Talk:Michigan highway system

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

	This article is part of the Michigan State Highways WikiProject, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to highways in Michigan. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
B	This article has been rated as B-Class on the quality scale. (add assessment comments)
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the importance scale.

This article is part of WikiProject Michigan, a WikiProject related to the U.S. state of Michigan.

Talk:List of highways in Michigan/completion list

1 State highway numbers that inspire or are inspired US highway numbers
2 Decommissioned Highways
3 Older Discussion
4 oddball highway
5 What is Category:Michigan state highways for?
6 Naming?
7 Infoboxes
8 SVG shields
9 History Rewrite
10 Single digit routes renumbered in 1939

[edit] State highway numbers that inspire or are inspired US highway numbers

There are numerous state highways that have numbers inspired by US highway numbers. It ranges in sever reasons from using a state highway number that is the same as a US highway that formerly used it's alignment (e.g. Michigan State Highway 27) to Having 2 opposite termini of a US and state highway with the same number almost touching termini (e.g. US-24 and M-24, US-25 [now decommissioned] and M-25). Should we set up a denotation on the state highway list for that trivia? Also, there are some state highways identical to US highways in route number but aren't inspired by one another (e.g. US-33 [now decommissioned] and M-33); we should denote those ones too. There are also M highways identical to US highways in number that shared alignment with the US highway before it became a US highway (e.g. M-16 and US-16); those ones should be denoted too. --SuperDude 05:04, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Honestly, I think that kind of trivia is best left to specific pages about those highways rather than clouding up what is intended to be a simple listing of various routes in Michigan. The title is "LIST of highways in Michigan" after all. In my opinion, this information, while interesting to those of us with a fascination in highway designations, is very minor and would deserve inclusion only after individual pages have been created for those routes and all other more important and pertinent information has been assembled.

In addition, the situation where route numbers are simply "duplicated" (e.g. US-8 vs. M-8) don't even deserve any explanatory text at all, since there is no association between them and none is implied otherwise. (Of course, situations like US-10 and M-10 or US-27 and M-27 are related and do not fall under this discussion.) As for the M-16 (1918-1926) and US-16 (1926-1963) "relationship," that was purely coincidental, albeit an interesting coincidence, and may not warrant special attention outside of a minor notation on any specific route pages dedicated to US-16. CBessert 05:19, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Decommissioned Highways

There seems to be a push to list various decommissioned route designations, although only a few are being included and the inclusions seem to be sporadic. I have mixed feelings about including ALL decommissioned routes here, as that would make the list of highway designations unbearably long, in my opinion. Should this be broken into a separate listing? Should someone make a more concerted effort to include EVERY decommissioned route designation from 1918 to the present instead of just a few? (I welcome those interested in a complete listing of every route ever used in Michigan to wander over to my website's Master List: 1918-Present.) CBessert 02:55, May 19, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I think having a separate list for decommissioned highways is a good idea. Honestly, I think most of the stubby little entries on decommissioned highways are pretty sorry excuses for articles. In many of those cases, the content could probably be merged into and redirected to the list. I had been hoping to have some time and motivation to refer to your site to try and clean them up a bit, but the software project I'm working on has just begun functional testing and my brain has been too tapped out for the past several weeks to do much substantive work on Wikipedia. older≠wiser 01:40, May 20, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Older Discussion

Interstates 127 and 131 are actually U.S. Highways. Could someone please fix these articles so that their titles are "United States Highway 127" and "United States Highway 131", and put links to them in the list of U.S. highways? -- Gregory Pietsch

I'm not really happy with this article as currently stands. I mean, does there really need to be separate pages for "Highways in Michigan" and a "List of State Highways in Michigan". I think I want to combine them somehow, but I need to think about it a bit. Any suggestions would be welcome. Bkonrad 16:58, 28 Feb 2004 (UTC)

[edit] oddball highway

The text below was added under the County-Designated highways section, but it is not of the same type as the other highways that have unique county DESIGNATATIONS. Personally, I do not think this segment of road merits a separate article. older≠wiser 22:31, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Old US-27 (between Grayling, MI and Indian River, MI), a relic of the old US-27 along I-75 that is now county-maintained.

[edit] What is Category:Michigan state highways for?

Please see Category talk:Michigan state highways for a question I raise about the use of that category. older≠wiser 13:20, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Naming?

There is no such thing as "Michigan State Highway X". All sources - state laws, MDOT, and michiganhighways.org - use the "M-X" naming. (This is the assumption I'm working from, so if there is in fact an expanded version in somewhat common use, please let me know.)

Thus, in accordance with naming conventions, the articles should be at "M-X (disambiguation term)". I recommend using either "M-X (Michigan)" or "M-X (Michigan highway)", with redirects from forms such as "M-X (MI)" for ease of linking (with the pipe trick). ("M-X (highway)" doesn't work because of motorways named MX or M-X.)

Any comments? --SPUI (T - C - RFC - Curpsbot problems) 15:10, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

You are correct that there is no such thing as "Michigan State Highway X" or "Michigan State Road X" or "Michigan Route X" or any similar variation. In the early 1910s, before the highways were signed in the field, the Department of State Highways referred to these designations as "Trunk Line X" or "T.L. X", but ever since they were posted in the field in 1918-1919, they have been referred to in print, speech and all other forms as "M-X". The only time you hear ANYTHING else is from out-of-state visitors who are unaware of the almost-ninety year old convention. CBessert 01:43, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

So the question remains of how to disambiguate when "M-XX" might mean something else. For example, see M-80. Since we all agree that the road is not called Michigan State Highway 80, it should be moved to something else, such as:

M-80 (Michigan) — doesn't say what it is.
M-80 (highway) — doesn't say where it is.
M-80 (Michigan highway) — cumbersome.
Michigan-80 — probably not even common usage.
Highway M-80 (Michigan) — probably both awkward and wrong.
etc.

I'd say M-80 (Michigan) is probably the best bet, because "(highway)" would still be ambiguous, as there's a similarly named route in Scotland. — Apr. 27, '06 [11:30] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Naming the articles either "M-X (Michigan)" or "M-X (Michigan highway)" appear to be the most appropriate options. I would opt for (Michigan highway) as the parenthetical identifier, just because there may be occasions when "M-X" could related to Michigan in another sense also. Freakofnurture does have a good point that it is cumbersome, but in this case it might be better to be cumbersom than ambiguous. But either way, the "Michigan" part is important. -- Nataly a 11:33, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Redirects will deal with cumbersomeness. --SPUI (T - C - RFC - Curpsbot problems) 13:50, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I just thought more about this. We can state without a doubt that these reads are located in Michigan. We can't prove that they are in fact "highways", as the state of Michigan never refers to them as such. Let's go with "M-X (Michigan)". — Apr. 27, '06 [14:05] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

State laws use the text "state trunk line highway system" - see [1] for instance. --SPUI (T - C - RFC - Curpsbot problems) 14:56, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Not sure if I'm really serious, but "M-X (Michigan road)" is SLIGHTLY less cumbersome, and covers highways and byways. I don't expect everybody to love this. Otherwise, "M-X (Michigan highway)" seems best. Chris the speller 15:52, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Getting really technical, M-185 isn't necessarily a "road", as it is banned to motor vehicles, but it is a "highway" by legislative fiat. Same for any ferries on state trunk lines (assuming they exist). Either way, redirects from one to the other, except in the very rare (if at all) case of something else in Michigan named M-X, will make it less cumbersome. --SPUI (T - C - RFC - Curpsbot problems) 16:53, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I think my first choice would be M-X (Michigan highway). M-X (Michigan road) is OK, but it does seem odd as the article are about the state trunkline highway system. older ≠ wiser 02:09, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

I just moved M-1 (Michigan highway). I'm probably going to do others soon if there are no objections. The completion list is for coordinating redirects. --SPUI (T - C - RFC - Curpsbot problems) 22:23, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Leave the articles where they are. Good grief. --Rschen7754 (talk - contribs) 23:08, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Infoboxes

Has anyone taken anytime to implement an infobox template at all for the Michigan highway pages? I'd like to see something along the lines of the inbox on the CA SR-1 page. The only nitpick I'd have is that the Northern terminus should be listed first, not the Southern terminus. Most people read top to bottom, left to right. When it comes to standard maps, that's North to South, West to East. Any reason why people list South first? I'd also add a section in the infobox for the counties traversed by a route. Any thoughts, comments, suggestions? Imzadi1979 19:41, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

The reason why most highways/routes are listed south-to-north and west-to-east has nothing to do with how most folks read textual words on a page. Rather, with only few exceptions, highways are generally milemarked (either in the field with actual milemarkers or in internal inventories) in that manner. Thus, the "beginning" of a route is considered to be at its western/southern end or its western/southern crossing of a state line and its end is at the eastern/northern end or where it crosses a eastern/northern state line. Again, there ARE some exceptions to this rule, but the vast majority of routes follow this convention and the entire Interstate system follows this standard as well. So as to not ignore decades of documenting routes from west-to-east or south-to-north, I would suggest not changing in midstream. CBessert 05:35, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

M-1

Michigan state trunk line highway

Length:

21.48 mi (34.57 km)

Commissioned:

1970

Decommissioned:

2009

South terminus:

Adams Street, Detroit

Major
junctions:

I-75 in Detroit

I-94 in Detroit

I-696 by Pleasant Ridge

North terminus:

BL 75/BUS US-24 near Pontiac

Michigan state trunk line highways
< M-554		M-2 >

Bannered - Decommissioned - Freeway

I've worked out a base, gently hacked from the California routebox. It's far from done, as I haven't as of yet figured out quite how to work the CONN/BUS highways in there, but it's definitely a start. —

IW4^U_T^C 08:42, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware there is no need for a connector or Business M-xx shield. There is one Connector, M-13, but it is unsigned (and for that matter it is not officially referred to as Connector M-13). And there is also one Business route Business M-28. I've never been to Marquette, but isn't it signed with the word BUSINESS over the top of the normal shield. -- KelleyCook 15:12, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

There are several Business routes in the state for US Numbered Highways, as well as the 3 three M-routes, BUS M-28, BUS M-32 and BUS M-60.Imzadi1979 00:18, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

I've been on CONN M-13 quite a few times, and it is in fact signed, as is CONN M-44. CONN M-125 is odd, as it's actually signed CONN I-75/M-125, so I don't think that counts. There are quite a few BUS US routes, but this infobox, as it currently stands, is only for the various M-routes, and honestly, I think adding BL/BS and BUS US routes would be redundant. —

IW4^U_T^C 01:22, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Take a look at at the page for BUS US 90 in New Orleans. The business plate exists as a graphic that was stacked in that infobox for the BUS US 90 "assembly". Imzadi1979 02:41, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I did my own take on IW4's work. see BUS M-28 demo for an idea. Also look at M-1 demo. Imzadi1979 05:46, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Looks pretty good, but I've created a single SVG image for that (Image:M-28Bus.svg) as well as the other BUS and CONN routes, so that should probably be used instead. Also, I think that creating a new article in the mainspace for these demos probably isn't the best idea, as then they are searchable; I'd create them in your userspace, like I did with my demos. —

IW4^U_T^C 21:09, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

There are new infoboxes, complete with maps on several of the pages now. I like the look, but shouldn't the "next" and "previous" highways at the bottom only link to M-trunklines, not Interstate and US Numbered Highways? That way if I click the link on M-1, I'm directed to M-3, and then M-5 and M-6 in order. As of right now, if I click the links, I get either US 2 or I-696 with no further connection to any other Michigan highways. (I-696 doesn't have any kind of infobox yet, but if it did, it more appropriately will link to other Interstates even though I-96 is completely in the State of Michigan.)Imzadi1979 08:10, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Ignore that... I found the browse box at the bottom of the US 2 page. That makes my thoughts irrelevant once they are completely done.

They're being worked on, slowly. I've been on vacation since the 8/2/06 so I haven't done any editing since then. And, I'll fix those maps you posted to my talk page soon now that I'm back home ;) Stratosphere (talk - Contrib) 02:50, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] SVG shields

I was bored a few days ago, so I took the list of current and decommissioned Ms and made SVG shields for them, as well as blanks and templates (including business and connector highways). That should help the articles quite a bit, and whenever a state project takes off, there you go. I know that a lot of decommissioned routes never used this type of shield, and if need be, I can figure out the cutout version. Oh well...hope it helps! — IW4^T 11:16, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the shields - and thanks to Stratosphere for all the maps! Personally I think it's best to use the current shield for even old routes - otherwise it's a rather arbitrary decision, unless there was a major renumbering at the same time as a shield change. --SPUI (T - C) 06:09, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History Rewrite

I'm not completely sure of the relevancy of the newly-added "History" section. However, as it contained quite a few errors of fact, featured very poor grammar and had several stylistic errors, I rewrote the paragraph in its entirety, correcting those issues, but leaving the section largely intact. Any thoughts are welcomed. CBessert 04:58, 11 July 2006 (UTC)