Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Delle, Utah

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. There's not all that much discussion, but the editors who are familiar with this kind of topic are for deletion or at least are not enthusiastic for keeping this. Sandstein 19:29, 7 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Delle, Utah[edit]

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This one may end up being a substantial discussion, as there are a lot of source problems here. To begin with, the only substantial source for the history section (ignoring the long irrelevant section on the roads) is Van Cott's Utah Place Names. The 12-mile-away water source can actually be cited, but is not. The other cited fact isn't true, and it may actually prove a problem for a large number of Utah articles, and possibly those in other areas as well. The population figure is cited to the 1950 census, but no page number is given, and when I looked at the actual entry, the number 174 does indeed appear, but a map shows that "Delle" actually represents a huge area, not a small town. That appears to be the case for many if not most entries that aren't for incorporated places, and since the Utah articles frequently have population figures, I have to wonder how many of these are representative of the town they write about. I also must note that Van Cott's etymology appears to be nonsense, as "dalle" actually means something like "stepping stone".

All the business in the middle is uncited and questionable. The motel and gas stations are undeniable and well-documented; the railway camp less so. The topos don't go back very far, but the 1977 map I found has an interesting detail: there is a second spot labelled "Delle", right on the rails about a mile NW of the motel ruins. The topo also shows a siding there. After that things get iffy. Far and away the most references are for precipitation (mainly remarking on the months or years since any was recorded), as a locating point for things "near Delle", and a bunch of rail-related hits. There are some book and web references that large echo the article, but they are all relatively recent, and it's not clear that any of them are independent of either our article or of Van Cott. I can't find any old sources other than a Blue Book in which it is just a name. So I'm quite dubious that this was ever a town. Mangoe (talk) 03:42, 17 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I sense a challenge. ☺
It's a right old mess because it's the product of 5 editors. Editor 1 is Moabdave who knew only that it was a service station. Editor 2 is 63.226.66.4 who knew that it was a railroad stop but just blammed in more content beside the original instead of fixing the original. In between them is Ntsimp who added Van Cott and the other bits with actual sources connected to them, and is also responsible for the "unincorporated community" cop-out even though the previous two editors at least were specific about what the thing is/was. The 4th editor, who again didn't consolidate the existing contradictory narratives but wanted to write about a spite road (the same one as at Utah State Route 196#History) was An Errant Knight.
Van Cott is explicit that this was a "maintenance camp" for the Western Pacific and is now "a gas station, cafe, and siding only". There's no support for "enclave", "village", "town", or "unincorporated community" coming from the source actually used. Van Cott is quite clear on what this was and is.
There's not much in Van Cott, so I'd like to see two sources. Following the usual methodology doesn't get much, however. There's no Arcadia book covering this. It's the wrong side of the mountains to be part of the West Desert Hazardous Industries Area and the Hazardous Waste Corridor for which there is some documentation. And it's just ignored by the Tooele County General Plan. The only other even partway reasonable source just confirms Van Cott that Delle "consisted solely of an old, small cafe, motel and service station" and "There is no permanent housing located at Delle", and doesn't provide anything else. By adding in the spite road that's really in Skull Valley and the unverifiable businessman tale (from editor #5), the article is actually larger than what I can find to verifiably say about the place.
Uncle G (talk) 05:43, 17 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- This editor seems fairly confused by the nomination for deletion. It seems that the nomination is primarily due to less than ideal supporting citations regarding certain aspects of the former community and its history. However, the underlying dispute appears to be centered around whether Delle was an unincorporated community (a place where humans lived) or just a locale (a place with somewhat significant human activity, but without anyone residing there). The later issue should not be a debate as the United State Geological Survey (USGS) determined long ago that Delle was a populated place (not just a locale). The USGS apparently based its determination on the place's classification by the United States Census Bureau (which at some point classified it as a place where people lived). Referring back to the original debate, an unincorporated community is a populated place that is not currently a village, town, city, etc. It does not look like there is any evidence that Delle ever achieved incorporation as a town or city, so it would clearly have been Ann unincorporated community. Therefore it remains, as previously stated, that the dispute (if there really is one) is not based upon the past or present significance of Delle (even though it may be somewhat minor), but the lack of clearly supporting references. With that in mind, there are many, many articles regarding former and current communities that have less significance and much less in the way of supporting documentation. Accordingly, deletion would not be appropriate. An Errant Knight (talk) 15:15, 17 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  - No, that's not how GNIS phase 1 worked. Everything was "populated place" because there was no other designation, and "unincorporated community" is just the Wikipedia information-free cop-out conversion of that. No-one has actually made a determination. The person doing the phase 1 gazetteer saw a minimum of 1 building, and "populated place" it was.
    The GNIS Names files do not differentiate between various types of populated places. A subdivision having one inhabitant is as significant as a major metropolitan centre such as New York City.
    — Heard, Andrew M. (August 1986). Automatic correlation of USGS digital line graph geographic features to GNIS names data. United States Army Corps of Engineers. AD-A192-787.
    And rather than lack of clearly supporting references, the one source that explicitly says what the subject is was ignored by the editor who added it in favour of the information-free cop-out. Editors 1 and 2 at least agreed with Van Cott. Editor 3 used but ignored Van Cott. Editor 4 just ignored Van Cott and wrote about something that's in Skull Valley, not at or in the "maintenance camp" or the "gas station, cafe, and siding". Uncle G (talk) 04:28, 24 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 02:38, 24 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Delete It's a place on the railroad and the highway, but I don't see any indication that it is or was a community or that the minor activity at the site established notability. The above is mistaken; the WP:GNIS has many errors, and it made its classification from USGS topographic maps, not the Census. Reywas92^Talk 03:13, 24 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Geography and Utah. CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 06:11, 24 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 18:42, 31 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.