Talk:National Register of Historic Places listings in Harris County, Texas

Another coordinate mistake

Arthur B. Cohn House coordinates are incorrect. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.111.108.164 (talk) 23:07, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

I see they moved the house again. Found out where it is now and corrected the coords. They moved my train again too! 25or6to4 (talk) 05:41, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

Coordinate Mistakes

The coordinates for this table need to be verified. Heights State Bank Building is incorrect currently. Also, could someone explain (or link to) how these tables are updated? It would be helpful to know how they are scraped from NHS's website.--Isaiah (talk) 02:34, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Old split

Beginning the process of splitting up this article into more manageable bite-sized pieces. Will split city of Houston into it's own article first, with rest of greater harris county remaining. 25or6to4 (talk) 21:22, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Have been split off to National Register of Historic Places listings in Houston, Texas. That page will need splitting as well. 25or6to4 (talk) 21:54, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Second split completed. 25or6to4 (talk) 22:48, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

After starting the new "Split" section below, i see that the old split actually did further divide Houston into this list of 38 "downtown Houston" RHPs vs. other Houston vs. other Harris County. The two Houston list-articles just showed "Houston" for every entry in the "City or Town" column, however. And the definition of "downtown Houston" used (involving the 10, the 45, and the 90) seems not to correspond to the Downtown Houston defined in its article (involving the 10, the 45, and the 59). So, while the old split was more refined than i first understood, it still seems useful to reconsider how Harris and Houston oughta be split, in next section. --doncram 11:00, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Split

Houston (red), in Harris County, TX

Harris County was recently re-merged back into just one list-table, undoing the split-out of Houston mentioned above. This was mentioned at wt:NRHP#Template limits question... with concern about some limit of template sizes, which may or may not be a problem now. It is a pretty big list though, probably now the largest list-table of any in the List of RHPs system, and probably ought to be re-split.

Paraphrasing from what i wrote at wt:NRHP, it seemed obvious to one editor that the previous split (Houston vs. other) didn't make sense. Glancing at the map of Houston vs. Harris county, at Google maps-displayed distribution of RHPs, and at Houston#Cityscape and linked Geographic areas of Houston and List of Houston neighborhoods, I agree, it seems to me that the editor was right, the split didn't make a lot of sense. It looks like Harris County / Houston oughta be split into geographic areas, e.g. perhaps Downtown Houston (approx 45 RHPs) vs. other "inside the 610 loop" (approx 200 RHPs), vs. "outside the 610 loop" (about 20 RHPs). Or in some other geographic split using freeways, as opposed to using the "Houston" (253 RHPs) vs. "non-Houston" (13 RHPs) division used previously. For the time being, I think it's best to treat it as one combined county, one big table, and to sort out a good partition by discussion here.

Note: if an intended split could be agreed upon, we could proceed by refining the 6th column in the table, currently labelled "City or Town", to identify which RHPs are in which section to be split out.

Comments? --doncram 10:49, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

In my mind, we'd do best to follow the approach mentioned above by 25or6to4 — split Houston vs. other, and then split Houston into two or more pieces. That's basically what we've done at National Register of Historic Places listings in Suffolk County, Massachusetts, and it works well — the county has 300 sites, including 279 in Boston, so we have the 21 non-Boston sites on one list and the Boston sites in several other lists. It's normally not the best idea to split out just a few sites or leave just a few behind, but when it's basically a huge city versus everything else, it's still reasonable — especially when we absolutely have to split it for technical reasons. One alternative is having a line dividing the county in half, but that means that spots across the street in downtown Houston are on separate lists from each other but on the same list as a spot way out in the suburbs. Another alternative is a downtown-versus-everything-else thing, but that ignores legal boundaries (which we generally follow unless we don't have a choice) and still gives us a huge list and a couple of small ones, as Doncram notes with his 610 highway loop comment. Instead, let's follow the Boston example: one county list that excludes the big city, and two or more city lists that either follow official boundaries (e.g. wards, or splitting the city by quadrants like in DC) if practical, or that follow well-known unofficial boundaries (e.g. highways) if official ones aren't practical. By ending up with two or more city lists of approximately equal size and one county list that excludes the city, we'll follow familiar boundaries and produce a group of lists that are easily understood. Nyttend (talk) 02:01, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Agreed that splitting into 2 or more city lists of approximately equal size, and one other county list, would be good. But here I don't see any obviously good partition that way. For splitting Boston, there was long preparation and discussion during 2009-2010 at Talk:National Register of Historic Places listings in Boston, Massachusetts, before it was ultimately split in two by a consensus decision. And Boston has official neighborhoods that partition the city in a MECE way. Houston does not seem to have any official partition (at least not documented in Wikipedia yet). The "management districts" itemized in List of Houston neighborhoods seem to be quite patchy, not suitable for this. Awaiting comment by editor who thought that previous split was inappropriate. No rush on this here. It's less of a problem, size-wise, now than it would have been a few years ago. --doncram 19:45, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

I was the one that originally split the list due to the template errors, and had used the three-section split: downtown Houston (inside the unofficial inner loop of I-10/I-45/US59), the remaining listings inside Houston city limits, and then greater Harris County. This brought the counts to 38/215/13. Since these three lists already existed previously, I would suggest a straight revert back to the split versions, as nothing new has been added to the lists since then. A fourth grouping that would alleviate the 215 in greater houston would be to separate off Houston Heights, which holds the grouping of around half of the remaining sites to the NW of downtown. 25or6to4 (talk) 22:21, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

This list really should be split; it is of a nearly unwieldy length. Magic♪piano 01:42, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

I just gave notice of this discussion again at wt:NRHP, mentioning 38/215/13 split being achievable. But actually I would go for the further split of the 215 into approximately equal parts, for Houston Heights vs. other, as User:25or6to4 suggests, if a clear definition (i.e. map) of the Houston Heights district can be provided to use in implementing the split. I don't see a map or any link to a map from the Houston Heights article. --Doncram (talk) 18:04, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

I am willing to assume the big blob of NRHPs in a group northwest of downtown, seen in "map of all coordinates" are all in Houston Heights, with possibility of some further refinement later. --Doncram (talk) 18:21, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

The four-way split makes the most sense to me. There's some precedent for it (Jefferson County, Kentucky for example), and having a list with 200+ listings after the split defeats the purpose of a split. That's why the listings all got merged back into one list in the first place. TheCatalyst31 ^{Reaction•Creation} 01:05, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

IMHO post-split lists shouldn't be longer than about 120 entries, and should be clearly delineated, so that finding the correct sublist to add new entries to is not burdensome (as it is in Louisville/Jefferson County, where boundaries are not crisply described). When I first poked at this last year, I did a three-way breakdown using I-45, I-69, and TX-288 as a north-south line, and I-10 west of that line as an east-west dividing line. This created sections with about 70 listings in the east and southwest, and 130 in the northwest. I don't know how splitting out non-Houston listing would affect these. I couldn't find a good way to divide up the big blob of Houston Heights-area listings without meaningful local knowledge. User:25or6to4? Magic♪piano 02:40, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

I don't mind using highways as a matter of our convenience for dividing the suburbs and rural areas, if there aren't more natural historical or legal boundaries to be found. But I'd prefer to cover the well-defined-by-highways Downtown Houston as one unit, because although Houston is famously weird in its lack of zoning, I do figure that there is commonality in the listings there. Rather than mixing downtown historic tallish buildings/skyscrapers like Humble Oil Building with faraway Pomeroy Homestead, say, which sounds remote and different. And also the Houston Heights blob, which has a lot of houses and selected other types such as Houston Heights Fire Station serving the neighborhood, seems coherent and probably reasonable to present/discuss together. Note there is a well-defined Interstate 610 (Texas) loop. How about Downtown vs. Houston Heights (perhaps cut off by I-610, not sure if the heights technically extend out a little or not) vs. rest of inside of I-610 loop, vs Harris County outside I-610 loop. The outside will get 23 then. Downtown was asserted to be 38 before. Houston Heights is half of the remainder I guess. Hmm maybe this is a lot like User:25or6to4's breakdown, but the division of remainder would be more easy to understand geographically, and easier to assign new listings, than legally Houston vs. not-Houston, given Houston's irregular and discontinous (with exclaves) legal shape. Whatever. --Doncram (talk) 03:07, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

P.S. There is article Geographic areas of Houston, which starts off: "The geographic areas of Houston are generally classified as either being inside or outside Interstate 610, known as the 'Loop.'" --Doncram (talk) 03:29, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Ok, so the previous couple times I've tried this, I've started with the outside 610/inside 610/inside inner loop division. Houston Heights was a distinct division/previous city, especially after seeing it first-hand, so I would generally keep those in their own separate grouping. When I visited that area previously, I noted that the few sites that look like part of HH but are outside 610 are definitely not representative of the HH grouping, so I left those in the outside 610 section. I investigated trying to separate out the sites to the southwest of downtown Houston in the Medical and museum districts, but had trouble defining a boundary versus getting too many sites versus drawing in unrepresentative sites. I do like the working definition used below for the HH neighborhood. I might suggest using Durham Drive instead of Shepherd Drive as the western boundary, which keeps one site (Carden House) in the HH section.25or6to4 (talk) 19:04, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Okay good, that sounds like we should have a consensus now, because it sounds manageable and thereby addressing Magicpiano's stated concern, and it achieves "familiar boundaries" and "a group of lists that are easily understood" per Nyttend, and it meets TheCatalyst31's preference for splitting into four, i.e. leaving none over 200. From what you say, maybe this is pretty much re-achieving the split you did before, 25or6to4, but now with more consensus and we should be able to write it up more assuredly (with better explicit discussion of the HH area) and it should stick this time. Sure about including Carden house in the HH section if you want to, of course, IMHO. The fact that it is the exception west of Shepherd Drive just needs to be mentioned in the lede discussion defining the area, IMHO. --Doncram (talk) 03:32, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps the lists should be named:

• National Register of Historic Places listings in downtown Houston, Texas (or downtown Houston?)
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Houston Heights, Houston, Texas (or Houston Heights, Harris County, Texas? or Houston Heights, Texas?)
• National Register of Historic Places listings inside the I-610 loop in Harris County, Texas ? (or central Harris County Texas? or inner Harris County, Texas?)
• National Register of Historic Places listings outside the I-610 loop in Harris County, Texas ? (or outer Harris County, Texas?)

I notice that the previous split-out three list-articles, with their edit history, are at:

• National Register of Historic Places listings in downtown Houston, Texas (currently a redirect)
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Houston, Texas (currently a redirect)
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Harris County, Texas

and in implementing the new split it would be good to honor the old edit history by re-using those, but I don't see how to do so clearly; probably it is more clear just to leave their history where it lays now. The "Harris County, Texas" one will need to be modified to link to the four separate split-out articles, of course. --Doncram (talk) 03:32, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps there will be more comments, but maybe we can start towards re-dividing it by coding the rows with, in the city/neighborhood column, D for Downtown, HH for Houston Heights, In for inside the I-610 loop, Out for outside. I just temporarily changed the template:NRHP header to show those codes. We still need to keep the identification of cities. So change from "city=Houston" to "city=HH, Houston" or "city=In, Houston" or whatever, temporarily, with those codes to be removed in the separate list-articles after the split. It looks to me like there have been cumulative changes to the list-article, including adding lots of images, so that it probably easier or more reliable to split it again manually from the big list, rather than returning to the old split articles and updating. Is this approach towards getting it done, okay? Or I am fine if someone else wants to just do it on their own, however else they want to get it done. --Doncram (talk) 03:18, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm OK with this basic split strategy. I don't think the proposed list names are the greatest, but I don't have any good alternative suggestions. Magic♪piano 12:32, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree. Maybe "central Harris County" and "outer Harris County" would be better, and maybe these will get moved later, too, if/when someone informs us of better names, if we haven't really gotten it right. --Doncram (talk) 12:56, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Downtown Houston, Central HC, and Outer HC sound fine to me. I'd lean toward the "Houston Heights, Houston, Texas" wording, which is similar in format to "The Highlands, Louisville, Kentucky". 25or6to4 (talk) 13:31, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Much better names. Magic♪piano 14:16, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Comments:

1. IMO it might make sense to split Houston into one or more dedicated list(s) partly because there are pieces of Houston in other counties: some bits are in Fort Bend and a tiny smidgen is in Montgomery County. Knowing this is the case, it may help to say in a post-split Harris County list that any sites in the "Houston city limits" (use that wording to be clear) in any county should be in the Houston list.

2. Remember many areas have Houston postal addresses but are outside of the Houston city limits (often in unincorporated areas) - It makes sense to trace each address (especially those in the periphery of the city) and compare it with maps of the Houston city limits.

3. It's sadly true that Houston doesn't have an official overlay of districts like other cities. I would agree that the overlay of state-level management districts and homeowner's associations are patchy, and there are areas not really in any neighborhood. (IMO the City of Houston's "Super Neighborhoods" don't really count)

WhisperToMe (talk) 23:17, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Yikes, that sounds radical to contemplate mixing historic sites from different counties, where the city runs out. Maybe too radical for WikiProject NRHP for the moment, I dunno. It would sort of cause problems in the other counties' list-articles too, which are defined clearly. So far the list system for NRHPs basically covers every item just once, in its county. But hmm, i have to admit we do have duplicates for individual properties and historic districts that literally span across borders. Anyhow, I think it would be a big improvement to divide the Harris County list basically as proposed above. But another way the NRHP sites are covered is to mention them in articles about counties, cities, towns. Very often county articles include a photo an NRHP-listed courthouse; many town articles have "History" sections which list their sites. Are there articles about any of the Houston exclaves, or is there an article about them collectively? It would be highly appropriate to list, or mention in running text, the NRHP listings in any such article.

From List of enclaves and exclaves: "The cities of Bellaire, West University Place, and Southside Place together form an enclave of Houston. The cities of Bunker Hill Village, Hedwig Village, Hilshire Village, Hunters Creek Village, Piney Point Village, and Spring Valley Village together form another enclave of Houston." It would be great if someone locally informed, could compare the locations in "map of all coordinates" to those village areas, or otherwise sort out which items should be mentioned in the linked village articles, and insert the brief mentions? User:WhisperToMe, could you perhaps do that? I personally would be glad to help create new articles for any of those in a quick editing drive, if they are currently redlinks, so that the insertions would be more meaningful and could include some specific information from the new NRHP articles. I suppose an editing drive could be hosted in another subsection below. --Doncram (talk) 20:26, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

I'll check to see if any of those sites are in the "mini-cities" mentioned. They're quite tiny places and I've written extensively about them on Wikipedia. I will note that places in Bellaire have postal addresses of "Bellaire, Texas" but places in West U, Southside Place, and the Memorial Villages usually have "Houston" postal addresses. WhisperToMe (talk) 10:32, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

@Doncram: I did the map all function and here I don't see any sites in Bellaire, nor West U, nor Southside Place, nor the Memorial Villages. The vast majority are in the Houston city limits. Also, none in Fort Bend Houston (see map) nor Montgomery County Houston. WhisperToMe (talk) 10:40, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

Or, perhaps better, could there be a drive hosted at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Houston? To create or expand coverage for all the NRHP sites in Houston exclaves (or enclaves?), or in all of Houston. I saw mention somewhere of some editors being interested in stirring up that wikiproject again. :) Please ping me and Oldsanfelipe from there if there are any proceedings. --Doncram (talk) 20:32, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Nothing will be fixed in stone; stuff can be revised later, but I think we're ready for implementing the four-way split. In the list-article I have coded (no doubt imperfectly for the moment) the HH ones, the outer Harris County ones, and the downtown Houston ones, ready to split out to:

• National Register of Historic Places listings in downtown Houston, Texas
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Houston Heights, Houston, Texas (with explanations of various definitions for HH)
• National Register of Historic Places listings in inner Harris County, Texas (with explanation in lede that it omits downtown and HH of course)
• National Register of Historic Places listings in outer Harris County, Texas

It will be easy to clean up later if some of the items are coded wrong and go to the wrong list, because they will stand out in the "map of all coordinates". User:Magicpiano, if it's all right I will proceed with implementing the complete split in the middle of some night, soon, after running an update on wp:NRHPPROGRESS. If you want to do a small split as a test you can go ahead, or if you want me to do just the outer Harris County split, which splits out 13 i think, first, I could do that. --Doncram (talk) 22:30, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind a division like that. Doing this allows people to sidestep the process of checking whether sites around the periphery of Houston are really in the city limits or not. Downtown Houston has well-defined boundaries now. The Heights may be a bit trickier but I'll propose how to do this.

The unfortunate reality is that in many states city governments can incorporate across multiple counties (Kansas City, Missouri comes to mind - while Chicago does too, the only part in DuPage County is a part of O'Hare Airport). Texas as we see is one of those states. A good piece of reading would be "Why do cities, counties and school districts have wacky boundaries? Curious Texas brings the history" from The Dallas Morning News which chronicles a slice of Renner, Dallas: it's in the City of Dallas, but is also in Denton County, and lies within the Carrollton-Farmers Branch Independent School District.

The good news is that there are probably few, if any, NRHP historic sites in parts of Houston in Fort Bend and Montgomery counties; those parts right now are pretty small.

WhisperToMe (talk) 05:00, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

Here are some things to keep in mind while figuring out how to split the county list. First, while the downtown area may seem well-defined due to the inner freeway loop around it, this is about to change. Interstate 45 has historically run along the western edge of downtown, but TxDOT will soon reroute it along the eastern edge along the I-69 / I-10 corridor. The western route, known as the Pierce Overhead, will either be razed in order to reconnect the downtown street grid with the near west side or be turned into some sort of urban public space like New York City's High Line. The discussion is still ongoing. This points to the potential futility of using transportation infrastructure as dividing lines in a dynamic city.

As far as defining Houston Heights or other neighborhoods, I'd consider using the platted additions as mapped by the Harris County Appraisal District. These are seemingly written in stone and not subject to change.

If dividing the county into only two lists is a possibility, one suggestion could be to use Buffalo Bayou/Houston Ship Channel as a dividing line. Buffalo Bayou cuts the city neatly in half beginning at the county line near Katy, runs parallel to the south of I-10 into the Barker Reservoir, then proceeds from the reservoir through the center of the city passing next to downtown before emptying into Galveston Bay. It also places the two largest cities outside of Houston, Pasadena and Baytown, in separate lists. Although most of Harris County would be covered by the northern list, that's okay because Houston itself is located south of the county's geographic center.

Those portions of Houston within Fort Bend and Montgomery counties have no historic sites on either national or state registries. Although most of the state's largest cities now extend into adjoining counties, only Amarillo has NRHPs in more than one county due to that city being bisected by a county line. Dallas has a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark in the Collin County portion of Renner mentioned above, but no NRHPs outside of Dallas County. Generally, those portions of Houston and other major cities that extend beyond their home counties are characterized by suburban sprawl with nothing worthy of historical distinction. Fortguy (talk) 06:02, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

I see that Buffalo Bayou/Houston Ship Channel is a pretty clear dividing line and worth considering. It could be used to split the NRHPs in the county or Houston very similarly to how splitting on the I-10 would do. Pasadena has just 3, Baytown has just 1, of NRHP places identified in the current Harris County list, so I think it is okay for them to be presented along with the relatively few others in outer Harris County. We seem to want to use 4 groupings, not 2. It seems better/more positive overall, to me, to go with "Downtown Houston" and "Houston Heights" as positive areas to talk about in presenting the information, and then inner vs. outer division for the rest. That seems like adopting definitions of regions that are used somewhat in practice, and have coherent themes maybe in terms of types of NRHP listings in each one, and seems less like inventing/coining new things. I think consensus is still on track for the four-way split. --Doncram (talk) 21:54, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Fortguy, point taken about using transportation infrastructure as borders. But, the Downtown Houston area is pretty well defined for now by the highways, and any teardown of highways is not going to lead to immediate change of the general definition, is it? I mean isn't it well enough defined for us to use for now for breaking out this county-wide list-article into meaningful chunks, as has been worked out? Please say if you really object or not to proceeding as worked out; I'd like to implement the four-way split now. --Doncram (talk) 02:46, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

This is not a problem for much of the I-45 route. Southwest and west of downtown, the path of I-45 conforms to existing streets. The Pierce Overhead is called that because it runs along and above Pierce St. as an example. Northwest of downtown is where things get tricky. This is where the city street grid breaks down due to railroad yards along with parks and greenbelts associated with Buffalo Bayou and White Oak Bayou. One solution would be to then follow Buffalo Bayou to I-10 which runs along Buffalo and White Oak. This would remove two NRHPs from downtown: a mail processing and distribution facility and a building on the UH-Downtown campus. Another possibility would be to define Houston Ave. to I-10 as the western edge of downtown extending downtown a few blocks into a mostly industrial area. This would keep the above two NRHPs downtown and add the Jefferson Davis Hospital and the 1879 Houston Waterworks facility to the downtown list. The case could also be made to move the boundary eastward along Bagby and Girard streets or some other nearby path, but this would also remove one or more NRHPs from downtown depending upon the path chosen. Fortguy (talk) 04:15, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Okay it's fine by me if you and/or other editors want to tinker with the Wikipedia-stated definition(s) for Downtown Houston that are stated in Downtown Houston and will be stated in the lede of the list-article for it, and for you to move some items back and forth between list-articles, accordingly. --Doncram (talk) 02:41, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Implementing... I just split out four lists, and updated at wp:NRHPPROGRESS, and tried updating at one of the duplicates-related pages, and I ran the wp:NRHPPROGRESS script, which completes. However it displays error stuff for the duplicates and totals rows for Harris County. User:Magicpiano, could you possibly please take a look? I obviously am missing something or another.

Also, in the process of splitting, I was bothered by a cluster of 8 listings just north across the I-610 from the Houston Heights section. I left them in the National Register of Historic Places listings in inner Harris County, Texas list-article for the moment (they can be seen by "map of all coordinates" there). Rather than moving them to the National Register of Historic Places listings in outer Harris County, Texas article. Because they are not really out there like the rest of outer ones are. They seem kind of "inner" to me. Can they be kept in "inner", or can these arguably be put into Houston Heights article? --Doncram (talk) 04:48, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

In regard to the Barker-Cypress listing, it needs to be classified as outer. There is a Barker-Cypress Road to give you an idea of its location. Regarding the properties lying just north of Loop 610, classifying them as the Heights is defensible, but perhaps unadvisable. They lie outside the historical boundaries of the Heights, and lie outside of what many (but not all) Houstonians would consider to be the Heights. I would apply a hard geographical boundary established by the 610 Loop. It is easy to understand and will lead to the fewest disputes. Oldsanfelipe (talk) 11:08, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

I'll look at what's up with the progress page, but it may be tomorrow before I get to it. Magic♪piano 17:26, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Fixed; there's extra stuff in the header of the duplicates listing. It would probably have fixed itself automatically the next time I run NationalRegisterBot. Magic♪piano 18:08, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks! --Doncram (talk) 18:40, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Oh, hmm, that is about Barker-Cypress Archeological Site, for which no coordinates are available. All sites having no coordinates got left in the inner HC list by the way I did the splitting, without any intention by me about it. Okay I see Barker-Cypress Road is way out somewhere, so sure I will move that to the outer HC list...okay, moved. Also lacking addresses:

• Harris County Boy's School Site (currently a redlink) moved to outer HC
• Mansfield Street Archeological Site (currently a redlink) (There is a Mansfield Street running e-w, north of the 610, so expect this should go into outer HC) moved to outer HC

I only have info for the first (outer): [1]. Oldsanfelipe (talk) 16:11, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I put the reference into the description field for the entry in the outer HC list. --Doncram (talk) 01:03, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Where should those two go? Worth checking the usual THC sources to see if there's any info available about either. I'll try to create articles for them if I can find anything. --Doncram (talk) 15:38, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Okay, I will expect to move those 8 listings to the outer HC list, except if something turns up justifying moving any of them to HH list instead, per criteria for HH listing suggested below (that if any source claims HH-ness, they can go into HH). I'd like to take a quick look at the NRHP documents if they are available for these. I'll create articles or develop articles to get the NRHP documents, first, where necessary. The eight items are:

• Independence Park (Houston, Texas) / McCullough Park (Houston)
• William Mackey House (Houston, Texas) (currently a redlink)
• Ben C. and Jenetter Cyrus House (currently a redlink)
• Charles Johnson House (currently a redlink)
• Independence Heights Residential Historic District (currently a redlink) (Independence Heights)
• Ella Lewis Store and Rental Houses (currently a redlink) (Independence Heights)
• Oscar Lindsay House (currently a redlink) (Independence Heights) moved to outer HC
• General Mercantile Store (delisted), got moved to outer HC list already

Several of these are included in an MPS Multiple Property Submission: "Historic and Architectural Resources of Independence Heights, Houston, Texas", and seem not associated with the Houston Heights neighborhood at all. Independence Heights was the "first African American municipality in Texas" per its article. These items should in fact be covered in, and linked from, the Independence Heights, Houston article. And be included in the "outer HC" list-article. --Doncram (talk) 18:40, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

More specific info about any of these here, or helping develop articles about them, would be welcome. I'll be back with my quick view based on NRHP docs and anything else that comes up in developing articles, within a few days I hope. --Doncram (talk) 15:38, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

In fact those all are Independence Heights, and all are now moved. Adding a note to lede of outer HC article about the cluster. --Doncram (talk) 01:01, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

By the way, is "inner Harris County" okay as a name? There was support for "central Harris County" when it was proposed above, but unintentionally I used "inner" instead. --Doncram (talk) 01:01, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Further refinements, for the future:

• develop articles about other NRHPs in HH list-article, especially on south edge, which may turn out to reveal some are not HH especially, in which case they will be moved to inner HC list.
• there may be some duplicates to be listed in both the HH and inner HC lists, e.g. there is one about a bridge, and one about a Houston Heights avenue esplanade, whose coordinates are pretty far south, which might be a long esplanade running outside the neighborhood. Anything marginal is now in the HH list-article. --Doncram (talk) 01:01, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

how can Houston Heights be defined

By this source with historic map, it looks like Houston Heights was a distinct development with a very clear boundary of streets (but no awareness of future highways). HoustonProperties.Com, a real estate site, defines it clearly now, using highway boundaries: "One of Houston’s first master-planned communities, Houston Heights is an upscale neighborhood of over 3,700 homes located North of the I-10 highway, South of Loop 610 and West of Highway 45. / Located in the 77008 zip code, just northwest of Downtown Houston, the Houston Heights borders Highway I-10 on the South, 610 on the North, 45 on the East and Shepard on the West." This last is very convenient for our purposes I think, i.e. we can describe this easily as our working definition of the neighborhood for our list presentation purpose. Possibly later locals could suggest refinements of the borders. There are numerous other Google hits on "Houston Heights map" which could be explored, but I am currently okay with this real estate definition if it doesn't sound outrageous to anyone. --Doncram (talk) 03:21, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Per 25or6to4's note above, the HH area could be defined as here, but with addition of Carden House, which is okay by me. This can be done by using Durham Drive instead of Shepherd Drive as the western boundary. Or by stating the Shepherd Drive as the western boundary but noting the exception of including the Carden House. This is just a matter of wording in the lede of the list-article. --Doncram (talk) 03:18, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

What often happens too is that entities originally based off of a distinct development now have harder-to-define boundaries disputed among multiple parties. The Third Ward was based off of an actual political ward of Houston but now has many different people defining different boundaries. As for the Heights, the Houston Chronicle posted this map. WhisperToMe (talk) 23:31, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Good, the Houston Chronicle's map goes over further to the west and includes Durham, at least north of 13th St., thereby including the David A. Carden House in the neighborhood. --Doncram (talk) 20:02, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

One of the lists should be based on the Heights. However the lists are defined, they should be organized in a way that non-natives should be able to edit them accurately. The historical and modern cultural definitions of the Heights are nuanced, so these should be ignored for the purpose of generating an easy-to-use list. I noticed a modern map above of the Heights and it was mostly accurate, but excluded a wedge that protruded into the Washington Avenue corridor. The historical map produced by Doncram is legitimate, but some of the street names have changed. An easier to apply method would be zip codes. You can generate zip codes by running an address through a search engine. The larger area could be defined by 77007 and 77008, which will include all of the Heights proper, but include much that is outside of the Heights proper. If you separate 77007 and 77008, you will split the Heights, but it may be necessary to achieve a manageable number of listings. I concur with WhisperToMe in the comment just above.Oldsanfelipe (talk) 11:22, 20 October 2018 (UTC) edited for grammar by Oldsanfelipe (talk) 11:24, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

One way could also be to see if secondary sources consistently refer to X site as being in the Heights and whether it falls in any one of the "recognized" boundaries of the Heights; list it as a "Heights" site if either one is true. WhisperToMe (talk) 05:00, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

Excellent idea, IMO. --Doncram (talk) 02:41, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Development of most or all of the HH NRHP articles, and development of the list-article, should enhance coverage of the HH neighborhood. I've just linked to the new list-article from the existing Houston Heights article for now. And I'll link to this discussion from the Talk page of the HH NRHP list. --Doncram (talk) 17:49, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Please make sure that whatever the final bounds of the Houston Heights and downtown are, are included in the headers of those lists (for those of us who don't want to have to parse the Houston Heights and Downtown Houston articles every time there's a new listing). --Magic♪piano 18:13, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Yes, the original HC list-article and each of the four split-out ones need more work in their ledes, including to define the areas, and this project won't be done until that is done. I assume what you say about "headers" means to include coverage in the lede of the list-articles. I probably should look at how the organization and explanation is done for National Register of Historic Places listings in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and/or other splits. I will post again here and ping Magicpiano at least when I do think this is all done well enough, which will take a few days. --Doncram (talk) 18:40, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Done-ish

Done, maybe? I created a {{Harris County Texas NRHP topnav}} template for use navigating between the lists (adapting an Arizona NRHP topnav template), which could be more visually appealing but works. I did put in some rough description of the HH and downtown H areas, into the ledes of their list-articles and of the Inner HC one, and into the overall HC article. I confess I was a bit breezy and broad in the area descriptions, just asserting that HH is "approximately, Highway I-10 on the South, I-610 on the North, 45 on the East and Durham on the West". I hope that serves well enough for future placements of new listings. It will take some further development of articles to finalize out more exact boundaries of the HH area (and will then require some moves of items between HH and inner HC lists). I think it is no real problem if, "whenever in doubt, put in HH" rule is followed, so the broad cursory description is okay.

Thank you Oldsanfelipe, Magicpiano, Fortguy, WhisperToMe, User:TheCatalyst31 25or6to4 for your concentrated attention and help here, which allowed this to get done quickly. It would not have been possible without all your participation, really. I stand willing to do further if necessary, but I do think it is done pretty well right now. --Doncram (talk) 03:17, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

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