Select most recent inspection, break tie between inspections from same year I have a road_insp table:

create table road_insp
(
    insp_id int,
    road_id int,
    insp_date date,
    length number(10,2)
);

insert into user.road_insp (insp_id, road_id, insp_date, length) values ( 1, 100, to_date('01/JAN/2013 6:00:00AM','DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM'), 1000);
insert into user.road_insp (insp_id, road_id, insp_date, length) values ( 2, 100, to_date('01/JAN/2014 7:00:00AM','DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM'), 1000);
insert into user.road_insp (insp_id, road_id, insp_date, length) values ( 3, 100, to_date('01/JAN/2015 8:00:00AM','DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM'), 1000);

insert into user.road_insp (insp_id, road_id, insp_date, length) values ( 4, 100, to_date('01/JAN/2016 9:00:00AM','DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM'), 750);
insert into user.road_insp (insp_id, road_id, insp_date, length) values ( 5, 100, to_date('01/FEB/2016 10:00:00AM','DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM'), 250);

commit;

select
    insp_id,
    road_id,
    to_char(insp_date, 'DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM') insp_date_formatted,
    length
from road_insp;

   INSP_ID    ROAD_ID INSP_DATE_FORMATTED      LENGTH
---------- ---------- -------------------- ----------
         1        100 01/JAN/13 06:00:00AM       1000
         2        100 01/JAN/14 07:00:00AM       1000
         3        100 01/JAN/15 08:00:00AM       1000

         4        100 01/JAN/16 09:00:00AM        750
         5        100 01/FEB/16 10:00:00AM        250




I'm able to select the most recent inspection of each road_id using this query:

select
    insp_id,
    road_id,
    to_char(insp_date, 'DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM') insp_date_formatted,
    length
from 
(
      select
        r.insp_id
        ,r.road_id
        ,r.insp_date
        ,r.length
        ,row_number() over (partition by road_id order by insp_date desc) rn
    from user.road_insp r
) 
where
     rn =1
;


   INSP_ID    ROAD_ID INSP_DATE_FORMATTED      LENGTH
---------- ---------- -------------------- ----------
         5        100 01/FEB/16 10:00:00AM        250




However, rather than simply just select the most recent inspection, I want to do do something a bit more complex:


Get the most recent inspection
But if there is more than one inspection in that inspection year, break the tie by getting the longest inspection




   INSP_ID    ROAD_ID INSP_DATE_FORMATTED      LENGTH
---------- ---------- -------------------- ----------
         4        100 01/JAN/16 09:00:00AM        750


In other words, if there are multiple inspections in the latest inspection year, it doesn't really matter which one came first (within the context of the year). It's more important which inspection was longest.

How can I do this?
You can modify the order by clause in the window function: 

row_number() over 
    (partition by road_id 
     order by extract(year from insp_date) desc,   -- latest year
              length desc                          -- higher length
    ) as rn


Tested in dbfiddle.uk (only in version 11g).



In version 12c, you could also use the FETCH FIRST syntax.

The wanted PARTITION BY makes things more difficult than a simple FETCH though. We'll have to use a LATERAL inline view or CROSS APPLY:

select
    r.*
from
    ( select distinct road_id
      from road_insp
    ) d,
  lateral
    ( select
          ri.insp_id,
          ri.road_id,
          to_char(ri.insp_date, 'DD/MON/YY HH:MI:SSAM') insp_date_formatted,
          ri.length
      from road_insp ri
      where ri.road_id = d.road_id
      order by extract(year from ri.insp_date) desc,
               ri.length desc
      fetch first 1 rows only
    ) r 
;