Talk:Kauai

Ordering of cities/towns
This might seem retentive, but the lists of important towns and interesting places both seem rather random. Perhaps they should be ordered in some useful fashion. For the towns, by population might seem natural, but I would propose that we instead list towns from one end of the island to the other, so they are more or less geographic in order. Given the linear nature of the highway system, a list from Haena to Hana might be useful. (Or Hanalei to Kekaha...) Something similar could be done with the places of interest, too, although not all of them are necessarily on the highway, so they aren't quite as linear. Opinions solicited! Davidlwilliamson (talk) 07:57, 20 January 2008 (UTC)


 * I apparently felt motivated, as I have a new ordering of the towns put together. I'll insert that in a moment. Discussion still welcome, of course, but it seemed like a good idea. Davidlwilliamson (talk) 08:53, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * According to the State Constitution of Hawaii, Hawaii does not have any official ("incorporated") cities or towns of any kind, not even Honolulu. The only form of local government that Hawaii has is the "county" of which the state has about four, Hawaii County, Kauai County, Maui County, and Honolulu County (the entire island of Oahu with whatever islets it has). Maui County has the most islands (incl. also Molokai, Lanai, etc.), Hawaii County has the largest area, and Honolulu County has the greatest population. The State of Hawaii has two seats in the U.S. Congress. One congressional district is completely on Oahu, and the other district covers part of northern Oahu, plus all of the other islands, giving the two districts approximately the same populations, as is a constitutional requirement in the U.S.A.24.156.77.8 (talk) 00:05, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The State of Hawaii has a fifth county, Kalawao County, on Molokai.
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalawao_County,_Hawaii
 * DaKine (talk) 16:52, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Zuckerberg
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg owns land on Kaui. http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/facebooks-zuckerberg-sues-hundreds-of-hawaiians-to-force-property-sales-to-him/ar-AAm1TvX Olivier Mengué | &#8644; 08:54, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks - added (and updated) the news source to the "history" section. mcld (talk) 20:00, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Okina in the article conforms to MOS
Please refer to Manual of Style/Hawaii-related articles. I have reverted the edits that removed the ʻOkina from the article. The ʻOkina conforms to the MOS for Hawaii articles. Questions? - Please discuss at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Hawaii-related articles, and do not alter individual articles. Thank you. — Maile (talk) 00:11, 25 November 2017 (UTC)


 * This is an encyclopedia in the English language, and so there is no justification about saying "Anglicized" this and "Anglicized" that. The English-language alphabet is exactly what we expect and what we deserve!24.156.77.8 (talk) 23:50, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090323004412/http://old.kcc.hawaii.edu/campus/tour/plants/pmokihana.htm to http://old.kcc.hawaii.edu/campus/tour/plants/pmokihana.htm

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Kokeo Point
I think there is a mistake in the Kokeo Point reference. Besides the fact that I cannot find a place by this name along the south shore the link brings you to Koke'e headland, correctly located on the north shore.Bassrolf (talk) 12:57, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Inappropriate page moves
This page appears to have been moved several times without any discussion occurring on the talk page. One editor cites the USGS designation, which is indeed Kauaʻi, the other cites WP:COMMONNAME and WP:ENGLISH. Well, as a part-time resident of Hawaiʻi, I can tell you that Kauaʻi is the common name in use on the Islands. The island is a county of the State of Hawaii, and that county's official name is County of Kauaʻi. The inclusion of the ʻokina is common usage on the Islands, on street signs and Government buildings. The removal of the ʻokina is incorrect and is part of a pattern of indigenous suppression which it is inappropriate to continue on Wikipedia, especially at this time. The ʻokina is used throughout Wikipedia on articles related to the Hawaiʻian Islands, and it should not be removed from either the body or titles of articles. Skyerise (talk) 16:19, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: I have move-protected the article after restoring the original name Kauai. This will need a formal move request and a clear consensus before it is moved. -- MelanieN (talk) 18:08, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 5 July 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: no consensus   ~ Amkgp  💬  15:24, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

– From MOS:HAWAII: Use of the proper diacritics in Hawaiian language words and phrases is important. However, when using the kahakō and ʻokina for a word in article content or title that has both these marks, it is suggested to use both of the characters or neither of them. This is to avoid a misuse of the diacritics that would change the meaning of the word. As with any letter or character, omission of the kahakō or ʻokina in Hawaiian words can change the pronunciation and often alter the meaning of the word in the native Hawaiian language. It may alter a geographical location: for example, Kalaʻe and Ka Lae are different places. Lānaʻi is an island and has some other meanings, while lānai is a covered porch around a house, and lanai means "stiff-backed".
 * Kauai → Kauaʻi
 * Lanai → Lānaʻi
 * Hawaii (island) → Hawaiʻi (island)

In regard to "Spelling in article titles", MOS:HAWAII states: "Whenever possible, the most common name should be used with the regional spelling and orthography preferred for titles and consistently used when referring to the subject in the body of the article." By this standard, the article should be moved to Kauaʻi, as this is the official name of both the island and county and is used both by USGS and the County website. Similar reasoning applies to Lānaʻi (USGS, Lānaʻi Chamber of Commerce) as well as the fact that the name of this island is used as an example above. The article should not bear a title meaning "stiff-backed". Skyerise (talk) 19:32, 5 July 2020 (UTC) Geologic map of the southern flank of Mauna Loa Volcano, Island of Hawaiʻi, Hawaii.
 * Oppose. MOS:HAWAII goes on to state that "Sometimes, Hawaiian related articles may have titles that are not using the regional spelling and orthography. If consensus holds for spelling in the title that ignores the diacritic marks, create a redirect that does." In the case of the inland names themselves, the most common English language spelling is what should be used for the article titles, and I don't think the most common English language spellings use the diacritics. Rreagan007 (talk) 20:02, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Support I think the USGS is a reasonable guide here. Use the okina and macron for the islands and other geographic features, but not for the state of Hawaii itself. For proper names based on 'Hawaii', follow usage -- e.g. yes for UH, no for state depts. And never in "Hawaiian". Consider the USGS usage,
 * There's also the county govt sites, e.g. County of Kauai, County of Hawaii. — kwami (talk) 20:12, 5 July 2020 (UTC)


 * Comment kwami reminds me that I failed to include all my reasons. Please also be aware of/consider that the inclusion of the ʻokina is common usage on the Islands, on street signs, government buildings, government websites, and official documents. The removal of the ʻokina is incorrect and is part of a pattern of indigenous suppression which it is inappropriate to continue on Wikipedia, especially at this time. Skyerise (talk) 21:55, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Weak Oppose, at least without further sources offered. The USGS is a good source but it isn't everything.  Google news: Kauai shows lots of recent articles, for Kauaʻi shows some articles but mostly from 1-4 weeks ago, indicating substantially fewer sources using this variant.  Checking Google Books, things are more split - there do seem to be more Books using Kauai, but of the recent ones many are travel guides and the like, so it's possible that high-quality sources are more likely to use the okina.  There's clearly been a shift in usage, but I'm not sure the okina form is dominant yet.  As far as Skyerise's last comment, Wikipedia follows trends not sets them - so if the rest of the world changes their usage, as it seems to perhaps be doing, that will change Wikipedia as well.  SnowFire (talk) 06:42, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * GoogleNews isn't a good source, because names tend to get simplified online. We usually check RS print sources instead, and go by the quality of the publication, rather than just a raw count. I'm adding the county sites to my argument, since they use the okina despite being online sites where you might expect ASCII. — kwami (talk) 00:20, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Newspapers are reliable sources, though, and also printed sources? I disagree on this "simplified online" argument - nobody has any issues with displaying special characters these days, everyone uses UTF-8.  If quality is the concern, here's the high-quality The New York Times using "Kauai", no okina, in 2019, not a Travel section or bloggy type article, and I've found other articles in the NY Times archive where okinas are used within the article, but not for the island name.  Also, county websites are not that relevant; WP:COMMONNAME / WP:OFFICIALNAME suggests that Wikipedia shouldn't just follow official usage.  (I should add in fairness that one of the print books I have on a Hawaiian topic does use okinas for the island names, so I recognize that usage is split here, hence only a weak oppose.  But there's clearly a strong current of usage without the okina as well.)  SnowFire (talk) 06:17, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Support per nom.--Ortizesp (talk) 14:20, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose - We should use the English name unless the native name is more common in English. Interstellarity (talk) 14:44, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Moral support. I don't think there are really separate "English" names for the islands.  It's not like Venice/Venezia.  The so-called "English" names are somewhat-inaccurately-transcribed and -pronounced versions of the Hawaiian names.  If we could make them more accurate, that would be better. That said, this is a larger discussion.  If my argument were accepted, we should also move Oahu and Molokai and I don't know how many other articles.  I don't put a lot of stock in cross-article consistency, but the argument I'm making is more generally applicable, so it seems a little dubious to just start applying it on one article. --Trovatore (talk) 19:41, 7 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Support all 3, common use on the islands, Hawaii is bilingual and these are the more correct names. The base names will redirect so absolutely no loss to anyone by full orthography. In ictu oculi (talk) 10:26, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Strong Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. No evidence that the proposed titles are used more commonly than the current titles in reliable sources. Because they aren’t. WP follows usage in reliable sources. We don’t evangelize use of diacritics, nor anything else, on WP. —В²C ☎ 15:28, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Age of the Island
According to the Kauai Geography and Geology site, it is the oldest Hawaiian island rather than the second oldest as it states on this Wikipedia page. Here is the link to the site I am referring to. https://www.kauai.com/kauai-geography#:~:text=Kauai%20is%20the%20oldest%20island,many%20indigenous%20plants%20and%20wildlife. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:5B0:4BCB:38F8:25A3:FEA2:A7CC:890C (talk) 12:51, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

The site referenced just above is a commercial (i.e. tourist promotional) site, and is not an authoritative source for this encyclopedia. That Ni'ihau is older than Kaua'i is accepted by most geologists and is in keeping with this Wikipedia article about the Hawaiian Hot Spot: []. A better reference for the ages of Hawaiian islands is this one from The Hawaiian Center for Volcanology: []. --DaKine (talk) 16:41, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

Comments on the article
1. The entry on the sugar mill in Koloa has only pertinent information as far as the first sentence. After that, the additional information does not seem related so it should not be there.

2. I cannot find a location for Mana or Waiawa.

3. The image entitled "Na Pali Coast State Park" had a duplicate. I removed one because it was redundant. I also rearranged the images of the entire article to improve the layout.

4. "Popular tourist shave ice shops are Wailua Shave Ice in Kapaʻa, and Uncle's Shave Ice in Lihuʻe and Koloa." This sounds like publicity on Wikipedia. It helps the business but this is an encyclopedia.

ICE77 (talk) 03:49, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Oahu which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 18:45, 10 July 2023 (UTC)