Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (protected areas)

Why did you redirect National parks (Australia) to Protected areas of Australia? I thought National Parks were called just that in Australia. I'm not opposed to the name change per se, but this type of name change needs to be discussed before being done unilaterally. I suggest Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions. Your title, or something similar, may just bring order to the chaos of naming these type of index pages (since this would be a more inclusive and consistant name) -- might even become a naming convention. --mav 15:24 Aug 8, 2002 (PDT)

First I want to apologise for the redirect without discussing it first. The reasons for it were:

1. To create a test article for the WikiProject Protected Areas. Since the basic information already existed on the page National parks of Australia (which was already a redirect from National parks (Australia) I took that information, put it on the page Protected areas of Australia and redirected the two national park pages. I admit that it probably would have been better to create the new page without the redirects...
2. An area called a national park obviously is just that, though the meaning of it can vary in different countries. However, on the said page there were only 6 national parks out of a total of 37 protected areas (14 of which -the Historic Shipwrecks- I included more than two months ago). While doing the redirect I included 8 more protected areas. That makes 6 national parks out of a total of 45. IMO it's not a very good idea to call a page something that covers only 13 percent of its contents.
3. I used the name "protected area" because, as you said, it is more inclusive and it can be used for any existing (and possibly future) type of protected area. Moreover, it is the term used by The World Conservation Union (IUCN) and other national and international organisations. For more information, see this link (http://www.wcmc.org.uk/protected_areas/categories/index). Even if a particular country only has one protected area type, I am for using "protected area" as a general page title. The precise names can then be used on the page itself.

-- Guy 04:44 Aug 9, 2002 (PDT)

I am intrigued. Personally I like the term and since it appears to have an official definition it just may work. The above problem you mention with protected areas in Australia also exists in the United States -- yes there are many national parks but far, far more protected historical sites, national monuments, volcanic monuments and national wilderness areas (all of which are administered by the US National Park Service). I wonder where Claude is... You really should be talking with him since he has already done much work in this area. --mav

All I can say is that I'm eager to talk to him. A few days ago I wrote a message on the talk:National park page. Today I have written a similar message on his user talk page. I'm waiting for his reply... Guy 03:30 Aug 10, 2002 (PDT)