Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of highway route numbers in Oregon


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. Tone 21:58, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

List of highway route numbers in Oregon

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Article conveys no real information, there isn't a list of highway route numbers for every other state, and there doesn't need to be. WikiDonn (talk) 19:32, 24 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep Were it not for the fact that we seem to have articles about every single frickin' one of these highways, I might agree on notability, but there's no real reason offered to delete. It's a sortable table and it does convey real  information, about the location and the opposite ends of each road.  As a navigation aid, it's acceptable under WP:CLN.  Mandsford 21:12, 24 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep This page is in effect the list of Oregon's state routes; it only has this name to differentiate it from List of named state highways in Oregon. We actually have one of these lists for every state, pretty much; most of them are under names like "List of numbered routes in X", but Oregon is a special case because of its named highways. I agree that the title's awkward, and the page probably should be moved to a better name, but that's hardly a reason for deletion. TheCatalyst31 Reaction•Creation 04:04, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
 * In this case, it will take a little prestidigitation. List of numbered routes in Oregon is a redirect to State highways in Oregon, which in turn has in it links to this page and to the named highways page.   Undoing the redirect is easy, but then this title would be redirected to that one, etc. etc.  The nomination wasn't made based on the article's name, of course, but I can see how the unconventional title suggested that there weren't such articles for other places.  Mandsford 13:16, 25 June 2010 (UTC)


 * If you want more detailed reasons, it goes against WP:NOT: "Wikipedia articles are not... mere collections of internal links". It also says: "Wikipedia articles should not read like... travel guides...Notable locations may meet the inclusion criteria, but the resulting articles need not include every tourist attraction, restaurant, hotel or venue, etc. Such details may be welcome at Wikitravel, or Wikia travel instead". I also think it loosely goes against Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. Most of the links are not to articles, but sections of articles of bigger roads that include that section. So it is basically a list of links to other more detailed lists. As said before, we have a list of named roads in Oregon, and that list is notable, but since these ones don't have names this list is not notable enough for inclusion here. I would also suggest everyone here read WP:Listcruft especially meaning #4,7 and 8. --WikiDonn (talk) 18:18, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The article is hardly a mere collection of internal links; the routes are all in a sortable table with their endpoints and dates of establishment/closure. The highways in the table are mostly state highways, which almost always meet notability criteria, and therefore are appropriate content for a list. I'm not sure why you think most of the links are not to articles; most of the links are to individual articles about the numbered road included in the links, and the articles are named after the numbered routes rather than the named highways. The fact that the roads don't have names is hardly a reason for deleting the list; most state highways in other states don't, and we still have lists like this for those states (Alabama, Arizona, California, etc.). In fact, Interstate Highways, U.S. Highways, and the like don't have names either, and we certainly wouldn't delete those for lack of names. TheCatalyst31 Reaction•Creation 21:30, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
 * See New York, Pennsylvania, and Florida for examples of articles that don't contain a list of every single state road. So no we don't need a list of start and end points nor do we have an individual article for every single state road. That is unencyclopedic. This article does link to other articles that only have the linked article as a section. For example: Interstate 105 (Oregon) redirects to a section within Oregon Route 126 which has a description of sections of roads in it. I didn't know that ones for other states exist, (this article really should contain that info box the examples you provided had that link to the other state road articles) but State highways in Oregon has enough information, and is in the same format as most of the other articles. --WikiDonn (talk) 00:23, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, New York, Pennsylvania and Florida all have lists of every state road, they're just separate from the article describing the highway system as a whole, much as Oregon is. We have an individual article for most of the state roads; the missing ones mostly don't exist because no one wrote them yet, as consensus generally finds state roads to be notable. Interstate 105 is an exception because it's a segment of a state highway with the Interstate designation; it's common practice to merge these articles, but only Interstate Highways are redirected this way. The only other redirects are decommissioned highways which were signed as another highway later on; the current state routes almost all have independent articles, check the links to see for yourself. And every item in a list doesn't need to have an article to make the list encyclopedic; for example, List of reference routes in New York lists many highways which aren't notable enough for independent articles but are still part of a notable highway system. TheCatalyst31 Reaction•Creation 02:09, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * You have to admit that these articles are poorly linked to each other since I wasn't able to find these articles from other similar ones. All this shows is that the problem was bigger that I thought, and just because other articles like this exist doesn't mean all of these shouldn't be deleted. These are almost the same as mindless, indiscriminate tables of statistics, so they are unencyclopedic. I have yet to here what possible thing anybody could learn from this article. People can see the start and endpoints, but then they would have to follow the link for each point to be able to tell where those are, and they would have to do that for every single road, going back and forth. It is impractical, and it is just best to have all the information about important roads in the same place, so it doesn't help with the organization of the main article. And about notability, the fact that the roads are not named or don't have some sort of significance outside the fact that they exist, only means the other articles like this should be deleted too. Answer me this, why do we need an article on every state road? What is the difference between this and having articles for every city road? --WikiDonn (talk) 18:46, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * These sort of lists are neither mindless nor indiscriminate. The article in questions lists the start and endpoints of the highways, and having to follow links to figure out where these are (and only if you don't know already) isn't that big of an obstacle. The list also lists the opening dates of each highway, which allows the reader to see a general overview of when Oregon established/disestablished the routes in its highway system. Though this list doesn't include this data yet, state highway lists also often include the length of the highways, which is definitely useful information as readers can see the longest and shortest highways in the state. In regard to notability, the roads do have significance outside of their existence; they were incorporated into a statewide highway system, a major highway network. See WikiProject U.S. Roads/Notability for a more detailed explanation of road notability in the United States. The fact that the roads have numbers rather than names is meaningless, because roads in the US generally aren't named; U.S. Route 20 is the longest road in the United States, but it has a number rather than a name. TheCatalyst31 Reaction•Creation 19:32, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but the fact that U.S. Route 20 is the longest road in the United States makes it notable, in fact highly notable. See my comment below about how merely existing doesn't make something notable on Wikipedia. --WikiDonn (talk) 20:04, 26 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Oregon-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Transportation-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 26 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep This list is highly useful for understanding the relationships between roads. For example, I always thought that US 26 was a state road—even after commuting on it for decades—until seeing a list like this.  While the guideline for navigation templates and categories is probably sufficient cause for the article to remain, its inherent value as an article providing high level highway organizational information, as well as specific geography and history, is more than sufficient for it to remain.  —EncMstr (talk) 17:20, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * But this article is not suitable under WP:INDISCRIMINATE: "As explained in the policy introduction, merely being true, or even verifiable, does not automatically make something suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia. Wikipedia articles should not be...excessive listing of statistics. Long and sprawling lists of statistics may be confusing to readers and reduce the readability and neatness of our articles." How is this article any different than a list of statistics? --WikiDonn (talk) 18:46, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * It's hardly indiscriminate—it's a list of highways and data relevant to them. An example of indiscriminate data would be List of Jackie Gleason's favorite animals.  If the list included additional data like length, number of lanes, surface type, connected cities, elevation data, would that make it less worthy of existing, or more so?  —EncMstr (talk) 19:19, 26 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep -- We have articles on English A-class roads, but not minor roads. These sorts of articles are commonly generated starting with a list, which shows what articles are needed.  However, tabular articles with additional information tend to be better in the long run.  Peterkingiron (talk) 23:53, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep -- No valid criteria for deletion given. We don't need xxxx is a personal opinion, not relevant to WP:V, WP:GNG, WP:list or WP:CLN, all adequately met by this list. If I believed (and stated) that We don't need editors who believe such and such would that in turn become a valid rationale for deleting them as a user.  Not only unlikely, but entirely against policies in WP.  Please stick with valid deletion criteria when nominating articles for deletion.--Mike Cline (talk) 18:00, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.