Talk:Tacoma

Primary topic

User:Ego White Tray and myself have a disagreement over what the primary topic is. EWY says in his edit summary that Tacoma, Washington is the primary topic. I believe that there is no primary topic and that we have no way of knowing which of the many meanings the reader is looking for. For myself, I was originally brought here looking for information on the Toyota Tacoma - the cities, ships, etc meant nothing to me. Other readers may be looking for the ship. We can not assign a primary topic based on what is most important for one editor. Comments?  Stepho  talk  04:00, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Well, I'm saying it's primary topic for the very simple reason that Tacoma is a redirect to Tacoma, Washington. But, aside from that, I'd first say that the pickup isn't even in contention, since it is almost never called just "Tacoma" but usually "Toyota Tacoma." Excluding the city in Washington, there are eight disambiguation entries on the page and five of them (including the pickup) are unquestionably named after the city. Of the first 20 Google results, 18 are about the city, with the pickup and guitar company getting one result each. The case for the city as primary topic is overwhelming. If you have any good arguments otherwise, I suggest opening a move request to propose renaming this page to just Tacoma, which is the standard way to make a topic no longer primary. Ego White Tray (talk) 04:34, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

I have objections to most of what you just said. But since you've changed Tacoma, Washington to be just another item in the list instead of above and beyond the list, I'm happy with the final result.  Stepho  talk  05:16, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Well, if I don't hear any good counter-arguments, I will put the city at the top, which is standard practice for a disambiguation page that has a primary topic. Ego White Tray (talk) 03:08, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

I have no objection to putting Tacoma, Washington at the top of the list of cities - after all, one of them has to be first. I only object to it being separated out, above and beyond the list. WP:HITS strikes out using Google as a way of ranking the cities (Google doesn't differentiate between being truly more important or just a particularly chatty group). Tacoma is more likely an accident of history - ie somebody associated with Tacoma, Washington created Tacoma in 2003 before anybody else did and nobody got around to changing it (except for some fuss in mid 2004). The pickup is often called "the Tacoma", with the brand name being assumed. Your reasons are not overwhelming.  Stepho  talk  06:18, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

Let's completely reject the idea that we need to rank the cities. The city in Washington has over 200,000 people living there, and the other two places don't even have a 1,000. Based on that, there can be no doubt that Tacoma in Washington is the primary city with this name. The question then becomes what non-city entries could possibly challenge the city for primary topic. None of the ships are all that famous, and the guitar maker isn't one of the top names in its industry, so I guess the only possible challenger is Toyota (which, I should note, explicitly named this vehicle for the city/mountain). Ego White Tray (talk) 19:04, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

As far as the Google Hits, the page rejects it as a way to determine notability (all topics here are clearly notable anyway), but says nothing about determining primary topic. Yes, Google rankings have their flaws - but there is nothing about the city that would wrongly give it a higher score than Toyota. All the things that bias Google results bias both topics pretty much the same. Ego White Tray (talk) 19:07, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

Agreed that cities don't need to be ranked - I have no objection to where Tacoma, Washington happens to be within the list of cities. As to what could challenge it for being the primary topic - well, I guess that depends on what interests you. I have an interest in the vehicle but no interest in the cities, guitars or ships. Another reader may well have different interests. I'm quite happy with this article as it is now and think it represents the interest of most readers in a fair manner.  Stepho  talk  09:04, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Requested move

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Jeffrey34555 (talk) 18:58, 1 February 2026 (UTC)

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Tacoma → Tacoma (disambiguation)Tacoma (disambiguation) –

Tacoma, Washington is a major city of about a quarter million people. It's also the name of a model of truck, which of course is named after the city.

For 5.5 years, the base name Tacoma has redirected to Tacoma, Washington, the result of a WP:BOLD move by yours truly, confirmed shortly thereafter by an RfD discussion. A recent RfD discussion changed that, and now Tacoma is a disambiguation page. However, this should never have been an RfD because it was essentially a debate about moving a page.

Partially because this wasn't listed as a requested move, WP:PRIMARYTOPIC's second criteria, long-term educational significance, never got brought in. It is impossible to argue that a truck has anywhere near as much long-lasting educational significance as this major port city of the Pacific Northwest. The city is the clear primary topic, and the disambiguation page should be moved back to Tacoma (disambiguation) to open the way for a redirect straight to Tacoma, Washington. Red Slash 17:58, 25 January 2026 (UTC)

• Comment This was just discussed at RFD, and the consensus was for this WP:NOPRIMARY setup. 162 etc. (talk) 18:13, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
• Suggest to close without action and wait a while before reconsidering: I don't see anything inherently wrong about the RfD. It was a discussion about whether a redirect leads to the correct topic or not, so RfD was an appropriate forum, although it could also have been refactored as an RM. There was no suggestion to move Tacoma, Washington to Tacoma, which would have been contrary to WP:USPLACE. Since the conclusion was that the redirect should lead to a disambiguation page, and the resulting situation would create a WP:MALPLACED disambiguation page, it led to a move of the disambiguation page. All that seems OK, procedure-wise. So I suggest that the outcome of that RfD should be respected, and a new RM should be submitted after some time has passed by – perhaps 6 months or a year. I personally sympathize with the idea that the RfD's outcome is undesirable, but I don't think we should just re-argue the merits and try to overturn it immediately. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 21:17, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
• Oppose and speedy close. The RfD seems fairly conclusive and no reason to overturn its outcome at this point. I don't think there's a primary topic between the two usages anyway.  — Amakuru (talk) 22:47, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
• No change : By your own argument, Tacoma, New South Wales in Australia and the lakes in the US are also more important than the vehicle. Which implies that the disambiguation page is correct.  Stepho  talk  23:46, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
• I went to check the statistics, but then I realized the RfD was this month. The clickstreams for example update once a month, and the data for this month is already going to be confusing because the change was made in the middle of it. It would make more sense to wait until early March with this, because then we will be able to see the clean February clickstreams in WikiNav. The tsv's update in the first week of the month, and WikiNav updates on the 12th of the month. --Joy (talk) 08:42, 26 January 2026 (UTC)
• Speedy close we already discussed this at RFD and white you have mentioned a few more points I don't see much new so either wait a few months or use move review if you think the close was incorrect. Crouch, Swale (talk) 20:30, 26 January 2026 (UTC)
• Close I agree with the other editors that we should defer to the RfD since it was decided very recently. cookiemonster755 ^(talk) 09:08, 28 January 2026 (UTC)

Support Yeah, it's a truck against a major city in the Pacific Northwest. The first RfD was sensible and the second one was misplaced. LivinAWestLife (talk) 12:43, 31 January 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.