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This times 100! and condensing the regional forums to a mere 4 or 5 for the US would be solid. People tend to go to the forum that they believe will get the most traffic/views. That's why most everything is just dumped in SG.
A map is certainly a cleaner layout and more user friendly than a wall of text that you have to pick through, with a handful barely used. Not saying this will solve everything with regionals, but certainly an excellent first step.
So, if i'm hearing you right... have the "reply page" basically built right into the "thread page"? This would be great, that way you don't have to open a new window/tab to reply and you can reference the thread without going back and forth. Maybe something like this?