much more relevant in BC are MoE regions, Forests Districts, et al. At things like LRMPs, RDs are only one of many jurisdictional stakeholders at hte table, and quite generally among the weakest and most toothless....that municipal-type powers of the Islands Trust in the Gulf Islands pre-empt RD authority in those areas, or bypass ir or however it works, is another consideration not just with the Capital Regional District but several others as well. Summing up, Greater Victoria is a place/space, the Capital Regional District is a municipal-type administration spanning it as well as other areas, but it's not a place.....Skookum1 (talk) 20:11, 11 April 2009 (UTC)


 * And re the inclusino of Greater Vancouver material merged into what had been titled Greater Vancouver Regional District but is now Metro Vancouver, citing a poor example is just not a good example, as once again said merger was ill-advised given the longevity of the one term vs the transience of the regional district - and the regional district's very name. Greater Vancouver still has a meaning of its own, and it's not synonymous with the regional district or the area spanned by the regional district's boundaries.  Lower Mainland, yes, exists as an article; it's apposite on the Island would be South Island (British Columbia region) (which there is need to create along with Mid Island and North Island).  Where and how South Island differs from Greater Victoria I'd also like some input;opinions on (Duncan or not Duncan?  Certainly Shawnigan yes? and is the Juan de Fuca region part of South Island, being an outer extension of Greater Victoria, or is it "West Coast of Vancouver Island"....).  Anyway there should have been no more equation between Greater Vancouver and the GVRD article than there woudl be between the Nanaimo Regional District and Nanaimo, or between the Cariboo Regional District and Cariboo.  The thing to do, again, is to treat t eh regional district articles as teh government articles that they really are and to stop using them as geographic articles/categories/classification system.....Skookum1 (talk) 21:17, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Rail tracks east and west of Victoria Harbour
In reference to a discussion started at Talk:Seaspan Marine Corporation can any one living in Victoria tell us what tracks still exist west of the harbour apart from the E&N. Are there any facileties on the harbour front to load/unload rail cars from a car float? The track along Store Street appears to be past history. Map. If there is no car float loading/unloadig facilety in Victoria, where in Nanaimo is it located and where is the corresponding one located in the Vancouver area? Who actually operates/owns the car float. Peter Horn User talk 19:07, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The Canadian term is "rail barge", Peter; people might not get what you're talking about....is that a USian term or just a Britishism? (like "flyover" vs. "overpass").Skookum1 (talk) 19:30, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The Wikipedia article calls it car float, so rail barge just happens to redirect to car float. I'm only using the term which is used by Wikipedia as the primary article name. If you look at the car float article and its history you'll find that it is most probably an American term. Just click on the links. Peter Horn User talk 22:05, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Skookum et al, re car float vs rail barge, please note the conversation started at User talk:Peter Horn. Peter Horn User talk 20:26, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Part of map 092B044} & [http://openmaps.gov.bc.ca/imfows13/imf.jsp?site=idt part of 092B044 zoom in show that there used to be a ferry slip on the west side of the harbour south of the Point Ellice Bridge. The "satelite" and "hybrid" modes of city map no longer show this track. This city map no longer shows any tracks along Store Street east of the harbour. On the west side there may be a track along Harbour Street that then appears to continue closer to the harbour front and under the Point Ellis Bridge for some distance north. But it is really hard to tell if this is actually true because it is impossible to zoom in close enough. The CN yard northe west of the Point Ellis Bridge no longer exists, satelite photos don't lie because they record whatever is below on the ground at the time that the photo is taken. That map is taken from Google Earth. Peter Horn User talk 19:24, 12 March 2011 (UTC) Peter Horn User talk 19:29, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Dockside Green leads me to believe that the tracks are "toast" (gone). Peter Horn User talk 22:45, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Try also this map and zoom in on Victoria BC Peter Horn User talk 00:36, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

PRIMARYTOPIC dispute re Saanich
If there are people from Greater Victoria still around on Wikipedia, please see Talk:Saanich, British Columbia, though my experience is that local input is derided by demands for global citations, and WP:CSG is given short shrift or even denounced.Skookum1 (talk) 08:35, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

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