Talk:History of Maryland Route 200

Unbiased and NPOV
I did not write this article, but have read it carefully and added the lead and construction sections. My review did not find POV problems. It maintains an encyclopedic tone in explaining a 30-year controversy that factored into a number of political campaigns. Accordingly, I am removing the tags at the top of the article. Racepacket (talk) 14:36, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The article is still a mess and I have readded the cleanup tags back.  Dough 48  72  14:40, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Be specific on the talk page. Saying the article "is still a mess" is not helpful. Your review does not illuminate either. Please explain in detail why you believe each tag is justified with specific examples. Racepacket (talk) 14:52, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The planning section seems to drag on to the point where it is WP:TLDR. External links should not be included in the prose; if they are being used as references, they need to do so using reference tags. There are several stubby one and two-sentence paragraphs throughout the article. There are awkward spellings such as "Stand alone Intercounty Connector". The issues stretch beyond the prose quality to the fact the article gives undue weight to the planning and barely talks about the construction of the road. A lot of the political information in the planning section needs to be cut from the article. It should summarized to say several politicians opposed the road rather than list out every instance of a politician's opinion about the road. With the information condensed, this information can logically be merged back to Maryland Route 200.  Dough 48  72  15:01, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Hello, Dough! As a relatively recent local resident who's a bit curious as to how this whole situation with the ICC shaped up, I'd benefit from seeing the detail here. This particular little stretch of highway seems to be a key piece for understanding the politics of an overly congested metropolitan area and how its transportation situation got like this. *ducks and covers awaiting tomatoes* Trilliumz (talk) 01:04, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay, took a first pass at copyediting. Is it starting to look a little clearer why all the messy details would be of interest for local and regional politics? Trilliumz (talk) 02:06, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
 * It still isn't notable, and that's why it's been nominated for AFD before. --Rschen7754 02:18, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Notability
Re: Notability. For this article, it's not due to the project being a feat of highway engineering, but rather on its political impacts, the question of how the highway will affect the major traffic congestion problem, and the duration of the situation. WP:GEOSCOPE "Demonstrable long-term impact on a significant region of the world." DC region is significant; impact here is not just on county govt. but also on 2 governors' races, with direct interest from a sitting US President. WP:EFFECT, includes "possible impact on elections," and "An event that is a precedent or catalyst for something else of lasting significance is likely to be notable." Fining drivers who enter without an EZ Pass is a precedent which could well catalyze other developments. WP:PERSISTENCE "Fifty-six years is an embarrassing. The only thing more embarrassing than 56 years would be 57," Ehrlich said about how long the debate has been going on ... It's such a big deal to Ehrlich -- that his voice cracked when talking about it." (from 2006 news story)

Agreed that 50 years of controversy involving two governors may not fit neatly into the established format used by WikiProject Roads. Why not let it branch out into a separate but related article instead? Trilliumz (talk) 03:39, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I've been told that this may do better on an article such as Washington Outer Beltway, rather than making a controversial "History of" subarticle. --Rschen7754 05:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Possibly; however, I just heard something on the radio about an "Outer Beltway" discussion in Virginia, so that appears to be a larger concept than the MD Rt. 200. I am not all that familiar with editing to merge articles, nor do I know all that you folks know about organizing highway-related materials. What I can tell you is that as a local person trying to get a little more informed with a basic overview on the history and political controversy around this particular project, I've always heard it called the "Intercounty Connector," not MD Rt. 200 or the Outer Beltway. Getting some clear and basic information together on this topic would help me (and no doubt others) make sense of the rest of the stuff that's out there on the Web and in the news. When you walk into an existing situation where everybody's all lined up on different sides of a controversy, it can sure be helpful to have a summary of the soap opera characters and plot to date! I'm in agreement that the info that's in this article could be improved, or possibly moved to a better location. So I'm hoping your collective experience in how to slice, dice, and present the highway engineering portion will facilitate presenting the information about the public discussion as well ... How the heck do any of us stand a chance of becoming reasonable, informed citizens if even the Wikipedia community is too touchy to give a beginners' explanation of what everybody's all riled up about? Trilliumz (talk) 02:29, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Ok, here's my perspective. A lot of the original history behind the road that is now being built as MD-200 is related to the Outer Beltway. That article could benefit from expansion. If historical material is put there, it can be summarized and linked back into the history section of the main MD-200 article using a main tag. Ontario Highway 401 links back to four other highways for full detailed histories, but summarizes them to cover its backstory. Then the ON-401 article continues with its unique history. I think a similar approach could be done here.  Imzadi 1979  →   02:53, 12 May 2011 (UTC)