Talk:Grand Est

Sub-regions

I think it was a bit overhasty to completely dissolve and redirect Alsace, Lorraine and Champagne-Ardenne. Now we have 18 city articles immediately under this region – far too many, considering the 7±2 rule. It should be sub-divided, and the most natural sub-regions would be the old regions, given that they still matter in terms of cultural identity and traditions (travel regions don't have to be administrative divisions). I would propose to restore the three old region articles and make this one just a rough overview article with information that is relevant to the greater region as a whole. --RJFF (talk) 21:19, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

The proposal was first made in September 2016, was agreed the following January, and due to my anal and frequently-distracted way of working, the new regions only went live in October 2017. If you call that "overhasty", I'd hate to see your idea of 'slow' ;-)

As explained in Talk:Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, 7+2 doesn't apply to bottom-level regions, so is no reason by itself to initiate a split. On the other hand, the argument in favour of cultural regions is more convincing.

The vast majority of city articles and other destinations in this region are Alsatian, so there would be no challenge creating an Alsace article. However, there is much less on the other two former regions. If you take a look at the old Lorraine and Champagne-Ardenne articles, you'll see there was very little content in either, and not many dependent articles (cities, itineraries and other destinations). New articles on them would need a lot of work if they were to be worth having. Furthermore, a Champagne-Ardenne article where Châlons-en-Champagne redlinks is ridiculous.

So, as stated on the other talk page, if you propose to create three good new articles for each subregion with a good amount of detail (some of the more specific info in this article can be moved, but not to the extent that it is deprived of a large amount of its content), then I have no issue. If you simply propose to spread the existing info thinly across four articles, then I am strongly opposed. Subdividing for the sake of subdividing does not serve the traveller.

It's not just that I'm proud of what I've done here with Grand-Est and the other region articles; for years most of our French region articles were poorly-written, outdated and above all largely empty of content. A couple are still that way - Pays de la Loire and Centre-Val de Loire are the worst of the worst. Since the mergers and the amount of new content that I added to each new region article, the majority of region articles are now filled out with information under every heading, and this means that they work as overview travel guides for the regions they cover. So let's build on their success and add new content to Wikivoyage, rather just continuing to move around what we've already got. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 14:41, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

"Overhasty" was obviously not meant in a serious way. I am sorry that I did not voice my reservations and ideas earlier, but I only became aware of your project to re-organise the geographical hierarchy of France when it was nearly done. So, you weren't hasty, but I am quite late. Nevertheless, in a wiki, that is by definition ever-changing, it is never too late.

Arguing that this region is bottom-level, in a discussion on whether to subdivide it, is a circular argument (It's a bottom-level region, so we don't have to subdivide it, therefore it's a bottom-level region). The question is: should it be a bottom-level region? The 7 ± 2 rule is indeed a guideline (in the sense of a rule-of-thumb, not a fix regulation) that helps to decide whether a region should be divided further (see WV:Geographical hierarchy#Dividing geographical units). So it is relevant to this discussion. Moreover, there is the traveller comes first argument: many travellers still view Alsace, Lorraine and Champagne as separate travel regions, for traditional and cultural reasons and indeed there are still three separate regional tourism association: [1], [2], [3].

I believe that the new region is too bulky for a bottom-level region. Travellers may be overwhelmed with possibly irrelevant information if they want to focus on only one part of the region (to me, e.g. Alsace or Burgundy alone easily warrant a two-weeks tour each). Much of the information in, say, the "Eat" section only relates to the respective sub-regions, not to Grand-Est as a whole. Information on "getting in" also strongly depends on where exactly you are going, e.g. Strasbourg or Mulhouse airports are not really an option for someone heading to the Reims or Troyes area (instead they would use one of the Paris airports). Luxembourg airport may be an interesting option for those heading for Lorraine, but not the other sub-regions.

Unfortunately, while I have visited Alsace repeatedly, I have little knowledge of Lorraine or Champagne-Ardenne, so I am afraid I cannot author great articles about them. Alas, Wikivoyage's geographical hierarchy system does not allow the creation of just one sub-region (e.g. Alsace) unless the whole area is covered with sub-regions. But I have to disagree with you in one point: I think stubby articles do no harm. To the opposite: they may be seen as an invitation to add more content, even if it takes some time until someone finally attends to them. (Finding empty article sceletons about places I knew quite well was my reason to start editing Wikivoyage in the first place). Therefore, I still think we should restore the sub-regions, even in an incomplete state. --RJFF (talk) 14:33, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your patience, and sorry for the delay in replying. As stated above, I am not against subdivision on principle, so further argument isn't needed to convince me of its necessity. On reflection, it was unreasonable of me to expect perfection from the subregion articles; you're quite right that WV is work in progress, and that short articles (specifically outlines, not useless stubs), are better than nothing. However, I would urge you not to simply 'restore' the articles as they were, but to put effort in to making them better, even if that's just copy-editing outdated and bad info, and making sure there isn't substantial word-for-word duplication of Grand-Est; as pointed out on Talk:Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, this article used the three old articles' content as its starting point.

Furthermore, I don't think it's unreasonable to stand firm on the dilution of the existing articles. Apart from bits that really do suit the subregions better (the 'Get in' and 'Eat' sections that you point out are overly burdened with local specifics, plus the Lalique and Musée CDG listings in 'See' stand out), I do not think the contents of this article or those of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté should be substantially reduced in order to facilitate the growth of sub-region articles. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 12:20, 16 December 2017 (UTC)