Wikivoyage talk:Region article template/Archive 2004-2012

Thanks! these needed to all be brought into line with the others....

Region Maps

A lot of the exist country pages under the Region sections do not have any region maps. Instead they seem to have basic country maps and there is no room to place an region map. But most of these region sections contain a list of the particular country regions but there is no easy way to see them. A good example is the Spain page. Ideally we want to include this outline map somewhere within the Spain pages. http://shared.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Image:Spain_regions.png And do the same for other places

See and Do

So, I added two new sections: "See" and "Do". For regions, these would just be attractions that people shouldn't miss, or are more associated with the region than with the particular city they're in.

For example, Lake Tahoe#Do should include some information about skiing, and link out to the cities and ski resorts where you can actually ski. Similarly, Northumberland#See has Hadrian's Wall, and a link to the city where the main visitors' center is.

I don't think we need full attraction listings in the region pages -- just pointers to where to find the full listing.

I'm wondering whether it makes sense to have this at the country level, too.

Comments and criticisms very welcome. --(WT-en) Evan 17:13, 14 Apr 2004 (EDT)

Is there any real benefit of having "See" and "Do" separately ? Isn't it just confusing for the readers ? (WT-en) Wojsyl 14:18, 1 Jan 2005 (EST)

Buy

I'm adding a "buy" to the template. -- (WT-en) Nils 10:38, 22 May 2004 (EDT)

First, why? I'm not sure I understand why it's needed. Second, could you please add it to the full template with explanation, and not just the short part?

I'm going to remove it for now, until you have time to do the full job. --(WT-en) Evan 12:45, 22 May 2004 (EDT)

I'd like to suggest we include a buy section in this template. I don't see why it would be any different than "eat" or "drink"—it should simply include an overview of what there is to buy in the region -- what types of souvenirs would a traveler want to take home? This is also a good place to highlight major shopping destinations within the region, but not individual stores, which should be described only in the individual city articles. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 09:41, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

As long as it's optional, sure. (WT-en) LtPowers 10:20, 22 September 2009 (EDT)

Sleep

I think sleep has a place in the region template. Just like in country and large city templates, it's an overview of the type of accomidations travellers can expect to find. It's a good place to mention if there is camping, hostels, or something unique-- with links to the specific articles with listings. I'd like it put back in, it can always be deleted if it's not needed. (WT-en) Majnoona 21:46, 5 Aug 2004 (EDT)

Cities

Where do "villages" fit ? Under "Cities" or "Other destinations" ? Not all the travellers like to visit cities. I for one usually prefer travelling to villages or other smaller settlements if I have choice. (WT-en) Wojsyl 14:18, 1 Jan 2005 (EST)

I'm usually a stickler for strict templating, but for this I agree that "Cities" is just not a sensible moniker for very, very sparsely populated places like Svalbard, Falkland Islands or South Coast (New South Wales). Is there any problem with allowing any one (1) of "Cities", "Towns" and "Villages", depending on the population? (WT-en) Jpatokal 06:13, 27 Sep 2005 (EDT)

I think that sounds fine. Just like we use the formal name of sub-regions if they exist ("counties", "states", "cantons", etc.) it should be OK to use Towns or Villages or whatever. However, I think it should be an exception, not a rule. --(WT-en) Evan 12:42, 27 Sep 2005 (EDT)

Villages should go in the same section as "cities". By "cities", we just mean "communities" or "settlements", not necessarily big metropolises. --(WT-en) Evan 12:42, 27 Sep 2005 (EDT)

Then why not say "communities" or "settlements"? (WT-en) Andy Mabbett 09:56, 15 December 2006 (EST)

Because we've said "Cities" for more than 3 years; because we've got 12,000 articles that follow that standard; because multi-syllabic words sound stuffy and overblown; because "community" also refers to the people in the area; because "settlement" sounds more like a colonial outpost. --(WT-en) Evan 11:52, 15 December 2006 (EST)

If a region officially has no cities, then for that region it makes sense (less confusing, more helpful, less misleading, more accurate, etc) to use ==Towns== instead of ==Cities== - yes? ~ 203.144.143.5 23:29, 17 December 2006 (EST)

Surely we can use a criteria based on population. For example, if say over 50,000 or whatever, it is called a city, if less then its a town and if less than say 1000 people then it's a vilage. We could also partially solve this by ranking the list of 'cities' not alphabetically but by size. The reason given above is that we should stick to the template because we have used it for 3 years, but that doesn't make sense because it is simply still makes it wrong. Also I think the casual reader upon seeing a list of towns and villages that they know are clearly not cities, listed as cities, then will instinctively make a judgement that this information is incorrect and not bother any further. (WT-en) Terence s 08:08, 13 September 2010 (EDT)

Would that be population of the CBD? Of the metropolitan area? What about unincorporated communities? (WT-en) LtPowers 08:34, 13 September 2010 (EDT)

"Cities" is just wrong in many cases. (WT-en) Pashley 09:20, 13 September 2010 (EDT)

We do have Project:World_cities which lists anyplace that is either over 100,000 or a capital city. I'm not sure if it is up to date or how "over 100,000" is counted. (WT-en) Pashley 09:46, 13 September 2010 (EDT)

Towns or Cities

Swept in from the Project:Travelers' pub:

I changed a lot of Town, Towns/Cities, Small Town etc sections to Cities according to our templates. Seems not everyone is happy about that. I just think we should stick to the templates or change the templates. I realized this sloppynes when I tried to parse som Italian region with my wtbook script. --(WT-en) elgaard 19:49, 15 Jul 2005 (EDT)

Yeah, it's a continuing sticking point, but I was glad to see that you'd done it. It's never a mistake to edit articles towards the MOS. --(WT-en) Evan 20:04, 15 Jul 2005 (EDT)

Towns or Cities, again

Swept in from the Project:Travelers' pub:

We are having a little discussion on South Coast (New South Wales), Talk:South Coast (New South Wales) about Towns vs Cities. Could we settle it here? --(WT-en) elgaard 20:26, 26 Sep 2005 (EDT)

The right place for this discussion is Project:Region article template#Cities. (WT-en) Jpatokal 06:09, 27 Sep 2005 (EDT)

Itineraries

The Itineraries addition to this template is not all that recent any more, yet I haven't seen a good example of one -- the "submersible yak-drawn cart" is an amusing mental image, but doesn't really help much in devising a realistic itinerary. Can someone recommend a good example from a real page? Or is this concept not taking off? -- (WT-en) Bill-on-the-Hill 18:20, 26 Dec 2005 (EST)

I'm not a big fan. I think the link between guides and itineraries are loose and I'd rather use RDF to associate itinerary articles with "guide" articles, and list them in the left navigation area. But that's just me. Three days in Singapore is probably a good example of what people want to see here. --(WT-en) Evan 23:15, 26 Dec 2005 (EST)

I'd like to remove this section of the article template and instead use Project:related articles to associate an itinerary with a city, region, country, or whatever. Objections, comments, criticisms, support? --(WT-en) Evan 13:08, 3 November 2006 (EST)

The related tag should serve the same purpose, and removing the Itineraries sub-heading gets rid of a somewhat confusing part of this template. Support. -- (WT-en) Ryan 19:23, 14 November 2006 (EST)

Objection. The itineraries should be clearly visible in the article, and the main issue is just that there aren't all that many itineraries yet. The related articles box is hidden in the navbar and is practically invisible; just look at how many people we get adding the Wikipedia link to the main body because "it doesn't work". (WT-en) Jpatokal 23:27, 14 November 2006 (EST)

I'm not opposed to including itineraries in an article if it works (Singapore#Itineraries works nicely), but I'm not sure it should by default be a part of the template - maybe just adding a note on Project:Where you can stick it would suffice? As it is we have hundreds of region article templates, most of which have either an empty "Itineraries" heading or else have had that heading deleted. -- (WT-en) Ryan 23:33, 14 November 2006 (EST)

I don't have much of an opinion either way on keeping or not keeping the default heading, although I'd lean towards keeping it: just like with other headings, it means that even if there isn't anything here, there should be. But I would object loudly to removing the existing sections and shunting their contents into the Related box. (WT-en) Jpatokal 23:37, 14 November 2006 (EST)

Order of cities

Is there a guideline for in what order cities should be listed (alphabetical, size, geographical)? -- (WT-en) Brendio 10:30, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

Capital city first - then, following a one line gap, other cities in alphabetical order. At least that's the way I have always done it, and as nobody has ever changed the order or commented on it, I guess it's an acceptable formula. (WT-en) WindHorse 22 Jan 06

Sounds good to me. The only thing I'd add is a remineder that this does not need to be an exhaustive list of cities in a region... some of this lists are a little overwhelming. (WT-en) Majnoona 11:12, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

I don't think alphabetical listings should be a standard, what we do every time. I see them as the default, what we fall back to if there's nothing better. If there is a natural order, such as I've used in Fujian, or the obvious West-to-East listing for cities in Mediterranean Europe, we should use that. Making sense to the reader is far more important than consistency. (WT-en) Pashley 01:14, 24 July 2007 (EDT)

My concern with deviating from an alphabetical standard is that most contributors here learn from example (chances are they will never find this discussion) and a lack of standard ordering in lists could encourage ordering schemes that I think we should avoid. For example: ordering cities by "importance" or "quality." Although as I write this, I realize that (WT-en) Marc and I did just that with the Chicago#Districts. Perhaps I should think about this more carefully. In any rate, there are other ways to convey geographical orderings. Maps are an obvious one; another that I liked was the "next destination" template idea for "get out" sections. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 01:32, 24 July 2007 (EDT)

Personally, I see the region and cities' lists as an index, and so feel that the present way of listing places alphabetically is fine. Furthermore, I think it would be difficult to list destinations using other categorizations and, to be honest, I can't say I'm convinced of the benefit of doing so. For example, we could use importance. That would be obvious for perhaps the first two or three places on the list, but generally not so for the remaining 6 or 7 and, anyway, under the present system the capital city has the premier spot. Geographically is a possibility, but how do we know where travelers will arrive and in which direction they will travel. If there is only one valley, then it might be appropriate to list the places in the order that a traveler will come upon them. This we already do on itineraries. However, most countries or regions are more complex than a single valley, and so listing them from north to south, for example, will not be helpful for someone who is traveling east to west. Using the alphabetical way to list destinations is not perfect, but I still contend that it is the most user-friendly system - both for contributors and readers. However, places listed under 'Get out', and perhaps 'Districts', have a different criteria. For one thing, they are often not well known (unlike the major cities on the main list), and so travelers are more likely to search for them based on their location, not name. Therefore, listing these destinations geographically is reasonable...Anyway, just my opinion.... (WT-en) WindHorse 09:34, 24 July 2007 (EDT)

Order of sections

I also wonder if if would be better to move the regions, cities and other destinations to the bottom of the page, as these are just lists and it means that you have to sometimes scroll three pages to get to the Understand page to start actually reading about a region. I think it would be better to see the list of cities etc. after you have read about the area, getting in etc. See the Bavaria page for an example of this. -- (WT-en) Brendio 11:57, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

I'd like to eventually move them to the left navigation menu, along with the table of contents. --(WT-en) Evan 12:22, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

I agree. I think that the 'understand' section looks better at the top, then possibly 'get in' as the second section. (WT-en) WindHorse 23 Jan 06

I would prefer to keep the Region, Cities and Other Destinations at the top of the page at present. These are rather like tables of contents for all the related articles. There is already an untitled Introduction/Understand section at the top of the page that can be used. At present it is only being used for a sentence or two but I see no reason why couple of paragraphs couldn't be here. You would then only need to have an Understand section on small article if you wanted to get really detailed. Bavaria is a good example of what can be done and is a very reasonable, though modest introduction. I am thinking of something more like the size of New Zealand's introduction for most articles. -- (WT-en) Huttite 16:29, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

I am always unsure of what info should go in the intro and what should be in Understand. Perhaps that is part of the problem. -- (WT-en) Brendio 17:07, 22 Jan 2006 (EST)

What (WT-en) Huttite said is also true. The lists of cities and other destinations are like a table of contents in a book, and so obviously should be on the top. To continue the book allegory, I guess the the indroduction is like the blurb on the back cover: it offers a short and consise appraisal of the contents, whereas the understand section is more akin with a book's introduction, offering more depth and detail. In short, I would say the indroduction should state where the region is located, followed by one or two lines about its most notable features. The introduction can add further details about these, as well as an outline of the region's history and present status. Personally, I like to have some background knowledge of a place I'm visiting, not just information on tourist sites and restaurants. Anyway, these are just personal ideas... (WT-en) WindHorse 23 Jan 06

How small should one make (sub)regions

If a region can be broken into a subregion on local political grounds, should it necessarily be the case? If a region will have say 7 towns in it, is it worth breaking it down further into three subregions of around two towns each? I think not. Is there a minimum number of towns/cities that a region should have before it is considered. By the way, I mean towns and cities that are of interest to tourists. My example is the current subdivision of Franconia into Upper, Middle and Lower. I think the region page for Franconia is enough. -- (WT-en) Brendio 17:00, 30 Jan 2006 (EST)

We try to keep things in the 7±2 range, per the Project:geographical hierarchy page. --(WT-en) Evan 17:04, 30 Jan 2006 (EST)

How many is nine.

So the "Cities" section of United Kingdom says

Many cities and towns in the United Kingdom are of interest to travellers outside the capital city of London. Following is an alphabetical selection of nine - others are listed under their specific countries and regions:

And then it lists nine cities other than London.

Call me a crazy Yank, but that's ten to me. Or to put it in Project:Slippery slope terms,

Many cities and towns in the United States are of interest to travellers outside of the world-famous cities of New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Chicago, New Orleans, Honolulu, and Miami. Following is a selection of nine of these other cities:

What do others think? -- (WT-en) Colin 13:50, 15 December 2006 (EST)

The capital is a bit of a special case, especially in countries like the UK where it's so dominant in size and tourism compared to the competition. If it's in the bullet points, then it's just one of nine, but if it's in the text body like that, IMHO it doesn't count. (WT-en) Jpatokal 13:58, 15 December 2006 (EST)

In this case, though, it's in the text like that precisely because someone wanted to get around the nine cities limit. I think we should stick with the bright line limit. -- (WT-en) Jonboy 14:01, 15 December 2006 (EST)

Note that this tactic has already been spread to the England article too by the "Leeds should be in the list" anonymous user who has used it as a means of finally getting Leeds in there. It's not his Leeds boosterism that concerns me; rather it's the precedent of boosting an item into the text for the specific purpose of injecting Just One More City into the list that concerns me.

Also in this instance London would clearly be in the list if it wasn't already in the text. - (WT-en) Colin 14:03, 15 December 2006 (EST)

So, I'm going to dissent on this. The "Nine rule" comes from the Geographical hierarchy, where we suggest using the 7±2 heuristic as a branching factor for our hierarchy. That is, each level in the hierarchy has a maximum of about 5-9 sub-levels. That way, when someone's looking at the page for the United States, they aren't confronted with 50+ sub-elements for all the states and territories, but instead with a more manageable set. People's brains are hard-wired (supposedly) to handle groups of 7±2 things pretty well; they feel natural, while bigger groups feel overwhelming.

But, it's not like that's the most important rule that trumps everything else. For example, I think that if there's a very small region with 10-12 villages in it, we're not going to split it up into two separate arbitrary regions with 5-7 villages apiece just to satisfy this rule. 7±2 is a rule of thumb that should be balanced against other criteria, not an iron edict to be obeyed above all others.

Now, that all said, the "Cities" list at the country or major region level is kind of special. It's not really part of the hierarchy. It's a way of making shortcuts, so that people who don't know much about Azerbaijan, for example, can find Baku without knowing that it's in the Apsheron Peninsula region. These are utility shortcuts so that people who don't know a lot about their destination can find that destination easily. One rule of thumb might be asking, Would it be ridiculous to have a guide about X without mentioning Y? If you can have a guide about Japan that doesn't mention Tsuruta, well, let's move that link further down the hierarchy. If you can't have an article about France that doesn't mention Paris, we should have a place on the page for that city.

Anyways, down to numbers: the 7±2 list is about as applicable for city lists as for hierarchy lists, but I think it's a soft limit. If there are 10-12 cities that people are going to feel are really missing from Germany or Australia, well, let's bend the rules a bit.

Finally, on the specific topic: Leeds is not one of those cities for either the UK or for England. And routing around these limits in order to shoehorn it into the list is a real waste of time, energy, and goodwill. --(WT-en) Evan 15:18, 15 December 2006 (EST)

I think that sets a bad precedent. It's already tough enough to stick to nine-cities-period, convincing people that their cities are not worthy of an exception will be even harder. (WT-en) Jpatokal 23:10, 15 December 2006 (EST)

I'm not sure I like the "is it ridiculous not to mention" guideline as it's too arbitrary - many people might think it's ridiculous not to mention any number of cities on the United States article, for example. My take on things is that the 7 +/- 2 guideline is something that generally doesn't need to be considered, but is useful for those cases where there's a question about what cities/regions/whatever are appropriate for a list. If a county has fifteen towns, it's clear that the list should point to all fifteen or (if appropriate) that the county should be sub-divided. However, if a state has 200 cities it's not clear what cities should be listed for the state article, and in that case a guideline is useful in helping people decide what should be included.

Regarding Colin's original point, I don't feel too strongly about it but if pressed would say that London should be included as a bullet in the list. -- (WT-en) Ryan 23:16, 15 December 2006 (EST)

Well, it is the point of the "Cities" section at country and region level. We "promote" cities higher up the hierarchy as a navigation aid only; it helps people get to the most common cities they're looking for faster. It's not a popularity contest or a judgment on the quality of the cities; it's just a way for people to get to the links they need faster. --(WT-en) Evan 23:27, 15 December 2006 (EST)

Agreed, but I think the discussion is where we draw the line in terms of which cities get "promoted". As it stands currently the guideline is that 7 +/- 2 get promoted. If I understand your earlier point you're suggesting we change that guideline to "is it ridiculous not to mention", and I think that opens the door to everyone's own interpretation. Also, since the 7 +/- 2 rule is a guideline we could always make an exception if there was a region that contained more than nine cities that absolutely had to be listed; however, that would probably be the rare exception. -- (WT-en) Ryan 23:44, 15 December 2006 (EST)

I'd like to suggest the creation of a template called Template:Ninecities that would look something like this: <!--We try to keep city listings to between 5 and 9 almost all the time. If you want to debate *which* nine cities should be here, or explain why this is one of the rare exceptions to this rule, please use the talk page.--> Then I could just do {{subst:ninecities}} when I edit a city list down to nine. (Which is fairly frequently.) This might prevent people from (understandably) thinking, "Oh, I just created an article for my favorite little place. I'll make it the 10th city on this list." (And then the next person makes it 11, etc...)

Where is the 7 +/- 2 Rule Spelled Out?

Is there somewhere where we officially note the 7 +/- 2 guideline? I was looking and didn't immediately find anything and would have thought that this page was a good place for it. Specifically, I added an orphaned article to Central Maryland as that was the smallest parent sub-region for the town in question. In this case I believe that it increased the city list for that region to more than 9, but since there was no smaller region to use I believe this was OK as all cities are supposed to be listed in a parent region. Is that indeed the case? See Contra Costa County for just one of many examples where there are more than nine cities listed - it doesn't make sense to break that region down further simply to create a list of fewer than nine cities. If that's NOT the case, then what's the official policy with respect to orphaned articles?

Also, just to be clear, the region article template does note "if there are more than 10 consider breaking the region up" but doesn't really go into any detail about why, when more than 9 is totally not OK, when more than 9 IS OK, etc. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 11:18, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

The common practice is to allow more than 9 regions, but not cities. It's ideal to have less than 10 regions, but if it doesn't make any sense, we haven't been forcing it. A good example of when to do this is when you have, say, 7 top level regions in a state that make perfect sense, but then want to break those down by county and have 11 counties in one of those regions. There's no better option, so we keep the 11. The rule is spelled out at Project:Geographical hierarchy#Dividing geographical units at the useful shortcut of 7+2. But you're definitely right—we haven't spelled out the intricacies of our practices anywhere. Maybe it would be useful to write a separate policy on dividing geographical units? --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 11:51, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

And yeah, it's OK, even desirable, to have more than 9 cities when there is no smaller region to put them in. We talked about that at Project:Geographical hierarchy#Should every city be listed in *some* region? --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 11:57, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

I contend, though, that it's useful to put those below the list of 9, so that when/if we subdivide further, it's obvious which 9 cities to keep in the original list. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 11:59, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

Thanks for the pointers - I remembered several discussions on the matter, but a quick search didn't find anything. Would it make sense to add the following to Project:Geographical hierarchy#Dividing geographical units, and then add pointers to that section to Project:Region article template#Cities and other relevant places:

1. Whenever possible lists should be no longer than 7 +/- 2 items.
2. For city lists on region articles where a sub-region exists the list MUST NOT exceed 7 +/- 2.
3. For city lists on region articles where a sub-region does not exist the list MAY exceed 7 +/- 2 in order to ensure that all cities within the region are listed, but consider long lists as a sign that sub-regions may be needed.
4. In cases where lists exceed nine cities due to a lack of sub-regions, keep the nine most notable cities at the top of the list to make future breakup of regions easier.

That's a quick & dirty summary, please add & expand as needed. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 12:21, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

Telephone number subsection

I've proposed a Telephone number template for use in articles. Would it, perhaps, be sensible to have a "telephones" sub-section to the "understand" section, or elsewhere, in each article? (WT-en) Andy Mabbett 10:37, 29 December 2006 (EST)

Get out

This came up in Western India. For really large regions such as Western India or Midwest (United States of America), it makes no sense to have a Get out section. What can one write there? Suggesting daytrips will sound silly. So I want to amend the explanation here to allow the section to be left out for really large regions. — (WT-en) Ravikiran 05:12, 22 February 2007 (EST)

I agree with Ravi, some regions are way too large to have a Get Out section. We have to bend the rule for such places. After all, Western India and Midwest (United States of America) are bigger than many countries in size. (WT-en) Upamanyuwikivoyage 08:24, 22 February 2007 (EST)

I modified it. Please comment or change if needed. — (WT-en) Ravikiran 06:27, 23 February 2007 (EST)

See, Do, Eat instructions

Could the region template have a (commented out) instruction installed with the template indicating that these sections are not to be filled with listings, but rather an overview? (WT-en) OldPine 12:21, 4 July 2007 (EDT)

Actually, this is still a little fuzzy, as there are occasionally some places that just don't fit sensibly in a "destination", eg. the Miho Museum in Shiga (deep in the mountains near no town of any size, yet with no places to stay). Islands like Penang are also tricky, because there's one identifiable town (George Town) and then a scattershot of other attractions elsewhere. (WT-en) Jpatokal 13:09, 4 July 2007 (EDT)

Good point. The instruction language could indicate an exception for this situation. I dunno. Nevermind. (WT-en) OldPine 23:20, 4 July 2007 (EDT)

Get in

This section says it's OK to "just leave it out" if there is no clear entry point. Wanting to know whether that meant leave the section empty or remove it, I went to the example given: Midwest (United States of America) but there the Get in section is filled in. Some other sections have this language, too. Does "just leave it out" mean remove it or leave it empty? (WT-en) OldPine 07:04, 5 July 2007 (EDT)

I think it should mean remove it. Empty sections look ugly and I'd never support an article with an empty section as a guide or a star. Plus, they are a magnet for pointless information. That is the approach I took with "Get out" for region articles (see above.) That said, I am hard put to think of a situation where region articles will not have a get in section. — (WT-en) Ravikiran 07:14, 5 July 2007 (EDT)

I just removed the bit about leaving out the Get in section (not having seen this discussion). It's actually a requirement for usable status, so it stands to reason that it must be a requirement for the template in general. If there is no one clear entry point, then you could just give an overview of the various entry points, and why you would choose one over another, or of the main transportation routes into the region. There's certainly no clear entry point for this region article, but the section is still a useful thing for any visitor just starting to read about the region, I think. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 09:37, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

Article status descriptions

.... are wrong in this template. Eg: This is a usable article. It has information for getting in as well as some complete entries for restaurants and hotels. An adventurous person could use this article, but please plunge forward and help it grow! I am sure this will confuse users (it did me initially until Peter F kindly took the time to explain) and this does not represent the usable status bar for regional articles. Indeed indvidual listings of hotels and restaurants would seem inappropriate in a regional article. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 00:19, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

Yes the generic usable template jars with region articles—it's necessary to use Template:Usableregion. That template was not at all up to date either, though, but I've now fixed it. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 09:12, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

Thanks Peter for clearing that up.--(WT-en) Burmesedays 11:19, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

Talk

Why is there a separate "Talk" section in this template? As far as I have experienced, it attracts a lot of nonsense and encyclopedical information about language families and such. Travelers don't need to know that much about languages, and what they need to know, I think easily could fit under a sub-section of the Understand section of an article. --(WT-en) globe-trotter 11:15, 24 February 2010 (EST)

I don't know about folding it into understand, but I do think we should remove it from the region article template, since most regions will not have a different language than their parent region, leading to content duplication. Unlike country articles, I think it would be best to leave it optional for regions. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 12:53, 24 February 2010 (EST)

Seconded. "Talk" should be required in Project:Country article template, and included in regions only if absolutely necessary. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 19:15, 24 February 2010 (EST)

I largely agree, although I'm not sure it's true that the majority of regions have nothing new to say about dialects and language. =) (WT-en) LtPowers 09:08, 25 February 2010 (EST)

Agreed. It should be optional and only used when appropriate.--(WT-en) Burmesedays 09:15, 25 February 2010 (EST)

Other destinations

swept from pub:

I am sure there is a better place for this question, and an existing discussion but I cannot find it. Should Other destinations listed in the spirit of 7+2, be articles or attractions? My understanding has always been that they should be articles about places that are not towns/cities, and that attractions should go into the See section. I have made a few deletions on that basis, but figured I ought to check for sure before making anymore. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 22:50, 16 April 2010 (EDT)

I don't think there is a clear answer to that, because I know both have been used. Generally I think you are correct that they are supposed to be places that are not towns/cities, but it seems that attractions that are famous enough are also accepted. (WT-en) ChubbyWimbus 23:41, 16 April 2010 (EDT)

I have always moved attractions from other destinations to see when I have come across them. I have just looked around but could not find any discussions on this. But the country and region templates show linked other destinations suggesting that it should be articles, and where you can stick it only mention national/state parks as examples of other destinations. I cannot think of any reason to list attractions, which are not large enough to have their own article, under other destinations. Also, is it not implied in the name, other destinations, that this should only be destinations?, --(WT-en) ClausHansen 02:35, 17 April 2010 (EDT)

Come to think of it, I think I've also seen the "Other Destinations" used to house towns/cities in areas that don't have "other destinations" in regions with more than 9 cities but not enought for further regionalization... (WT-en) ChubbyWimbus 04:08, 17 April 2010 (EDT)

I have seen that too, and have moved those cities from other destinations to cities. I think it is more important to put destinatins in the correct category than to restrict the number of cities to nine. Further, as I understand it, the nine rule does not apply for lowest level regions, which can not be split in subregions, --(WT-en) ClausHansen 04:19, 17 April 2010 (EDT)

That's correct. At high levels, we absolutely should restrict O.D.s to non-city destination articles. At lower levels in the hierarchy, however, that's not always feasible, and sometimes we have to fudge a bit. For example, in Pennsylvania, Gettysburg is a major tourist destination, and it's an incorporated community, so by all rights it should go in "Cities". But the truth is that no one goes there for its food, nightlife, or culture; they go there for the battlefield. So we put it in Other Destinations and list it as "Gettysburg National Military Park". In other places, we use subregions as Other Destinations (see, e.g., Mid-Atlantic and its use of Finger Lakes as an O.D., or Napa Valley in California).

I think that was me who wrote the above. I still think it applies. (WT-en) LtPowers 19:33, 13 August 2010 (EDT)

[unindent] I think we need to discuss this further. Please see, for example, Talk:Switzerland#Other destinations. I thought the standard was that anyplace that is defined as a city cannot be listed in "Other destinations" in a region or country article (see discussion at Talk:India#Are hill stations cities? for a clear previous example), and that it was really for great uninhabited or at least non-city/-town/-village attractions like parks, huge temple complexes (e.g. Angkor Wat), and other great attractions (Iguaçu Falls and the like) that either aren't in the middle of cities or eclipse them. However, I see that there is not agreement on what should be in "Other destinations." I should say that I personally really don't care if cities are among "Other destinations," but it frustrates me for there to be no agreed-upon standard or guideline, because then we can't go to the next step and create hidden text that would by default explain to users how to use this section. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:10, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I think practice has always been that it is acceptable to link to city articles when it is clear that the link is for the destination being linked rather than the city itself. As examples, we link to Niagara Falls from North America#Other destinations since the waterfall is the attraction, not the two towns that happens to be located next to it. Similarly, Colorado#Other destinations includes Aspen and Vail, both of which are nice little towns, but the links are there for the very famous ski resorts of the same names. I'd like to see that practice continue - it would be a shame to have to exclude Niagara Falls or the two most famous ski resorts in Colorado just because they happen to be covered in city articles rather than park articles. -- Ryan • (talk) • 18:37, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I mentioned above "that it was really for great uninhabited or at least non-city/-town/-village attractions like parks, huge temple complexes (e.g. Angkor Wat), and other great attractions (Iguaçu Falls and the like) that either aren't in the middle of cities or eclipse them." In the case of Niagara Falls, the falls are an attraction that eclipses the city, and a strong argument can be made that the ski resorts in various ski towns eclipse the towns, but is it OK to simply link the town and mention the ski resort? As I said, I don't really care much what direction we go in; I just want clarity. I think that lots of people are confused about what belongs in "Other destinations," and I used to think it was fine to put cities there, period. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:48, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I can't really see why it would not be OK to add a place to the Other destinations just because it has some permanent population. As I've understood it until now, the Cities section is for large cities with a lot of attractions and the Other destinations is for, well, other destinations ie. everything else. This would include national parks, but also ski/beach resorts and cities/towns that are otherwise non-notable but have one very famous sight in the city or nearby. I think this is logical and works.

But if the destinations in the Other destinations section may not have any inhabitants, then it would effectively mean that we'd have to remove most destinations listed in the Other destinations sections of our country and region articles. That would make Other destinations about as useful as the Learn and Work sections. ϒpsilon (talk) 19:02, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I think it makes sense to mention a beach as an "Other destination" if the city where the beach is in is not mentioned in "Cities," but it's the beach and not the city that should be listed in "Other destinations," if we're going to maintain the idea that "Other destinations" means "Non-city destinations." Same with ski resorts - so that it makes sense to list Aspen Ski Resort as an "Other destination" in Colorado if Aspen isn't among the up to 9 "Cities" listed. But if we simply list Aspen, aren't we once again confusing the issue? I want everyone to clearly understand what should and shouldn't be put in "Other destinations." If we can't agree on anything that's sufficiently clear, maybe we should change the name of the section, perhaps to "Top 9 attractions" or something (but I don't think that phrase would be accepted here). But I think there are a lot of problems with article templates that go beyond this, as for example there's often a lot of confusion in this template between "Other destinations" and "See." We've been discussing these things at User talk:Wrh2/Why Wikivoyage was not my primary travel planning tool, and perhaps we should be discussing a reform to "Other destinations" in that talk page, too. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:19, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I believe current practice is exactly as Ryan describes. "Other destinations" may be major attractions that happen to be covered in a city article but where the lure for travelers isn't the city amenities. These are exceptions to the normal practice of restricting "Other destinations" to non-city articles, so they should be treated as such, but there seems to be wide agreement that they're acceptable when warranted. Powers ^(talk) 22:18, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Should we revisit hill stations in the Indian Subcontinent on this basis? The traditional reason to visit them is not for the city amenities but to cool off and enjoy hilly areas with great views. If not, I think that listing the city per se in "Other destinations" on the basis of its attractions confuses the issue, and, for example, instead of listing Aspen in other destinations, we should list it as Aspen Ski Resort. Does that make sense to you? I just want to avoid confusion. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:23, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't know anything about hill stations. Yes, the listing in "Other destinations" should list the attraction, pipelinked to the destination; that's standard practice AFAIK. Powers ^(talk) 03:07, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't really think there's quite a standard practice, in actuality, but it's good to see we both understand this the same way, at least. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:42, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Regional tourism link

Hi there, new to Wikivoyage, though been with Wikipedia a while. Where should the tourist info link for a region go and in what format? For instance, Haida Gwaii has Go Haida Gwaii. I've read the lede is a good place for it, but would I just add a sentence saying "Tourism info is available here.[1]" Doesn't seem right. - (WT-en) Wmcduff 00:57, 27 September 2011 (EDT)

See Project:External links for guidance. If that URL is the official link for the tourism board of the region then it would go in the opening sentence following the destination name: "The Queen Charlotte Islands or Haida Gwaii [2] (Islands of the People) are in British Columbia, Canada." -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 01:04, 27 September 2011 (EDT)

Aha. Thank you. And it is the official one, brought to us by the "local Destination Marketing Organization". I'm pretty sure that means "local tourism board." - (WT-en) Wmcduff 01:14, 27 September 2011 (EDT)

empty see/do, eat/drink, sleep sections

We seem to have a mess of continent > country > large region > province/state > region > subregion > city > district listings where at every level the standard sections (get in/get around, see/do, eat/drink, buy, sleep, get out) exist even though listing the same info at multiple levels of regionalisation becomes rapidly pointless or duplicative. If we already say that maple syrup grows on trees in Canada, repeating this information for Ontario, then again in eastern Ontario, then again in southeastern Ontario, the Ottawa Valley and every other subregion of Ontario gets boring and futile quickly. The end result is usually that these sections are left blank in all of these pointless subregions, which were only created as pages because each had 7 +- 2 towns or villages and enough text to fill the "Understand" section. Dining in southeastern Ontario isn't much different from dining anywhere else in Ontario, so the sections are empty.

To say that "Ottawa is home of the Canadian Parliament, a terminus of the Rideau Canal and offers many national-level museums" once is fine, but do we need to repeat this in Canada, Ontario, eastern Ontario and the individual subregion? If not, what goes in the subregion article beyond a general description and its area of coverage?

I'm thinking that each subregion really only needs a basic description with the "understand" information and the list of cities and towns. Anything more is already in the province, region and locality pages so there's no point in listing (get in/get around, see/do, eat/drink, buy, sleep, get out) again. K7L (talk) 20:53, 29 December 2012 (UTC)