Talk:Queen's Road, Hong Kong

revert explanation, queensway

This is one road, with four sections and names, but it's only one road. There is only one unique sentence between this article and the one on Queensway. There is no need to make stub articles spun out of stub articles. Putting the information in a larger context does more to help readers than a one sentence stub.

Secondly, that "nobody referred to the area as admiralty in 1967" is totally irrelevant. It locates the road NOW, not when the subsection was renamed. SchmuckyTheCat 21:19, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

They're four roads. Queensway does not share part of its Chinese name with the others, as the other three do. — Instantnood 18:41, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Four roads that can't stand on their own as independent articles, they do make one good topic. SchmuckyTheCat 18:48, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

They're many things that do make one good topic if lumped together, but they still have their own articles. — Instantnood 21:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

That doesn't even make sense. In any case, I've re-ordered the article and noted all the intersections so a reader can follow the flow of the road along a map. —Preceding unsigned comment added by SchmuckyTheCat (talk • contribs) 02:24, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

With due respect, SchmuckyTheCat, and due appreciation of your expansion in this article, I must say that it is ridiculous to force Queensway into this place. As Instantnood rightly pointed out above, these are four different roads (and not merely four sections of the same road) and this has been firmly established in Hong Kong people's mind. Here are some reasons to back this up:

1. History. Queen's Road Central, West and East had been named since the early days of colonisation, while Queensway was renamed from part of Queen's Road East only starting from 1967 (an unauthorative source: [1]).
2. Chinese name. The Chinese names of Queen's Road C, W and E are all (imperfect) transliteration of the English ones, while the Chinese name of Queensway means "Golden Bell Road" (a reference to the Dockyard in the area before it became today's commercial centre).
3. Spelling. Note the missing apostrophe and space in Queensway? It's no co-incident, mind -- unlike Singapore, roads named as "XX Way" are very rare and few, much less named in one word as "XX-way" (Queensway is one of the only two Hongkong roads with a one-word English name, the other being Glenealy).

And I simply can't agree that [f]our roads that can't stand on their own as independent articles, they do make one good topic. True, there might have been precariously little content in the individual stub pages, but the proper way in wikipedia to encounter these articles (whose notability has been established) is to expand it (which, to your credit, is what you have done, albeit at the wrong place), and not to arbitrarily group and merge them into a single article. Consider, say, footballers stubs -- there you'll find many player whose article is no longer than a couple of sentences, but that doesn't mean that here in wikipedia we shall group them together arbitrarily as, say, Young footballers named McQueen. --Pkchan 14:09, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Queensway isn't "forced" into this article and isn't at all arbitrary. It's one original road, Queen's Road. Look at it on a map, or drive it. It's still a single road. From this perspective, the oddball is QR East, which forks away from Queensway. On the contrary, splitting it out makes a gap in the history and path of Queen's Road.

1. History: History actually is the reason why this is a non-arbitrary grouping that makes sense. They all have one history, it was the first road in the colony, tracing it's history and path makes this the obvious place.
2. Naming: It doesn't matter that the Chinese name or the english name is different. It's still one road. The english name could be Golden Bell as well and I'd still say this is the appropriate place to put the text - even re-routed it's obviously the connector of the original parts of the road.
3. Stubs: Sure, an obvious thing to do is expand stubs. An alternative is to merge the stub to the context of a larger article where it's placed in a better narrative and better context. This is no more the wrong place to merge the content than it would be if the article was originally written as one road. If the sections on individual parts of a large article overwhelm the rest of the article or stand on their, then split the article. Similarly, if individual parts as small articles have no enveloping context, it makes sense to merge them together to make one good article. Your analogy to the footballes fails, they don't share the same context, same history, same place. And if they did, that grouping might not make a bad article. SchmuckyTheCat 15:53, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

See also: U.S. Route 99.

I guess both of us can agree on at least one point: that Queensway has a close tie with the Queen's Roads, both geographically (the "one-road" argument -- though I am not sure it would be a good idea to create an article to link up Queen's Road Central, Queensway, Hennessy Road, Yee Wo Street, Causeway Road and King's Road, Hong Kong)) and historically. The most notable dispute here is whether to present Queensway's main article here, or on a separate article.

How about this: we mention the close ties with Queensway in this article, but link to Queensway, Hong Kong as that section's main article? This solution, I think, would fit both requirements of establishing a strong linkage of Queensway among the Queen's Roads (though not as close as its current form, where Queensway is interpreted as a part of a long trunk road when it is actually not quite true) and establishing the notability of Queensway itself as a newly built, newly named road. Agree?

And, by the way, I do not quite agree with the analogy with U.S. Route 99 -- even if the old Queen's Road was meant to be Hong Kong Island's main trunk road as a single unit, such use was quickly replaced since the 1860s through successive reclamations by the "Praya" (nowadays' Des Voeux Road) in Central and Hennessy Road in Wanchai. --Pkchan 16:15, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I still don't see enough material to justify a split, and, if that happens, then the seperate Queensway article would lose the historical context section in this article that pertains to all of them.

The analogy to the US Route 99 is the article format. There no longer is a US Route 99, but the roads remain. The highway has probably a hundred different names through different localities, but they have a shared, and important, history. Where the local parts of the route have a lot of material, the article has been split out. That article though, is ten times the length of this one, as are split out sections.

Why is it better for Wikipedia to have lots of stubs for four sections of one road, rather than one encompassing article (that should still be considered a stub itself)? SchmuckyTheCat 20:13, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Proposed amendments

Taking into account both STC's and my comments I propose to modify the relevant articles as follows. If the below is deemed ok I'll execute the modifications. --Pkchan 18:56, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

old proposal already implemented on both Queen's Road and Queensway, Hong Kong and can be found as hidden text under this section --Pkchan 12:15, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Generally agree. — Instantnood 19:39, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

• PK, I don't have a problem with what you've done. But Wikipedia:Article size still suggests small stubs should be up-merged. Queensway still needs a lot of work before it really stands as an independent article (if ever). I've put a merge tag on the other article, and I'll suggest it to RfC. SchmuckyTheCat 22:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Hey, please mind you language. Does your PK above mean Puk Guy in foul language?

Please go ahead and submit to RfC and make a link here to discuss.

Yes, it is 2.924K. But, it is not a matter of size. While local people considers Queen's Road and Queensway are different, while most of them does not even know Queensway was part of Queen's Road East nearly 40 years ago, while their Chinese names are utterly different (Wong Hau Tai To vs. Kam Chung To), while their English names are different, it is ridiculous and counter-intuitive to merge the articles. (FYI, in Chinese wikipedia, they are two separate articles. zh:皇后大道 and zh:金鐘道.) It is really a waste of time to prolong the argument while we all can write more and better articles instead. — HenryLi (Talk) 02:57, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

No, by PK, I mean PKchan.

It's all the same road, and like I've said, by removing Queensway from Queen's Road you remove the common context of the article - such as the history section. I'm not convinced that all local people think it's not the same road - particularly locals that drive and the non-native Chinese speakers.

And when I look at road articles from other places, generally multiple roads (even obviously different roads) are often lumped together until each section reaches a size where it makes sense to break it out. Hong Kong has dozens of articles on individual roads that are nothing more than one or two sentences - if they are deserving of a stand-alone article at all. Without a grid, there are plenty of "named" 300m sections of asphalt in Hong Kong, they don't all need articles. SchmuckyTheCat 03:52, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Are you sure the roads and streets in Hong Kong are not in grids? " I'm not convinced that all local people think it's not the same road - particularly locals that drive.. " Are you implying the roads that the trams are running on have to be lumped in the same article? — Instantnood 10:10, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think there's any one insisting one removing the mentioning of Queensway in this article (I still disagree that it's the best way to present the information, but concede that it is acceptable). So the remaining issue here, I guess, should be to merge or not to merge.

So far I can see two main arguments being put forward in favour of the merge:

1. That Queensway and Queens' Road (W/C/E) are the same road. As have been said and re-iterated many times over here, they are not. History (Queensway was re-routed from the old Queen's Road East) doesn't support this assertion; the Chinese names are different; and we are to treat roads as one simply because they connect with each other then I suppose Wikipedia is more counter-intuitive than I think it is.
2. That Queensway can never be more than a stub and the merging is a way to improve it. I somewhat agree with the former (though being an eventualist I do believe that it will get expanded in the long run), but don't agree that in this case merging is the solution -- as I've said above it is no less arbitrary to do so than to merge, say, all roads along the Island Tram path into one article (as has been suggested by Instantnood, above). Let's keep it as a separate stub and wait for it to get expanded. --Pkchan 11:06, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

PS It still baffles me why were all these arguments not raised when I proposed my amendments three weeks ago, but re-opened now.

PPS Yes, I come from Hongkong, my name is P. K. and I welcome anyone addressing me so. --Pkchan 11:06, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

My opinion towards the entire issue: As now in Hong Kong everyone and everything, especially the roadsigns, treat Queensway and Queen's Road as two separate roads, I'd oppose the merge. Deryck C. 16:26, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Queen's Road Central, Queen's Road East and Queen's Road West are legally three roads. Queen's Road Central and Queen's Road West are not connected. A possible way out is to turn them back into separate articles. — Instantnood 22:13, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree that separating them is a possible alternative presentation of the materials, but not a necessary one. Let's stick to a form which fosters the greatest consensus among the editors. --Pkchan 12:17, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Why this the name changed in 1967

What made Hong Kong Government change both English and Chinese names in 1967? — HenryLi (Talk)

The road was actually rerouted. — Instantnood 10:08, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

The road was rerouted after name change. — HenryLi (Talk) 05:51, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

When, respectively, was it rerouted and had it name changed? — Instantnood 20:45, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

The road was re-routed between 1974 and 1975. Former nick of 金鐘道死亡彎角 also suggest the road was re-routed after the name change. — HenryLi (Talk) 17:14, 24 June 2006 (UTC)