Wikipedia:WikiProject Canada Roads/Ontario/Standards

Resources

• Main resources page

• Infobox and Navbox Guide
• Content and standards guide
• Member books
• 1989 vs 2008 Length comparisons
• Map colour guide

• Assessments

Infobox

• See WP:ONRD/BOX

Structure

These should generally be the only primary headers, in order:

• Route description
• History
• Future
• Services
• Exit list (or Major intersections for roads that are not freeways)
• See also
• References
• External links

Feel free to divide the sections into subheaders to divide long sections.

Explanation of sections

Route description

The route description is self explanatory at first, until you start writing one. It should describe the route as it is today! Always scale your route description to the length of the road; while Highway 2 could be described turn for turn in its entirety, Highway 401 is far too long to do more than describe it by sections.

History

In many cases, the history section is where you will explain the downloaded routes of provincial highways. Try to summarize such a description, however. The history of the route itself, on the other hand, can be as vibrantly detailed as you can find sources for. History should be covered chronologically, but not simply in a point-form-esque fashion:

• "On July 22, Highway 1 was transferred to the Foo Regional government. On August 15, the Foo Regional government put up signs announcing this change. On September 12, the new route signs were erected."

That reads like a grade 3 book report. Instead, tell the history as an all encompassing story:

• "Beginning on July 22, Highway 1 was transferred to the Foo Regional government. This was publicly announced on August 15, and by September 12, the erection of new route signs completed the transfer."

Can you see the difference?

Future

The future section should only exist if there is planned work to be done on a highway. No speculation should be placed into this section: Only what you can source. They may be reconstructing the highway outside of your town, but you do not know what the work is, why it's being done, and when it is (supposed) to be completed.

Services

There are service centres on Highway 400 and Highway 401. On Highway 401, these should be listed west to east. On Highway 400, they should be listed south to north. In both cases, a table should be used. The same concepts that apply to an Exit list apply to this table - Use #d3d3d3 for closed service centres, with a note and source in the Notes column.

Exit List

• WP:RJL

Major intersections

Major intersections follows the same concept as an exit list. The only difference is that Major intersections is used on a road that is not a freeway. You should list all numbered roads that intersect the subject road, the termini, and any other important arterial roads. Generally these are concession roads that have become the primary arterial roads, and major collector roads. Otherwise, follow the conventions of WP:RJL and the Exit list section directly above.

Templates

• {{Infobox road}}
• {{jcon}} - Use when you need a shield to appear (ie not in the prose).
• {{convert}} - Use whenever you use a kilometre value. Use the abbr=on parameter after the first usage of the template to avoid repeating kilometres and miles over and over. The bonus with this template is that it handles the formatting issues with units of measurement.
• {{Google maps}} - Use to source a Google satellite shot.
• {{Bing maps}} - Use to source a Bing satellite shot.
• {{cite map}} - Use to source atlases/map books.
• {{cite news}} - Use to source newspapers (online or offline).
• {{cite report}} - Use to source government press releases, announcements, news.
• {{cite web}} - Use to source websites.

Citations and references

Source as much as you can possibly source! It is far easier to remove unnecessary sources after the fact than it is to find more sources. You should not simply slap a link between <ref></ref> tags. Instead make use of the cite templates:

• {{cite web}}
• {{cite report}}
• {{cite news}}
• {{cite map}}

The documentation for these templates explains the parameters. In general a title, author, publisher, and date are included.

When using Google or Bing maps as a source, there are two templates that simplify the chore:

• {{Google maps}}
• {{Bing maps}}

These three need only a title, url, and accessdate entered.