title: SQL DB schema best practice for List item table
body: <p>I have a table say <code>Table1</code> which has following columns</p>
  
  <pre><code>1. Id
  2. Name
  3. TransportModeId
  4. ParkingId
  5. ActivityId
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Column 3,4,5 are the foreign keys and all three are simple list tables which has following columns</p>
  
  <pre><code>1. Id
  2. Item
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>For simplicity I have shown 3 tables otherwise my actual schema contains almost 25 List table.</p>
  
  <p>What should be the best Practice</p>
  
  <p><strong>Option 1.</strong>
  Keep all list table separate which will create 25 tables but on the other hand i will have a clean modular schema</p>
  
  <p><strong>Option 2.</strong> 
  Make a table with self join and add all the items in that table in which <code>ParentId</code> null will represent the name of the table and it can have more than one references in other tables as described above and it has to be kept in some kind of common module</p>
  
  <p>thanks</p>