Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airports

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Reliability – Airfields of Britain Conservation Trust

Hello. Sorry if this is an annoying kind of FAQ or I'm in the wrong section but is it possible to tell me, please, whether the Airfields of Britain Conservation Trust can be considered an RS for articles on former RAF fields? It doesn't look to me to be self-published, but I know nothing! Advice gratefully received, even if it is only somewhere else to ask ... Cheers DBaK (talk) 23:00, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

No comments here so I shall assume it's reliable till told otherwise. Cheers DBaK (talk) 14:34, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Excuse me for not answering before, the question went unnoticed here. I have consulted this website in the past, and observed that it changes very little. It was quite complete at one time, but is not very well kept up to date. Quite good for historical information, though, and that seems to be the prime intention. Jan olieslagers (talk) 14:42, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you so much Jan olieslagers for the useful reply. My main motivator was old RAF stations (for example Brunton and Eshott), so it sounds like it might be OK for that area: I absolutely take your point re currency. Thanks again! DBaK (talk) 19:17, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Dashes in airport names

I notice, esp. in Template:Airports in France, a lot of airport article titles with spaced en dashes in them; e.g. the redirect Angoulême – Brie – Champniers Airport and the article it redirects to. Per MOS:DASH, these should be unspaced, yes? Dicklyon (talk) 18:41, 14 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This is not my specialism, but it would seem to me that you might well be right. Jan olieslagers (talk) 13:20, 15 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not mine either. I have little understanding of the French conventions for hyphens and dashes in locale names and such, but there's clearly a problem with these articles using what appear to be made-up French names and styles that are not found in sources. So fixing the styling of the English article title is only half the problem. E.g. La Môle–Saint-Tropez Airport which I moved and edited, I'm not at all sure of. Dicklyon (talk) 20:32, 15 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Contact French contributors? But they might only react to messages in their own language, been there, done that. Feel free to invoke my assistance, being originally Belgian I have a fair bit of French. Jan olieslagers (talk) 21:29, 15 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't parle no francais, so maybe you can ask someone to take a look at the French names in the articles on that template. Dicklyon (talk) 03:38, 16 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I guess part of the problem is that here on enwiki, we apply (or ought to be applying) English conventions, not French ones. MOS:FRANCE is pretty short on details about dashes and hyphens, despite hyphenated place names being pretty common in France. It does mention that unspaced en dashes should be used for railway stations that serve two communities, and we could no doubt transpose that advice, even though some airport names have dashes not because they serve multiple communities but to distinguish between multiple airports serving a single city. That said, at a quick glance it looks to me that changing the spaced en dashes to unspaced ones would be the way to go. There are probably a few cases where the exact locality of the airport can be dropped from the title altogether, leaving just the name of the place that it serves, but that will require checking whether an English COMMONNAME exists or whether the French COMMONNAME or OFFICIALNAME should be used. I don't have time to do all those checks right now but I'd be happy to give advice (as a French speaker and resident). Rosbif73 (talk) 07:01, 16 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Merci, @Rosbif73. To continue on the example given, the French article is titled Aéroport international Angoulême-Cognac so it seems fr.wikipedia applies broadly the same guidelines as we do here. I only checked this single one example, though. But everything indicates that@Dicklyon is absolutely correct. Jan olieslagers (talk) 07:25, 16 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I'll look there for acceptable French names. To Rosbif's point, there are two questions here that we should not mix up: the English article title, and the French name in the article. I definitely aim to apply English (and English WP) style conventions in the article title, but we also want an appropriately styled native name. It seems we all agree that at least unspacing the en dashed is a step in the right direction. Dicklyon (talk) 15:27, 16 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What to do?

@Jae winwin: is active on a number of airport articles in Asia. It is an editor who never ever adds sources to an addition, never ever responded on attempts to communicate and often removes connection without explaining why. Very annoying, but he is not a vandal. After all, part of his edits are valid (removing start dates of new connections, removing connections after they ended). He has a talk page full of warnings but zero response. I tried to approach him in multiple languages, but zero response. I am at wits end, what do do next? The Banner talk 17:38, 15 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

My two eurocents: @The_Banner, you have been clear and firm yet polite in your communications. Exemplary, all my compliments! Since no reaction came at all, I think you need to continue on the way you entered, and get a first time-limited gentle block on said user. Since her/his contributions are numerous, to say the least, this should be immediately observed, and hopefully it will trigger some reflection, which is indeed long due. If you don't pursue now, you will be making a fool of yourself. To cite from George McDonalds book about Lilith: "she would not yield to gentle measures, harder ones must have their turn". Cheers, and keep up the good work! Jan olieslagers (talk) 17:59, 15 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

List of airports in Texas and WP:NOTDIRECTORY

I propose to radically pare down the list of airports in Texas due to WP:NOTDIRECTORY concerns. The list includes a truly epic number of redlinked airports that likely don't meet WP:GNG and WP:NBUILD. My impulse is to remove them outright per WP:NOTDIRECTORY but I would prefer to seek consensus whether WP:REDNO might be more appropriate. Discussion here. Carguychris (talk) 17:48, 17 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You may be right that there are too many trivial entries, but WP:NOTE is way too high a bar for list inclusion in most cases. Just don't link them, in preference to redlinks. Dicklyon (talk) 23:30, 17 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

BNA Maps?

I added two maps to Nashville International Airport–one domestic and one international–back in mid September. It stayed that way for 2 weeks until Blissfield101 (talk) removed them, citing "the consensus was no maps" and "they clutter the page up." As far as I know, the simple solution is to have the maps be automatically be collapsed so that they must be manually opened. I believe this is a good compromise as the maps can stay but Blissfield and others do not have to see them if they believe they take up too much space. Bliss also has a history of removing content to trim down the page length according to his talk page. One other thing I want to note is Bliss pointed out that other large airports do not have maps. This seems ironic, how does removing content make a page better? Maps visualize the scale of the airport without having to look at a "cluttered" table of destinations. A lot of small airports have maps that feel unnecessary but are there to list three destinations. Yet Bliss doesn't want one that's shows almost 90? In the end, is having a closed map a good way to add content and reduce "clutter"? King airaglub (talk) 12:52, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

He's making things up, there is no consensus to remove them. This has already been discussed at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airports/Archive 19#Removal of maps by Blissfield101, where previous discussions are also linked. While I've advocated in favor of these in the past, I'm honestly not as into them as I used to be. Users adding/removing destinations from the table might not always do the same in the map since it's a little more complex to edit; I think linking these sections to external maps like flightconnections.com would also be fine. Reywas92^Talk 13:55, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I had a feeling he was lying. I am glad somebody with a neutral stance on the topic was able to clarify this for me King airaglub (talk) 14:14, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not true. If you scroll down to the RFC I did on that very page, you will see 4-2 in favor of removal (of those who responded). Ultimately, they are difficult to maintain, redundant with the airline and destination table, not well laid out and having styling issues. Now a flightconnections.com link, I would very much be in favor of. Blissfield101 (talk) 16:21, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, I remember there being discussions about maps with most users in favor of removing them. Difficult to maintain and look very cluttered, especially in the case of large airports like BNA. (VenFlyer98 (talk) 17:02, 27 September 2024 (UTC))[reply]

“Difficult to maintain” I don’t care, I do not mind updating these

maps. However if it is necessary I will try to fix overlapping airport names. flightconnections.com does not show future flights like MEM and KEF. I still do not understand why you will not accept my compromise-having them automatically be in the collapsed form. This allows you to not have to see them while they are still viewable to anybody that wants to. King airaglub (talk) 19:50, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Why don't you start an RfC on this then? The last discussion was over 2 years ago now with no consensus reached (despite more people being in favor of the maps being removed) so it may be good to get a new one going to get a firm consensus. (VenFlyer98 (talk) 21:04, 28 September 2024 (UTC))[reply]