Talk:Climbing wall

Despite improvements to Spray wall accompanying its return to mainspace, I am unconvinced that this topic warrants a standalone page per WP:GNG and that it can be covered encyclopedically at Climbing wall (and indeed its inclusion will improve this article). See additional discussion at User_talk:El_Comandante#Spray_wall_moved_to_draftspace. Formally proposing the merger rather than boldly merging since the Spray wall page creator seems to disagree and pinging participants from the creator's talk page: @El Comandante @Schazjmd @Reconrabbit. Thanks! Dclemens1971 (talk) 01:29, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

@Dclemens1971 Why not include these informations here and in the article dedicated to the subject? Have you seen that I haven't finished to summarize all the sources yet? El Comandante (talk) 01:33, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

It simply does not appear that there is enough encyclopedic material about spray walls as distinct from climbing walls. Plenty of "how to use them" material out there, but Wikipedia is WP:NOTHOWTO. Dclemens1971 (talk) 01:41, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

@Dclemens1971 I've found and quoted an article published by researchers in a peer-reviewed journal about the differences between training on a spray wall or a standard climbing wall. What else do you need? There are specialized articles in Wikipedia far less supported by serious and reliable sources, including about climbing gear, as I mentioned in my talk page. I don't understand why this one is a problem to you. El Comandante (talk) 02:08, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

A spray wall is in essence a man-made product, and I am not as well versed in the usefulness of merging two different products into the same page, as it's more possible for there to be advertising/advocacy in this field. Looking at the articles as they are right now I would oppose merging them totally as putting the whole of the spray wall content in this article would put a lot more weight on it. I am also going to add that I initially became involved because I feel a brand new article with only one source should have more than that, and moving to draft is some kind of motivator for improvement. Reconrabbit 05:46, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

• A spray wall is a type of climbing wall and I would support merging into the climbing wall article (as a type of climbing wall, there are many more) as it is really a training tool (like a MoonBoard), and not a class of climbing. Not even as broad a concept as a climbing gym, which I think probably should also be merged into climbing wall. 95.45.158.57 (talk) 12:19, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose merge although some mention on this page with a link would solve the problem. Yes, it is a type of climbing wall (just as there are many kinds of musical instruments), but since it is not the common wall that readers recognize easily its stand-alone article has value. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:30, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

  A spray wall is a type of climbing wall that would be withing a climbing wall area or centre. It would be very unusual to have a climbig wall centre / gym that was only spray walls. In the musical instrument analogy, a spray wall is more like a special customized type of violin designed to help someone get better at the violin, but not an instrument in itself (i.e. not played in public). 95.45.157.176 (talk) 10:45, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

It's not clear that there's a consensus here, so I've added an excerpt to show how this might be a potential way of linking. Perhaps this is sufficient. Klbrain (talk) 16:47, 24 April 2025 (UTC)