Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airports/Archive 11

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 5

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Archive 9

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Airlines and Destinations tables

~~Voting has begun, please visit the "Airline/Airport Table Voting" column on this page. Voting Rules and Format are explained there as well.~~

I'm the editor cited in this discussion. Moved comments to this page.

From User talk:Snoozlepet#Airport Links:

Hi, Happy New Year! I saw a user edited something on ATL airport (I undid it) because it was not standard airport page format but I think it is very interesting and I think we might want to change it. I think we should have a vote like we did on the United/Continental integration but here is an example.... Tell me what you think, I know it looks weird at first but it might be found helpful for people searching on wikipedia. Thanks! Cali4529 (talk) 20:55, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Airlines	Destinations	Concourse
Air Canada Express operated by Jazz Air	Toronto-Pearson	D
Air France	Paris-Charles de Gaulle	E
AirTran Airways	Akron/Canton, Aruba, Atlantic City [ends January 6, 2012], Baltimore, Bloomington/Normal [ends June 3, 2012], Boston, Branson, Buffalo, Cancún, Charlotte, Chicago-Midway, Columbus (OH), Dayton, Denver, Detroit, Flint, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Houston-Hobby, Indianapolis, Jacksonville (FL), Kansas City, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Memphis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Montego Bay, Nassau, New Orleans, New York-LaGuardia, Newport News [ends March 9, 2012], Orlando, Pensacola, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Punta Cana, Raleigh/Durham, Richmond, Rochester (NY), St. Louis, San Antonio, San Francisco, San Juan, Sarasota/Bradenton, Seattle/Tacoma, Tampa, Washington-Dulles [ends June 3, 2012], Washington-National, West Palm Beach, White Plains, Wichita Seasonal: Allentown/Bethlehem, Bermuda, Harrisburg, Portland (ME)	C, D
Alaska Airlines	Seattle/Tacoma	B
American Airlines	Dallas/Fort Worth, Miami	T
American Eagle	Chicago-O'Hare, Miami, New York-LaGuardia	T
British Airways	London-Heathrow	E

From User talk:Cali4529/Archive 1#AIrport Links:

Per WP:AIRPORTS page content and past discussion, we don't wikilink airports/destinations. However, it needs to be discussed first at the project talk page before such changes are made. Snoozlepet (talk) 02:49, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

This edit visually preserves the perfectly fine destination format you've been using, with the added effect of wikilinking to the relevant articles, in the manner Wikipedia articles are generally constructed. Comments? Thanks. --Chaswmsday (talk) 20:54, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

I suspect the original reason for the policy was to reduce overlinking. However, I've frequently found it irritating that, upon seeing a destination in an airport article, I have to take a roundabout route to read an article about it (i.e. go to the airline article, then the airline destination article, to find a link there). I don't see a problem with Chaswmsday's suggestion--although I 'm glad that it's being discussed here first! --RFBailey (talk) 04:52, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

I like this format too as it provides easy access to related articles rather than taking a detour, and it also highlights dates which tend to get lost in the unlinked style. 119.155.40.154 (talk) 13:57, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Cali4529 and the anon ip 119.155.40.154. It has always struck me as odd that we don't do it and found the lack of a quick click-through to be irksome at times. I do see a small problem with it though. If some editors link and others don't then there will be a lot of catch up work tidying up behind alterations and new additions to avoid having a multi-coloured table. Also if there is a destination without an article it could get a bit untidy looking. The clear issue is sweeping aside the overlinking policy when applied to the tables otherwise it will get a bit odd looking with lots of blue and black mixed up throughout the destinations. If one destination is linked then they all need to be, and any repeats of that destination attributed to other carriers. -- Felix (talk) 18:36, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

All arguments above sound good, but I'm afraid WP:OVERLINK applies to all Wikipedia as a Manual of Style, and the project cannot overrule that.--Jetstreamer (talk) 19:20, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Just want to chime in as well. I'm worrying also about the overlinking issue and agree that if they're linked, they ALL need to be linked. We can't possibly chase down what has already appeared/linked above and what hasn't. (Just imagine if links cannot be repeated, how much work it would be merging a certain "C" airline into a "U" airline like earlier last month.)

Also, if the overlinking concern can be overcome, we will need to build a wikicode template page containing a listing of all airports to relief workload. One good thing to come out of this--the new page could serve as a hub for the standardization of city names and airport disambiguations. HkCaGu (talk) 19:55, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Isn't this the purpose of {{Airline destinations}}? Vegaswikian (talk) 23:29, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

(unindent) Quoting WP:OVERLINK: "Generally, a link should appear only once in an article, but if helpful for readers, links may be repeated in infoboxes, tables, image captions, footnotes, and at the first occurrence after the lead." That suggests to me that linking destinations for each airline (including repeats) would not violate the policy. The idea of the overlinking policy is to avoid having extraneous links in written prose---not to make navigation difficult. Also, it simply does not make sense to not link a destination next to each airline that serves it, particularly in the case of routes served by multiple carriers. For instance, in the Heathrow article, if you're reading the list of destinations for United and want to go to the article about LAX, you'd have to hunt through the list to first the alphabetically-first airline operating that route, which may be somewhat surprising (it's Air New Zealand). (I've seen tables which do this and they're rather annoying!) --RFBailey (talk) 02:23, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

In the beginning, destinations were not in tables, so since now we use tables, we can get around overlinking. HkCaGu (talk) 10:16, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Just to add another 3 cents, in addition to the points already mentioned, because this table is re-sortable, there isn't really a fixed "first instance" for any given wikilink within it. Plus of course WP:MOS/Linking is a guideline which states, "use common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions", not a policy. --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:13, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea to add links to airports in these tables, in most cases (surely we can use common sense). If we deliberately unlink them all then we're going out of our way to make life harder for readers. bobrayner (talk) 14:54, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Because no comments had been made here for a few days, I believed that a consensus had developed around this issue. Given that, I began modifying Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport to wikilink the destinations. When I was almost finished, Cali4529 reverted all of my edits, commenting only "no" on the reverts.

Cali4529 additionally blanked the whole discussion here, with the comment "My ideas were talk and are not to be placed here", which I take to mean an objection to my moving of his/her initial comments to this talk page. Cali4529 then sent a spurious block threat to my User Talk page: "If you add the airport links to all of the cities on any airport page again you will be blocked. There is no agreement made and again I WILL NOT tolerate any vandalism as you made, you will be blocked. Cali4529 (talk) 21:17, 30 January 2012 (UTC)".

I would appreciate any assistance in resolving this matter. Thanks. --Chaswmsday (talk) 21:39, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I was talking to User:Snoozlepet and put this in, this is my idea and my thoughts and it is not right to have them here. Anyway I am highly against it it looks stupid and is not necessary. For years we have had no problem, leave it that way. I was talking on his user page. Not this page. Please remove this. Cali4529 (talk) 22:35, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

You're a bit confused, sorry to say. There are no “copyrights” for such ideas here in Wikipedia, and once you share them with the community they're public. To this respect, you may read If you do not want your writing to be edited and redistributed at will, then do not submit it here below the "Save page" button. Those words speak for themselves. Just one more thing. Blanking contents, such as the one you did in this very talk page, is not permitted, and you may get blocked for that, let alone if the contents were not introduced by you but by other users. Please bear in mind that accusing any other user of vandalising pages is very serious stuff, unless you have proofs to support your claims.--Jetstreamer (talk) 22:59, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Isn't this page the "project talk page"? I moved the first comments here, the appropriate place to discuss changes to this project, as a springboard for further discussion. I'm not sure what you're finding offensive about any of the comments here. I'm also confused about your stance. Back on January 1, you seemed interested in the idea of wikilinking destinations. Now you seem diametrically opposed. But instead of reverting unilaterally, you should let the consensus work itself out.

Also, by reverting my edits, you're also losing some "citation needed" tags I added in the course of editing. I assume everyone in this project wants the destination tables to be accurate, and I couldn't verify some of the entries at Atlanta. --Chaswmsday (talk) 22:57, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I would wait and let some other editors that have not yet engage in this discussion (like myself) make some comments before making changes. I think that linking destinations is in this new table format is fine for me. However, for airlines that operate from 2 different areas of the airport, do we really need to link the airline twice. Same goes for the destinations, if we are going to link them, if more than one carrier fly to the same city, should we really link all of them. It will take us to the same article. Snoozlepet (talk) 23:06, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

The third opinion request does not apply here, as there are more than two editors involved. ~~Also, if you want to get a third opinion for the future, you should place an appropriate request here. The template placed at the top of this section does not work for itself~~.--Jetstreamer (talk) 23:01, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I've never done a "3o" before. (I've come from the world of "fair use" disputes, where things go straight to AN/I, sockpuppets, etc.) I'm not sure how kinder/gentler dispute resolution is supposed to work. Since I've already created the "third opinion" entry, do I need to go remove it, or just the template here?? Thanks. --Chaswmsday (talk) 23:11, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

OK, I see Jetstreamer has removed it from WP:3O. Now what do we do?...--Chaswmsday (talk) 23:14, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you meant by "operate from 2 different areas of the airport", Snoozlepet. Yeah, I think for some of the reasons listed upthread, it would be beneficial to wikilink each of the destination entries. Once an airport article is "done", it should be easy to maintain the format... :) --Chaswmsday (talk) 23:22, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

@Chaswmsday, What i meant was an airline operating from 2 or more concourses or terminals at an airport. Many airport articles, most airlines are listed seperate because check-in and departing gates for that airline to those destinations may be located in a different terminals and only the first airline name is wikilinked. Also the larger airports have a dedicated terminal or concourse strictly for international flights. I was asking if the airline is listed twice, does it really need to be linked twice? I agree with all of the reasons above. If a reader is looking at the destinations, it may be helpful to them which airport they fly to. Snoozlepet (talk) 23:34, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

There is nothing to depute, It is my talk with User:Snoozlepet and is no one else's business. If you don't remove it then I will and I will get an administrator in here. I don't like it and it is no one else's business. If someone asked me first before they added my talk I might have re considered but Chaswmsday was rude and nosey and added my personal conversation with User:Snoozlepet to this page which I am not ok with. Cali4529 (talk) 23:43, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Can we all please discuss the core of the post in a civilised manner, please?--Jetstreamer (talk) 23:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

@Snoozlepet, Oh you meant the airline itself! I think that once in the whole table should be enough...the only possible reason I could see for linking the airline multiple times would be to guard against a WP reader re-sorting the table and "losing track" of where the airline link went. I can't see that being such a huge problem that you'd need to design the page for it. But the destinations, I think definitely should be linked multiple times. --Chaswmsday (talk) 23:51, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

@Cali4529, It seems to be standard practice on WP to move/copy discussions about an article or project to the relevant talk page. I meant no offense and frankly found nothing that I would consider offensive or embarrassing in your initial discussion with @Snoozlepet. I didn't intend any insult. Sorry if you were offended. And see, now you're making comments on MY talk page about not proceeding with edits until consensus. I get your point, but since Bobrayner is also involved in restoring edits, it would make more sense to make those comments either here, or on Atlanta airport's talk page, so he can be included in the discussion. Since I'm so close to finishing, I'd like to do the last bit of destination links, then let this project community take a look at Atlanta and see what they think... OK? --Chaswmsday (talk) 00:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

@Chaswmsday, I like that suggestion. I would first use the WP:Sandbox to do a test run on the Atlanta Airport article then let other editors have a look at Atlanta Airport just as a test article and let them decide if its good. Then, they can post their comments here but remember WP:3RR. Snoozlepet (talk) 00:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I thought there was broad agreement here that destinations could/should be linked, but as far as I can tell from Cali4529's comments (which are a little difficult to follow; any clarification should be welcomed), they feel that agreement is invalidated because Cali4529 is unhappy that their initial comment was copied here, and - going a step further - any changes to articles in line with that agreement should be reverted. I disagree with that line of reasoning, but I don't intend to revert again; let's try to calm down a little... bobrayner (talk) 00:47, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

[BTW, The last comment was by Bobrayner (talk) at 00:20, 31 January 2012 (UTC)] --Chaswmsday (talk) 00:31, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see any consensus to override WP:OVERLINK. Adding those links to tables would be a clear violation of that guideline and should not be done. Vegaswikian (talk) 01:46, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Which sentence of WP:OVERLINK forbids these links to other airports? bobrayner (talk) 03:47, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

As I mentioned in my earlier post in this discussion (before all the silliness started), my understanding of WP:OVERLINK was that (i) it was intended to avoid superfluous links in article text (like that), not to impede navigation; and (ii) that it specifically mentions tables as somewhere that it's OK for them to be placed. --RFBailey (talk) 03:58, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I would like to remind everyone of the workload issue. If we had been too busy to add year to all the begin/end dates, how are we going to change all the tables projectwide. As I already suggested, we need a convenient copy-and-paste wikicode page containing all the airports and links. I myself would be just sitting on the fence without such a tool. HkCaGu (talk) 04:18, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

HkCaGu, Thats the problem I am having trouble getting over as well. Cali4529 (talk) 04:24, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Why is workload a problem? I don't think anybody has suggested that these links should be mandatory. The removal of links is problematic, imho, and asking people not to remove them is saving work, not creating it. (Since you mention dates, I remember somebody going round removing the year from dates, deliberately creating extra work for themselves; a task which made articles less useful to readers). The last thing I want is to encourage a massive campaign of ritual edits whose goal is to satisfy some internal standard rather than to help readers. bobrayner (talk) 04:29, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I tend to agree with the workload concerns. I am going to feel as though I should perform a conversion on an entire table if I make a quick hit-and-run visit and render a minor change to a table using the proposed (all-linked) formatting. Otherwise I would be leaving behind a multi-coloured and inconsistent table. Some airport tables are quite large, might change a quick visit update edit into a major editing session, however I think it is for the best overall to go to the multi-linked table display formatting. I will certainly at least try to do any articles I casually patrol.-- Felix (talk) 04:44, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

~~Voting has begun, please visit the "Airline/Airport Table Voting" column on this page. Voting Rules and Format are explained there as well.~~

How to list Dubai in airport articles?

Now that it has two airports, with Al Maktoum catering cargo only at present, should the cargo section of airport articles listing flights from Dubai show Dubai-International and Dubai-Al Maktoum as and where required? 119.155.40.154 (talk) 13:52, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the current Dubai Airport should be listed as Dubai-International while the airport serving only cargo should be listed as Dubai-Al Maktoum (the new airport will have passenger operations soon) so Dubai needs disambiguation. However, we have a lot of cities that have multiple airports but are not disambiguated (i.e. Nairobi, Johannesburg, Tel Aviv, etc.) Snoozlepet (talk) 20:32, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Montreal-Trudeau seems an appropriate comparison: these days, it's just about the only airport with passenger services, with Mirabel restricted to cargo. But we list "Montreal-Trudeau" in destination lists. --RFBailey (talk) 02:43, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Same goes for Dubai, the current airport is the only airport with passenger services while Al Maktoum is cargo only. The question is that should Dubai needs to be disambiguated if we did the same for Montreal? Snoozlepet (talk) 04:14, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't think we should disambiguate because there is a cargo-only airport. Different categories (passenger, cargo, pet, seaplane, etc.) should be counted separately. HkCaGu (talk) 10:12, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Cargo flights also operate from Dubai International not just Al Maktoum. 119.155.33.19 (talk) 02:55, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Peshawar International Airport

The airport has been renamed as Bacha Khan International Airport, article updated, signage at airport carries the new name, change article title if need be. 119.155.33.19 (talk) 02:48, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Someone with a personal view is not accepting this change and is constantly reverting the edits made. 119.155.33.19 (talk) 18:01, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

I left a message on the user discussion page. Slasher-fun (talk) 18:16, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Page already renamed. There are sources provided on the article's talk page reflecting the name change. Snoozlepet (talk) 19:38, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Accidents/Incidents

As a WP user I noted the strange list of accidents at Santos Dumont Airport and raised a query on its talk page. Since then, I found some relevant discussion here and here But perhaps these remain ambiguous by setting out notability criteria for accidents themselves, but without clear guidance on when they should be included in airport articles.

I also found that many Brazilian airport articles (all?) have adopted the same approach, including many accidents that have nothing to do with the airport at all, took place far away, sometimes at other airports or even in other countries. Just sampling a few others showed: London Heathrow and Paris Orly: only accidents at/near airport included. Dallas-Fort Worth: main list as at Heathrow, then a separate list for "DFW connected" flights. Miami International: follows the Brazilian pattern.

WP Airports editors might want to discuss? Davidships (talk) 02:08, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Paralleling WP:AIRLINES guidelines, only flights that originated in the airport or had it as a destination/stopover, plus any hijacking that ended up in the airport off the flight plan, warrants inclusion, provided that there were fatalities and/or hull-losses, or changes in procedures. I recently expanded the Accidents/incidents section at Ellinikon International Airport, and actually adopted that criteria. Non-fatal events that didn't carry with the hull-loss of the aircraft involved weren't included at all. You may also want to take a look at the same section at Ministro Pistarini International Airport, also created by me some time ago.--Jetstreamer (talk) 02:18, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

You would normally expect that an accident section for an airport was for accidents at that airport or for aircraft arriving or departing anything else would not really be relevant. An aircraft that originated at the airport then crashed hundreds of miles away or one that was on its way but never made it is not really relevant to the airport. It was not put in WP:AIRCRASH perhaps because we assumed that the use of the airport accident section for accidents at the airport was obvious! MilborneOne (talk) 12:35, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Surprised that only two editors have made any comments. I think MilborneOne is on the right track but since the "obvious" has been ignored by so many editors, perhaps an addition to the Airport articles section of WP:AIRCRASH should read:

Accidents and incidents. Accidents or incidents should only be included in airport articles if they took place at or near the airport and

The accident caused human fatalities or
The accident involved hull loss or serious damage to the aircraft or airport or
The accident or incident invoked a change in procedures, regulations or process that had a wide effect on other airports or airlines or the aircraft industry

Davidships (talk) 13:58, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree with the "at or near the airport" inclusion. —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 18:23, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Airline/Airport Table Voting

Airlines	Destinations	Concourse
Air France	Paris-Charles de Gaulle	E
AirTran Airways	Akron/Canton, Aruba, Atlantic City [ends January 6, 2012], Baltimore, Bloomington/Normal [ends June 3, 2012], Boston, Branson, Buffalo, Cancún, Charlotte, Chicago-Midway, Columbus (OH), Dayton, Denver, Detroit, Flint, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Houston-Hobby, Indianapolis, Jacksonville (FL), Kansas City, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Memphis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Montego Bay, Nassau, New Orleans, New York-LaGuardia, Newport News [ends March 9, 2012], Orlando, Pensacola, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Punta Cana, Raleigh/Durham, Richmond, Rochester (NY), St. Louis, San Antonio, San Francisco, San Juan, Sarasota/Bradenton, Seattle/Tacoma, Tampa, Washington-Dulles [ends June 3, 2012], Washington-National, West Palm Beach, White Plains, Wichita Seasonal: Allentown/Bethlehem, Bermuda, Harrisburg, Portland (ME)	C, D
Alaska Airlines	Seattle/Tacoma	B

It has been very infusing with the un organized discussion above. I think it is time we put a vote to it. All in favor for adding the links in the cities on airport city charts vote YES all against the linking vote NO. Please keep you votes to just the vote. The time for fighting and discussion has come to a close, if you wish to re open the topic at any point at the end of voting feel free. Voting starts January 30, 2012 at 9:00pmEST and ends February 1, 2012 at 2:00pmEST. This gives users ample time to vote. Thanks and sorry for fighting. At the end of the voting period, the answer with the most votes gets the Consensus. You can change your vote until the voting period is over. Again. all in favor for adding the links in the cities on airport city charts vote YES all against the linking vote NO.

Before posting a vote, let me remind you that WP:VOTE is discouraged. Rather, editors are supposed to gain consensus. One more thing: I intend this comment to stay here, so please do not delete it again.--Jetstreamer (talk) 02:52, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Voting will be used in this case because a consensus can not be made. The voting has begun and I want to make sure everyone recognizes that voting periods are shown in Eastern Standard Time. Cali4529 (talk) 02:59, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

No consensus is a valid outcome. What gives one editor the right to establish how the encyclopedia operates? Also involved editors are generally not the best people to determine the outcome of a discussion and further action. Vegaswikian (talk) 03:26, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

There are a whole host of reasons why this "voting" procedure is a bad idea. But to clarify:

A consensus is not a vote. Saying "At the end of the voting period, the answer with the most votes gets the Consensus" demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of what a consensus is. It's not a case of "majority rule".
Setting up a vote like this unilaterally is totally against the spirit of Wikipedia, and probably numerous policies and guidelines. This seems to be a result of an argument spread out over three hours, which is hardly enough time for many users to become aware this discussion was taking place. If you wanted to reopen the discussion, this wasn't the way to go about it.
Not everyone lives in the Eastern time zone (not even in the US). Wikipedia uses UTC as a standard.
Two days is an unreasonably short time to achieve a sensible outcome. Besides, arbitrary deadlines should be avoided.
Spamming the project members seems unnecessary, especially when it takes at three attempts to get the message right. [1][2][3]
In short, Cali4529 has displayed a considerable lack of understanding of numerous policies, and should take a step back and cool down for a while. --RFBailey (talk) 03:36, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Cali4529, please stop removing and rearranging other people's comments. I have undone the latest one, restoring other editors' comments to their original layout.
What's wrong with simply discussing the issue in the existing Airlines and Destinations tables section? Earlier it looked as though we had a consensus which was in line with Cali4529's initial suggestion; do we really have to start from scratch? bobrayner (talk) 03:48, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

If you all want to do it at this point, I don't care. I'm all for it if all this fighting stops. Cali4529 (talk) 04:01, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Cali4529: your editing in regard to this matter has been highly disruptive. The mass reverts to the ATL article, the complaining about the talk page comments being posted here, the refactoring of the discussions on this page, the removal of other users' posts, the setting up of this ridiculous "vote", the spamming of editors, the arguing about UTC versus EST, are all examples of this. All in all, I strongly suggest you calm down, take a deep breath, and come back to this discussion tomorrow with a clear head. --RFBailey (talk) 04:17, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't know if you read correctly, I said go for it. I don't care anymore. If you want to work that hard as to have to add all of the links to all of the airports then go for it. I wish you luck. Cali4529 (talk) 04:25, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Cali4529 has also replied on my talk page here. It's basically an admission of disrupting Wikipedia to make a point. Cali4529: there are no private conversations on Wikipedia. Users' talk pages are open for anyone to read. As Chaswmsday's edits were the subject of your conversation with Snoozlepet, they were perfectly entitled to quote that conversation on this project page in an attempt to open a wider discussion at a suitable venue. To go off on a petulant rampage of disruptive editing because you were insulted by that is, quite frankly, not acceptable behaviour. If it continues, a report to WP:AN/I may need to be made. --RFBailey (talk) 04:41, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Time Formatting

As explained, the timing was written in Eastern Standard Time so we took the liberty of giving you the time conversion.
CUT/UTZ/ZULU: 02:00Z 31 January to 07:00Z 2 February
EST: January 30, 2012 at 9:00pmEST to February 1, 2012 at 2:00pm.EST

Who is this "we"? --RFBailey (talk) 03:36, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Vote Format

~~Please follow this voting format,~~

~~['''Your Vote'''] + Signature (using ~~~~~~

Final Vote

Yes -Cali4529 ^{(Let's Chat)} 02:32, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
Yes. I think that appeals to WP:OVERLINK miss the mark, as the links we're discussing are not among the examples of inappropriate linking at WP:OVERLINK. First and foremost, articles should serve readers; many readers who browse a table which lists lots of airports are likely to want to be able to click through to articles on those airports. Deliberately removing useful links (rather than useless links to dates, dictionary words, &c) does a disservice to readers; it would be like delinking the players in New York Jets#Notable players or delinking the books in Naipaul#Bibliography. bobrayner (talk) 03:42, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
Yes - The linking proposal appears to be of benefit to the reader and the overall project. As the tables can be re-sorted all airline and destination entries would need to be linked to maintain table display consistency. I support the concept of linking all airline and destination entries. I also wish to add the comment that I think consensus was apparent without this vote and that the very short time frame for voting has the potential to somewhat alienate some participants in the project, or those who have interest in manual-of-style or table formatting and article display issues. If we are seeking a confirmation or clarification through a vote then it should be considered that not all editors are able or necessarily care to visit WP everyday. I suggest that the time for voting is extended, at least by a few days. Surely there is no urgency here, though I agree that with all the disputation on content, style and procedure it would be nice to be done with it. There were many good constructive suggestions and comments made above. - Felix (talk) 04:26, 31 January 2012 (UTC)...append.. (as per CambridgeBayWeather below)..."the airport must be linked and not the city" ..I agree. - Felix (talk) 01:46, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
Yes - definitely makes things easier to navigate. go ahead. - Rgds. Planenut (Talk) 04:50, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
Yes - to all of the reasons above. Snoozlepet (talk) 04:55, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
Yes but only if it is made clear that the airport must be linked and not the city and that if the airport does not exist a red link should be made. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 06:41, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
Yes I second what CambridgeBayWeather is saying. Thenoflyzone (talk) 03:36, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
Close the discussion with no decision given the changes to the directions. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:55, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Point of order: not a legitimate RfC

Guys, this can't possibly be meaningful. Could you please consult WP:RFC for how to set up and run an RfC? Just a few things: it's not a vote. Two days is not a legitimate timeframe. An RfC, particularly one that appears to propose something in conflict with site-wide guidelines, needs to be advertised more widely. I'll place an entry in an RfC that is properly held. Thanks. $Tony (talk)$ 01:43, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

How does it conflict with Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Linking? I doubt that most airports are common terms. Of course you could argue that some airports are fairly common but then you would end up with some linked and some not. There is also the readability issue with multiple consecutive links. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

In that case, I can't fathom what it's about (and I should be able to tell). Does it not concern the linking of cities? It's rather poorly explained. The wording should be crystal clear.

Tony (talk)

06:08, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Tony, check the edit history of this page. Yes, we know this set-up is a shambolic mess: it was done by an editor who was going off on a petulant rampage for spurious reasons. I don't think anyone is actually treating this as a "proper" RfC as such; rather, most of us are trying to have a sensible discussion of this issue. Save the lectures for the user who is responsible for this mess---it wasn't a project decision! Regards, --RFBailey (talk) 06:46, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

A request for comment about...what? An RFC is generally a discussion involving two (or more) proposed versions of article content proposed by two (or more) editors; the issue for discussion is clearly stated under the RFC tag. To expect outside editors to research an article's edit history is unrealistic; for example, I'm busy enough as it is at the moment with the WikiProject Wikify backlog-reduction drive. I'll return when there's something to discuss. Good luck and all the best, Miniapolis (talk) 15:35, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

I think the RfC template was placed in error. Sorry for the confusion--although this has been a rather confusing business. --RFBailey (talk) 18:30, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Making operated by small

What do you think? Making the operated by [ [---] ] small, saves space and cleans it up a little. Delta Air Lines and the comair ones are in the normal format the others in small format. Cali4529 (talk) 23:20, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Airlines	Destinations	Concourse
Delta Air Lines	Atlanta Seasonal: Detroit	B
Delta Connection operated by Comair	Detroit, New York-JFK, New York-LaGuardia	B
Delta Connection operated by Compass Airlines	Minneapolis St. Paul Seasonal: Atlanta, Detroit	B
Delta Connection operated by ExpressJet	Seasonal: Atlanta, Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York-JFK	B
Delta Connection operated by GoJet	Atlanta, Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York-JFK	B

Perhaps including the small in parenthesis will make it cleaner.--Jetstreamer (talk) 23:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

While the person on Cali4529 hacked my former account (Cali4529) about a week ago, I like this, hope it goes through. I just got my Cali account back, in an effort to keep users from being mad at me for a reason out my my control, I am keeping my ne account. All that mess above and the yelling from Cali4529 are not my comments. Aviationspecialist101 (talk) 23:38, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I find it curious, @Aviationspecialist101, that the "hacker" returned control to you, given that (s)he admitted this at 23:43, 2 February 2012 (UTC) on your old user talk page, still using the Cali4529 ID (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Cali4529&diff=prev&oldid=474667761), and that you replied to this on the same page at 23:44, 2 February 2012 (UTC) (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ACali4529&action=historysubmit&diff=474668003&oldid=474667761).

Also that, even though a hack isn't really your responsibility to clean up: prior to determining and making an effort to correct any of the hacker's mis-edits made in your name, you endorse one of the hacker's suggestions... Just curious. --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:01, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I was also surprised that the hacker liked to edit the same kind of pages; that's a remarkable coincidence. More impressive, though, is regaining control of the account - how did you contact the hacker and persuade them to let you have it back? bobrayner (talk) 12:05, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I found out late last night that it was my friend the whole time. I left my account logged in and he changed the pswrd. He came over to my house blah blah blah I saw he was on my account and thats it. The times I can't really explain, we were both on separate computers at my house after work and we were both on wikipedia then. With my backing of his idea on the wiki airports thats simply because he pitched that suggestion to me while we were talking and I liked it. Thanks for your concern! Aviationspecialist101 (talk) 13:54, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, that makes me curiouser still, @Aviationspecialist101. Why would you give your WP password to this "friend" of yours in the first place?? And after all of the havoc and bad feelings this "friend" caused you, why was (s)he still using your account at another computer in your house, in your presence?? And why, after your "friend" posted on Cali4529's talk page about having returnED (past tense) control to you, would you post an "it's all good now" type message immediately following that message, rather than immediately logging your "friend" out of WP, changing your password again, making sure the "friend" didn't learn the new password, then showing "friend" the door for causing you so much trouble?? Curious. And why wouldn't anyone believe that instead of your "friend story", you were always only one individual who overreacted to a perceived slight and acted disruptively?? And why would anyone following this conversation not feel compelled to request a Sockpuppet investigation?? Still, just curious. --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:22, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your curiosity! I didn't give my friend the password I left my account logged on while I was using his computer. I am not sure what you mean by "you were always only one individual who overreacted to a perceived slight and acted disruptively." Please further explain that. And while appreciate your concern I think you are over reacting to a simple occurrence. I haven't even done anything bad to make you warrant a "loud" conversation. You can delete my Cali page, I am only using this one because my friend made enemies with my account I do not want to be affiliated with that. Aviationspecialist101 (talk) 03:54, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't see where I was being "loud"; I just was curious about certain claims you have made and was seeking your clarification. In my statement you asked about, I suggest that perhaps there was no "friend" who hijacked your user id; rather, that Cali4529 and Aviationspecialist101 is, and always has been, only one individual -- you. You initially claim that your "friend" changed your Wikipedia password, but you later claim that you never gave "him" your password in the first place. Please explain this contradiction. --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:39, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Copied from User talk:Chaswmsday: He did change my password but I didn't give it to him. The only thing I can think of is if he saw me put it in once before. Thanks! Aviationspecialist101 (talk) 22:41, 6 February 2012 (UTC) --End copy. --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:31, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

No, he never said he "gave" his password to his friend. He said that "[he] left my account logged in and [his friend] changed the pswrd." Not sure where how you're coming to the conclusion that Cali4529 gave his friend the password. —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 05:31, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Quite true, but my presumption is that after my last comment, Aviationspecialist101 realized that the old password is required for a password change, and then subtly reworded accordingly. I really do feel like requesting a Sockpuppet investigation, but I figure (s)he'll just claim that the IP addresses match because (s)he and the "friend" were operating off one internet connection. I'd much rather that (s)he 'fess up and admit there never was any "friend". The very specific topics edited by "both", the general writing style and grammar, and the apparent lack of interest in cleaning up any problems caused by the "friend" render that explanation extremely implausible. But I'm done with him/her for now.... --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:50, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

How is a sockpuppet investigation going to help? He's already admitted that both accounts are his, and activity on the Cali4259 account ceased within 20 minutes of the AviationSpecialist101 account being created. Sockpuppetry is the act of a single person operating multiple accounts, not multiple people using the same account. --RFBailey (talk) 21:28, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, that settles it. —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 02:33, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Back on topic

In response to the actual query that was raised (whether to reduce the type size of the operating carriers of subcontracted flights): I don't think this is necessary. If it was a travel guide, how a flight is branded is important (the average passenger doesn't care if it's Comair, Mesaba, Skywest, or whoever, but does care that's its Delta); however, as an encylcopaedia we've already made a point of separating out the different operating carriers, so reducing the type size of the carrier name makes it less obvious as to why there are so many different (and overlapping) listings for Delta Connection. --RFBailey (talk) 21:45, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Why make "operated by..." smaller? I see absolutely no need to do that. —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 05:14, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Unnecessary, IMO. But how about destination wikilinks? (I really only came into the Atlanta article in the first place to correct to a US spelling. How I now regret that initial inclination... :>) ) --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:50, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Antonbabich (talk · contribs) seems to have decided to start doing this across several articles. A few I noticed: Los Angeles International Airport, Tolmachevo Airport, Cologne Bonn Airport, Hannover-Langenhagen Airport, M. R. Štefánik Airport. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 16:14, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Aviation/Style guide/Layout (Airlines)

A discussion about airline destination boxes not related to this project was copied here by User:Trevj - removed as not relevant to this project. MilborneOne (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Bit confused why a discussion on tables for airline pages has been put on the airport article - the airport tables are not the same and were not the subject of the above discussion. Suggest it is removed as it just confuses what are two different subjects. MilborneOne (talk) 18:13, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Not sure either, perhaps it was meant to be put on WT:AIRLINES. —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 18:17, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Apologies for my confusion and off-topic talk. This was due to me not fully appreciating the parent/child project setup. Thanks for your patience. -- Trevj (talk) 10:12, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I have removed it as not relevant to this project. MilborneOne (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Moved discussion to WT:AIRLINES —Compdude123 (talk | contribs) 18:42, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

(Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airlines#WikiProject Aviation/Style guide/Layout (Airlines)) -- Trevj (talk) 10:12, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

What flag to use for Hong Kong?

Putting aside my dislike of the use of flags in airport articles for the moment, I've noticed recently 208.76.113.2 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) changing the flag for Hong Kong in the statistics sections of Los Angeles International Airport and San Francisco International Airport from Image:Flag of Hong Kong.svg to Image:Flag of China.svg. Before I get into a revert war with the editor, I thought I'd see what the general feeling was about which flag should be used? -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 16:44, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

I seem to remember something about the HK aviation authorities still being different from the PRC so in licensing and aviation matters they are not the same which is why I believe we use the HK flag. MilborneOne (talk) 18:11, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Hong Kong's one, definitely.--Jetstreamer (talk) 18:30, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Also, Hong Kong has its own flag and to what Milborne said, Hong Kong and PRC have seperate aviation agreements from each other. Hong Kong SAR flag should be used. Snoozlepet (talk) 22:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Indicating both the departure terminal and concourse on the airport's destination table

Off topic but what page do the above example tables come from? I tried to do something similar with separating the terminals and concourses on the Atlanta page some time ago but that was reverted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.81.25.227 (talk) 00:14, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I completely made it up myself :). Kairportflier (talk) 04:18, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

ok, so I take it the consensus is still that the terminal and concourse should not both be indicated — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.81.25.227 (talk) 05:16, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Focus city airlines listed in the hub section of an infobox

Should airlines like Southwest that do not operate on a traditional hub-and-spoke system, but rather have a larger decentralized focus-city network, up in the "Hub" section of the infobox of an airport that is listed as a focus city? Someone just recently edited the Oakland International Airport article to include Southwest Airlines as a hub tenant. Just wanted to build some kind of consensus here before I went and edited it. nf utvol (talk) 20:01, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

From the airport's perspective, if a single airline has a lot of flights to and fro, maybe several aircraft (and crew &c) based there, then it's reasonable to call it a hub (even better if a reliable source calls it a hub) even if it's not the sole focus of that airline. bobrayner (talk) 15:48, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

My thought is that we should only list actual stated hubs there. That is, airlines that operate on a true hub and spoke system that fly a substantial number of flights to non-hub airports from the city in question. For instance, even though American Airlines has a lot of flights out of Nashville, almost all of their flights are to hub airports. With airlines like Southwest that operate on a Focus City system, probably a quarter of the airports they fly to would be considered hubs, which would just clutter the infobox. Also, many airlines have crew and maintenance bases at small airports, such as Dayton or Knoxville, that are definitely not a hub. Perhaps the addition of a "Crew Base" or "Focus City" entry into the infobox could be useful? Of course, then we run the risk of including too much in the infobox. nf utvol (talk) 16:16, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

How about a compromise? If a reliable source lists a destination as a hub of an airline, it's listed as a hub in the infobox. This is regardless of whether or not the airline uses a hub-and-spoke system. Airline webpages count as a reliable source if they declare the destination a hub, but not if they use the term "focus city" or something similar. - Jorgath (talk) 21:07, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

If the definition at Airline hub is to be trusted (and that article surely needs some TLC), a hub is:

An airline hub is an airport that an airline uses as a transfer point to get passengers to their intended destination.^{[citation needed]} It is part of a hub and spoke model, where travelers moving between airports not served by direct flights change planes en route to their destinations.^{[citation needed]} Many hubs of the airlines are also situated at airports in the cities of the respective head offices.^{[citation needed]} Some airlines may use only a single hub, while other airlines use multiple hubs. Hubs are used for both passenger flights as well as cargo flights.^{[citation needed]}

Which requires transfer traffic, not flights to non-hub airports. Whether Southwest's presence at Oakland qualifies, or whether that definition is correct, I leave for others to haggle over! bobrayner (talk) 22:03, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't want to get drawn into (i) what the formal definition of a "hub" is or (ii) what the difference between hubs and focus cities is, but I do want to point out the following:

The examples and perspective in this discussion deal primarily with the United States and may not represent a worldwide view of the subject.

Just an observation..... --RFBailey (talk) 23:42, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Good point. Another compromise suggestion, then: have the infobox template display "hub/focus city for" rather than "hub for," and include all declared hubs and/or focus cities. - Jorgath (talk) 00:35, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Alas, I must disagree again (don't take it personally; I'm very disagreeable). "Hub/focus city for" is slightly stilted wording, and if we want a global perspective, "focus city" is something we should be moving away from. Can't we just use the word "hub" more carefully? bobrayner (talk) 02:21, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm not taking it personally, don't worry. And I agree with the wording issue. The problem is that by only using official "hubs," we're on the verge of systemic bias against airlines that don't use a hub-and-spoke system, so what we need to do is actually use "hub" less narrowly even if we use it more carefully. Maybe the solution (though I dislike it) is to entirely remove the "hub" parameter from the airport infobox, leaving that information for the airline pages alone. I don't have a better idea, but we've got to either do that or find a way to include an equivalent mention of non-hub-and-spoke airlines in the infobox (and by equivalent I mean listing airlines that make major use of that airport). Hmm...maybe try to figure out a number of airports (3? 5?) that should be considered "hubs" for this purpose, even if they are officially listed as "focus cities" or some such thing? - Jorgath (talk) 04:21, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm not entirely opposed to removing it, as I fall under the flag of less-is-more in infoboxes. Does including the hub in the infobox really add anything of status to it that isn't better explained in the prose of the lead in and body? As an alternative, it could be useful to reword it and change it to "Major Airline Presence" or something along those lines. That would allow for the inclusion of smaller feeder airlines like PSA or Republic in the infoboxes of airports that they use as crew bases.nf utvol (talk) 15:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

NOTE - I just copied this over to the Infobox talk page. Lets continue discussion there to avoid cluttering it up here.nf utvol (talk) 15:45, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Inclusion of Template:Airport destination list in articles<span class="anchor" id="Inclusion of {{Airport destination list}} in articles">

Copied from my recent comments at Talk:Bristol Airport:

I've tried to trawl through the places where this was previously discussed, but have not been able to find where consensus was reached for its inclusion. Discussions have been moved from one Project talk page to another and also had headings changed which hinders searching. It was apparently discussed at WP:Village pump (policy), but again I've not found that. I think that the inclusion of such detailed information presents a few problems:

Depending on the respective lengths of the individual articles and destination data, inclusion of such data could give undue weight.
Wikipedia is not a directory
Spammers (especially with single-purpose accounts) can currently easily add their favourite airline(s), without considering the inclusion of others
Maintenance of up-to-date information is an issue, but this can be adequately addressed if enough editors are involved.

Alternative outlets are are also available and should be considered, e.g. spotterswiki.com, flyerguide.com.

I've also notified members of the parent project, because I didn't know if it had been done previously. -- Trevj (talk) 11:30, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

One thing I'm not clear about: are you questioning the use of the table versus other ways of formatting the data, or the entire concept of including a list of the airlines serving the airport and the destinations? And you do realize that you revived a 2.5 year old discussion on the Bristol talk page? The table format tends to be more condensed, taking up less vertical space in the articles. Your complaint about discussions being moved is likely due to the archiving of this talk page, if you look through the archives (links in the yellow box at the top of this page) you should find the discussion.

One comment about the use of SpottersWiki, as I am a co-founder of the site: The majority of the articles only list the airlines and the aircraft types they use at the airport, as from a spotting/photography perspective, where the aircraft fly to isn't all that relevant as they mostly will care about what they'll see. The site also doesn't have nearly as many editors so much of the information is not nearly as up to date as Wikipedia. Of course, that can change if people are interested in adding more info. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 16:28, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi. I thought I'd properly searched through the archived talk of the relevant Projects but perhaps I missed something. As for reviving the discussion at Talk:Bristol Airport, it didn't seem to me as if consensus had actually been reached there. But even if it had, consensus can change. Anyway, what I'm qustioning are points 1-3 I gave above. Is inclusion of destination lists appropriate in all cases by default, or are there some airport articles with little historical info overshadowed by such lists? (Sorry, I'm not familiar with the articles but admit I could have a look myself some time.) Is such content of great encyclopedic value (e.g. would it be more appropriate to summarise which countries/continents are served) or is it sometimes included by editors with undeclared COI in order to promote their own interests? Are such lists accurate, relatively complete and neutral? Your comments regarding the useful Spotterswiki site make a lot of sense to me. Thanks. -- Trevj (talk) 21:08, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Trevj: your questions appears to be about the encyclopaedic value of including destination lists in airport articles, rather than the formatting of such lists, which was the subject of this discussion. It might have been better to begin a new discussion on this at the end of the page. --RFBailey (talk) 20:54, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Good point. Now moved. Thanks. -- Trevj (talk) 10:31, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

The idea behind the airport destinations list is to give an indication of the size and scope of services from the airport. It is an encyclopedia entry for the airport so is just trying to give a bigger picture of where the airport fits in the wider scheme. It is not a travel guide etc so it can be historic as well as recent and it doesnt have to be up todate and certainly doesnt need to indicate which terminals a particular service uses, although a by airline usage could be used. So it would be just as correct to have destination list from this year and ten and twenty years old to show the growth or otherwise of the airport. So rather than putting in a load of detail which doesnt show the size and scope of services we should perhaps consider that so far the historic tables have been ignored. Perhaps if users think that it should be up to date and be usable as a travel guide they should consider other wikis as more suitable platforms than an encyclopedia. MilborneOne (talk) 12:55, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Some of the entries in transclusions of this template amount to original research and are therefore candidates for removal. Per WP:NOTDIR, I agree that inclusion of such lists should not be based on being up to date and be usable as a travel guide. Websites such as flycheapo.com afford such information. Older lists of destinations would indeed be of encyclopedic value, and the inclusion of a column providing years of operation would be possible way to achieve this. Templates such as {{Yes}}, {{Terminated}} could also be included in an appropriate additional "Current" column. -- Trevj (talk) 15:24, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Qantas DFW-BNE-SYD

Why is Sydney not listed as a Qantas destination from DFW? Qantas doesn't change plane nor flight number from BNE to SYD (QF8), like Singapore Air from IAH-DME-SIN.... in IAH page, Singapore is listed as destination. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeremiahjr (talk • contribs) 04:13, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

The fact that it's served in the opposite direction (QF7 flies non-stop SYD-DFW), and that it shows up in the Oneworld timetable as "direct", should be fine. I've added it back. --RFBailey (talk) 19:48, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

There was a stupid edit-war about it in December, which resulted in some  comments left in the article text, and no proper discussion apart from in edit summaries--most of which centered around to what extent BNE is a "hub". None of this is relevant: guidelines may be ignored if doing so improves the article in question. Nitpicking and pedantry generally do not. --RFBailey (talk) 20:00, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Some examples of this exact same matter is: EWR-BRU-BOM (Jet Airways), EWR-BOM-AMD (Air India), JFK-DEL-BOM (Air India), and ORD-DEL-HYD (Air India). The flight number and aircraft don't change on those routes but those flights passes thru the respective airline's hub airport. Snoozlepet (talk) 06:25, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

No, those are not the "exact same matter": in those cases, there isn't a non-stop in the opposite direction. And even in those cases there is inconsistency: on the JFK article, Jet Airways are listed with Brussels and Chennai, yet Air India only with Mumbai.....

I suspect the point of the "hub" guideline was based on fairly common situations with US domestic routes of the form [Random Place 1]-[Major Hub]-[Random Place 2] which happen to have a through flight number. In such an example, it makes no sense to list [Random Place 2] as a destination from [Random Place 1]. But that's not the case here. --RFBailey (talk) 18:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

An experienced user has decided to revert this change, sparking a sequence of tit-for-tat reverts on the DFW article. Rather than escalating that into a full-scale revert war, I will discuss the various issues that arise here instead. I quote the following from the WP:AIRPORTS style guide for airport articles:

List non-stop and direct flights only. That means the flight number and the aircraft, starts at this airport and continues to one or more airports. Avoid using the description 'via' since that is more correctly listed as another destination. If passengers can not disembark at a stop on a direct flight, then do not list it as a destination or as 'via'. Direct flights are not always non-stop flights. However, avoid listing direct flights that contain a stop at a domestic hub, as virtually all of these are simply flights from one "spoke city" to a hub, with the plane continuing from the hub to a second spoke city. Furthermore, these flights often involve plane changes, despite the direct designation. Including these flights dramatically increases the length of destination listings, artificially inflates the airline's presence at a location and requires constant updating, as these "timetable direct" destinations have little rhyme or reason and may change as often as every week or two.

The project style guides are not formal guidelines, let alone formal policies, so therefore it is completely wrong to say that Sydney "cannot" be added. This is not a hard-and-fast rule, it's a piece of advice.
When it says "virtually all of these are simply flights from one "spoke city" to a hub, with the plane continuing from the hub to a second spoke city"; it would appear that this case is one of the exceptions to the "virtually all".
I suspect that whoever wrote this was American. The practice of using through flight numbers with a change of aircraft appears widespread in the US, but not elsewhere. In that context, the guideline makes sense, but that's not the case here.
Nowhere in that guideline does it mention excluding originating flights. In 99.99% of cases, if there exists a non-stop flight from A to B, then there also exists a non-stop from B to A, so the point is irrelevant. However, in the remaining 0.01% of cases, could someone explain to me why it is inappropriate for points of origin to be listed as well? I can't think of a good reason (and pedantically quoting the dictionary definition of the word "destination" does not count as a good reason).
The guideline says "avoid" listing through-flight destinations; it does not forbid it.

I could go on, but that's enough for now. --RFBailey (talk) 18:50, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

I've been thinking deeper, and my conclusion now is that it makes sense in this case to include SYD at DFW. I think the deciding factor should be the aircraft type--the very reason US hubs have been excluded. At BNE, all SYD flights use small aircraft--except this one that's the B744 from DFW which has to return to SYD somehow. Compared to let's say UA's through-hub continuations at IAH where many aircraft of any type fly in and out at any time. We can review this hub criteria for Air Canada at YVR and YUL and Air India's connection, and maybe other cases too. HkCaGu (talk) 20:02, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Southwest/AirTran SOC Approaching

You may or may not know that Southwest expects to receive an SOC on March 1, 2012. Whenever they actually do receive the SOC, are we going to do the same on airport pages that we did with United/Continental when they received their SOC where we combine both airlines into the lasting airline name? Example below... Kairportflier (talk) 15:55, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Pre-SOC:

Airlines	Destinations	Terminal
AirTran Airways	Akron/Canton, Atlanta, Dayton, Denver, Milwaukee	B (Concourse N)
Southwest Airlines	Baltimore, Chicago-Midway, Nashville, St. Louis	B (Concourse B)

Post-SOC:

Airlines	Destinations	Terminal
Southwest Airlines	Akron/Canton, Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago-Midway, Dayton, Denver, Milwaukee, Nashville, St. Louis	B (Concourse B, N)

Yes, when they do receive the single certificate on March 1, 2012, the name "AirTran" will be dropped from air traffic controllers and pilots and all flights will be referred to as "Southwest" flights. After that day, the AirTran certificate will cease to exist and will use Southwest's. However, ground operations such as websites, FFPs, reservation systems, etc may not be combined until later. This may or may not happen as because CO/UA's ground operations are still seperated and will not be merged later but I don't know about AirTran/Southwest. So, all former AirTran listing should be changed to Southwest (same as UA/CO, NW/DL). Snoozlepet (talk) 06:17, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to beat the anti-certificate-only drum again. Unlike UACO, DLNW and even USHP, Southwest and AirTran are two very different airlines. And they will take a lot longer to integrate. All I'm trying to say is we can't ignore the branding. UACO and DLNW were sharing codes long before SOC. This doesn't seem to be the case for WNFL. If we go purely by cert, should we then combine DLConn operated by SkyWest with UAExp operated by SkyWest? HkCaGu (talk) 08:03, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

And now you see why I brought it up now and not on the day of the SOC :) Conversions will be happening by then and really they have said once the SOC happens the changes will begin and I think that instead of separating them and possibly confusing the heck out of the reader we should combine them. Kairportflier (talk) 12:15, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

"For the reader"--what a concept we should never leave behind! I have to insist on saying we were too early on merging UA and CO when at so many airports you had to know who you're flying (to the same city) to walk into the right terminal. One of the reasonings was that we didn't want to change things twice, but this UACO overlap has been three times longer than DLNW. May I suggest "operated as" again. HkCaGu (talk) 17:28, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

It seems to me that Southwest is drawing a distinction between WN and FL operations. It seems like certain routes are being slowly "converted" to Southwest, and AirTran remains a distinctly branded operation with different amenities and policies (first class, checked baggage fees) then I think it's appropriate to keep them separate, listed as "AirTran Airways operated by Southwest Airlines" or "Southwest Airlines operated as AirTran Airways". At the point Southwest begins a wholesale shift to the Southwest brand and product, then it would be appropriate to combine them. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 19:50, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia has to be factual. To a traveler if wikipedia was a travel guide then we should put AirTran but factually the flights are Southwest flights and should be combined to Southwest. Just a reminder everyone, Wikipedia is NOT a travel guide. Kairportflier (talk) 21:09, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

It is not unprecedented for an airline to operate two distinct services under different brand names, with distinct inflight services, under a single certificate. I don't recall how it was handled here, but I would have advocated keeping them separate. Recent examples that come to mind are Delta and Song, and United and Ted. Going further back, we have US Airways and Metrojet, Delta and Delta Express, Air Canada and Tango and Zip, and United and Shuttle by United/United Shuttle. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 01:08, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

The facts are that once the SOC is received no matter what airline, the flights are the combined airlines flights. No matter the livery, inflight experience, website you book on, no matter what the fact is it is ONE airline and in this case that is Southwest Airlines. Kairportflier (talk) 04:24, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

May also remember that this is an encyclopedia so it doesnt have to be up to date as it it is not a travel guide or a news service. You could just leave stuff and wait for everything to settle and sort it out in a few months time (or even longer). MilborneOne (talk) 21:06, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

The CrankyFlier blog has a blog post today that gives a good summary of how the WN/FL isn't a merger like UA/CO, DL/NW, or US/HP. It basically states that Southwest isn't taking anything of the AirTran operation, but rather slowly winding it down and replacing it with Southwest. Not really a source we can use for articles, but something to keep in mind to help explain how this one is different. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 23:23, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree that it is different but in the FACTS, AirTran is Southwest the day they get the SOC. Kairportflier (talk) 01:18, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

And? In the FACTS, as you would put it, Wrigley is Mars the day they were taken over; but we didn't go round erasing every mention of Wrigley in 2008. This is supposed to be an encyclopædia. bobrayner (talk) 02:14, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

That is a completely different industry. The aviation industry can not be compared to any other because it is so unique. But like I said before the FACTS are that AirTran is Southwest once the SOC is received whether you like it or not. Wikipedia is supposed to be factual aka once the SOC is received we will combine AirTran and Southwest into one Southwest as depicted above. Kairportflier (talk) 22:26, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

SOC, so what? If you demand AirTran be combined into SWA without distinction, then I must demand that SkyWest be the only thing mentioned in those respective entries. No more connections or expresses. They have no certs to operate. Branding doesn't matter; only the certificate does, right? HkCaGu (talk) 00:19, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

(ec) The SOC is one piece of paper. I'm sure you're proud of the FACT that you brought to this page but there are, in reality, quite a lot of other facts out there; and we're supposed to provide encyclopædic coverage of the subject. Liveries don't change on exactly the same date; ticketing systems don't change on exactly the same date; ownership was resolved in 2010-1, of course; internal structures will continue to have distinctions for a while. The new airline, going forward, will continue to have distinct sets of former-airtran routes, former-airtran personnel, former-airtran fleet &c. Relentless focus on one single artefact of airline regulation is ridiculously myopic. bobrayner (talk) 00:25, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

You can not compare this to anything. Can't compare to a regional airline or anything. Its different. bobrayner I don't appreciate your attitude. In this situation booking systems, all of that none of it maters. They are considered one airline by the government when they receive the SOC. Your telling me that because planes are in different liveries and employees have different uniforms that they are not one airline. NO, they as of the SOC are ONE airline and you can all say they are not but the fact is they are and on the date of the SOC wikipedia will change with or without you. Kairportflier (talk) 03:14, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Why does one data point, the SOC, overrule everything else in the case of AirTran/Southwest but not in the case of SkyWest? You say they can't be compared, without stating why. When you say "on the date of the SOC wikipedia will change with or without you" are you threatening to make a WP:POINT violation?. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 03:30, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Hawaiian717 I was not threatening to make a WP:POINT violation because I have seen the punishments to other users. The point to that sentence is not important. When it comes to regional carriers, its simply different. Like I said, incomparable. Thats all, not a lot of explaining with that. There are so many differences from Airlines to Regionals that they are incomparable. Kairportflier (talk) 03:36, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

I doubt we're going to agree on this. I find your statement that airlines and regionals are incomparable absurd, because regionals are airlines. One company operating multiple distinct operations is what SkyWest does with Delta Connection, United Express, US Airways Express, and their Alaska operation. It is what Southwest will be doing with AirTran. Another example is Pacific Wings, which also operates GeorgiaSkies and New Mexico Airlines. Different branding, different liveries, different websites, different articles on Wikipedia, but all under the Pacific Wings certificate. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 16:28, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Your not saying anything that is going to affect this though. Regional Airlines are COMPLETELY different from Mainline Airlines. Kairportflier (talk) 23:28, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Simple one-stop must be notated where stop is?

User:DONALDderosa insists that a note must be added to explain where UA GUM-ORD stops (HNL) at GUM's listing. I've explained time and again that it isn't. I've run out of 3RR. Please help. HkCaGu (talk) 02:30, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Reviving this help request--an IP suddenly popped up. Suspicious. HkCaGu (talk) 03:54, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Ministro Pistarini International Airport

Can anyone please take a look at the article, just to check if this user is making the correct changes (I think s(he) does not). Is it right to change from Santiago de Chile to plainly Santiago in lists of destinations?. S(he) does not seem to understand my comments. I'm over my 3RR now. Thanks.--Jetstreamer (talk) 19:55, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Hello,

I understand your comments, but they don't convince me, since you try to justify incorrect information saying it is present on other important airport articles as well. I commented my last edit fully in the edit summary now, please ask for more clarifications if necessary. Greetings, Gertjan R 00:20, 27 February 2012 (UTC) (And please don't put silly warning templates on my talk page, thank you. WP:AGF.)

From the appearances of "Sydney" across airport articles, it makes sense to just call Santiago de Chile simply "Santiago", as it is bigger and much more well known than the other counterparts. HkCaGu (talk) 00:31, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

That might be acceptable, but this edit implicitly assumes that Campinas has a single airport when it actually has two, namely Viracopos and Campo dos Amarais. It is true that the second one has no scheduled services, but Wikipedia is written not only for us the editors, but also to the average reader who might not know that. Same issue for Curitiba.--Jetstreamer (talk) 01:07, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Long-time practice is that there must be two land airports with scheduled commercial services to warrant disambiguation. Seaplane and cargo are treated on a as needed basis. HkCaGu (talk) 03:35, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree with HkCaGu's comments here. Santiago de Chile is probably the most well-known city with the name Santiago; I can't think of any other cities named "Santiago" off the top of my head. Also, don't put warning templates on regular users' talk pages; those templates are meant for new users. The rest of us find those annoying. —Comp dude¹²³ 04:43, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

@Compdude123, Santiago (disambiguation) lists other well-known cities by the name of "Santiago" (Dominican Republic, Cuba, Spain). Snoozlepet (talk) 06:11, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

That's right, but there is an important difference: the Chilean capital is called Santiago in English (according to our main article), while the other three important ones are called Santiago de los Caballeros, Santiago de Cuba and Santiago de Compostela, respectively. They can perfectly be called that way in destination lists as well. Greetings, Gertjan R 11:58, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Don't you think it's time to discuss this “Long-time practice”, as HkCaGu says, given that the project is revising the common use of others —just the way we did with start/end dates— under the consideration that not only editors read Wikipedia? And regarding the use of warning templates, let me invoke WP:DTTR#AGF, to avoid calling them “silly”. There is much work behind the preparation of such templates.--Jetstreamer (talk) 23:01, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

I think this practice accords relatively well with real life practice: almost every large city has one or more airports only used for general aviation, charter or cargo, it would be rather superfluous and annoying to disambiguate the name of another tens or hundreds of airports just because of the existence of the internationally or even locally relatively unknown small airfields, such as Campinas-Campo dos Amarais. Greetings, Gertjan R 22:32, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Problem with an airport and verifiability.

I'm having a problem with Tsletsi Airport, in Algeria (IATA: QDJ, ICAO: DAFI). I copied the following post I made from the article's talk page:

I simply cannot find any information on this airport except for the GCM and WAD listings, which provide no info except its name and airport codes. I even looked at the supposed coordinates in GoogleMaps Satellite view, and around the greater Djelfa area, and I didn't see an airport anywhere. There's a patch that could be a dirt runway, but there's nothing else (certainly no buildings) in the general vicinity, and it could just as easily be someone's favorite off-roading track. Jorgath (talk) 17:20, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

There is just enough information for this airport's existence that I don't feel bold enough to nominate it at AfD, but...this thing needs some real work and I can't figure out where to start. No info at Algerian AIP, PilotWeb, or anywhere but GCM and WAD, and precious little there. - Jorgath (talk) 18:33, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Old image shows it was bigger enough to handle a Noratlas http://www.frenchwings.net/algeria/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=3679 MilborneOne (talk) 18:47, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

I added some thoughts to the article's talk page. Jan olieslagers (talk) 19:06, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Some thoughts there too. Much of the discussion should take place there, so I won't keep updating here (much), and I'll ask interested editors to visit the article's talk page. - Jorgath (talk) 20:10, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Linking destinations: try to make sense of all this

Following the shambles above, given the fiasco a couple of days ago, I'm going to try to make sense of the issues regarding the linking of destination airports in the "Airlines and destinations" lists on airport articles:

Current project style guidelines are not to link the destination airports.
A number of editors, including myself, have suggested that this is an impediment to navigation, and that adding links to destination airports would be useful to readers.
The main counter-argument seems to be that this would somehow violate WP:OVERLINK.
Other discussion has been about minor details, such as how many times an airport served by more than one airline should be linked, or clarifying that it should be the airport article which is linked to, rather than the city article.
The "vote" that was set up violates just about every policy/guideline/custom/practice of Wikipedia, but has nevertheless generated some useful discussion which in itself should not be disregarded.
The general consensus (with one or two exceptions) seems to be that adding the links would be a worthwhile thing to do.

My personal view is that the arguments using WP:OVERLINK are misunderstanding its purpose--as I said a couple of days ago: "(i) it was intended to avoid superfluous links in article text (like that), not to impede navigation; and (ii) that it specifically mentions tables as somewhere that it's OK for [links] to be placed." That said, I think it would help if we closed the "vote" discussion above, and rather had a centralised, civilised, normal discussion about it here instead. --RFBailey (talk) 07:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorry for coming in without properly researching the issues; I may have it all wrong. There would seem to be no problem in linking a destination airport (but not again and again, unless in a table ... also, it could be in the infobox and once again in the main text). But the city in which that airport is located is probably better not linked if very close to the airport, and especially not if it's NYC or London or some other well-known city; or find a section-link within the city article, which would be of more use to readers. Remember, the city should be linked within the airport target link, probably towards the start; so there's little point in diluting the links in a secondary anchor article. I hope this makes sense and isn't way off-topic. Thx.

Tony (talk)

09:31, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

For at least six years there has been no consensus to have links, other than the airline, in the destination section. Now it seems that consensus has changed and links should be allowed. I agree that the links should be only to the airport and in the case where an airport article hasn't been created then a red link. @RFBailey, could we not return to the section above rather than starting a third section? Or would a fresh start be better? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 09:54, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't think this fresh start was a bad move. The previous section started very badly, and we ended up in rather a tangle...

However, on reflection, I think a consensus became clear in each of the two prior debates. We don't need a third round. bobrayner (talk) 12:57, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Now when can we start? And what else do we need to "clear" before we start? And who declares a start? I hate to see another "Atlanta" again. If we start linking, will we bump into a big wall that we hadn't seen before? We can afford a necessary wait on this compared to the Continental/United certificate merger which was a "damn if you do, damn if you don't" situation. HkCaGu (talk) 13:57, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I felt that a fresh start would clarify things a bit. Tony's original post showed that it looked as if it was a project decision to use that ludicrous "voting" system. That said, there does seem to be a clear consensus that linking is OK (provided it's to the airport article, not the city), so perhaps we should update the project style guides and just get on with it? --RFBailey (talk) 16:35, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Per @Snoozlepet's suggestion, I've mocked up a version of Atlanta airport at User:Chaswmsday/Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport if anyone would care to take a look. (I was afraid that a version at WP's Sandbox would only last a few minutes). I got rid of images of course, since they're a big no-no in user space.

In the Destination Table section that I hadn't yet completed, Delta Express operated by Express Jet, I experimented with a different technique. There, I made use of a template where, given a destination, the template does a lookup and returns the same destination, now wikilinked. It seems like it would be a bit more elegant solution, but I found through trial-and-error that any seemingly small coding mistakes I made in the template or in the article's markup caused disastrous end results...

Per other comments, I definitely didn't mean to suggest that wikilinking be mandatory, just that I felt it would be desireable and in keeping with general Wikipedia usability. I didn't really anticipate the amount of work it would take to wikilink all of the existing destinations.

Also, I didn't mean to create any controversies related to quoting editors. I know that I was officially in the right, but still. I thought about removing the editors' names from the initial discussions, but I wasn't sure of the propriety of doing so, and at this point, that genie has already long left the bottle.

If there's any other way I can further complicate people's lives, please let me know. :) --Chaswmsday (talk) 15:17, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Also don't infer consensus from the vote above. The way it was handled was so improper that it basically means nothing. Some editors refused to voice an opinion about the merits of this proposed change do to the a desire to not participate in the circus. So, as someone suggested above, it is probably time for an RfC before any changes are made. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:54, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Why do we need an RfC? There was a sensible discussion going on before Cali4529 came along with the Atlanta revert war fiasco; my intention with this "fresh start" was to eliminate the circus and restore some level of sanity. In the original discussion, which went quiet after January 24 (this version) the general consensus appeared to be that links were OK, although there wasn't complete agreement. However, you were the only dissenting voice that I recall. Perhaps you could explain to us why you think that WP:OVERLINK would be violated? --RFBailey (talk) 19:16, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

An RfC would get past the mess on the talk page in, hopefully, a clean way and it would also bring in more eyes on the issue of over linking. This is a question that is broader then this project and having the addition exposure would not hurt. Vegaswikian (talk) 20:18, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree that this talk page is a mess, and that additional exposure doesn't hurt, but you still haven't answered my question. --RFBailey (talk) 21:59, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

@Vegaswikian, I deliberately did not "vote", as I knew that to be improper. I do hold to my earlier comments, including about the amount of work wikilinking existing destinations might entail. I also agree with @RFBailey about the lack of need for an RfC, as I don't believe I/we are proposing anything outside the bounds of WP:OVERLINK. I also concur with @RFBailey's interpretation of the Overlink guidelines. --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:39, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

No consensus has been made; don't go making any changes yet. N124BC (talk) 02:13, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Really? I am slightly surprised that the extensive support in multiple discussions on this page does not count as consensus. Is yet another discussion, such as an RfC, needed before people can go ahead and make the edits that have been supported here? bobrayner (talk) 03:17, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

While the support is a little more then half of the people it is not enough to make a consensus. Until one is made nothing should be changed. Kairportflier (talk) 04:11, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Please visit the section, Southwest/AirTran SOC Approaching below so we can clarify what we are doing post SOC before hand so there is no wait after the SOC. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kairportflier (talk • contribs) 04:13, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

I have "un-bolded" the request made above---I wish people would stop doing that (although at least it wasn't in bright red this time). It suggests that the rest of us are somehow incapable of reading.

As for whether there is a consensus or not--the discussion had gone quiet. The level of controversy that certain users have inflicted on this discussion suggests that it was appropriate that WP:SILENCE should definitely not have been invoked. One thing, however, is clear to me: those of us in favour of allowing links in destination lists have repeatedly given reasons as to why we think it's a good idea, and how WP:OVERLINK applies in this situation, while those against have just come up with comments such as "no consensus has been made", or "that's not a consensus" or "this is invalid--you can't draw a consensus from it", and refused to answer questions justifying their position.

Anyway, in this discussion at WP:AIRLINES in the past day or so, yet another reason why linking is a good idea became apparent to me: if a reader (yes, we're supposed to be writing for the benefit of readers, not ourselves) sees the name of a destination airport they haven't heard of, and wants to know where it is or more about it, then linking to it will be of benefit to them.

I just wish we could get on with improving the encyclopaedia, rather than for people to keep putting roadblocks in the way. --RFBailey (talk) 05:41, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Please pardon me for speaking rashly, but is there any area of Wikipedia where there aren't editors trying to thwart any and all attempts to improve the project? If anyone can tell me, I'll go edit in that subproject!

Apparently consensus can be broken by any new editor who wants to revert first and comment afterward on this page and on the article's talk page (with this bit of incivility: "Undone per no consensus. You just wasted two hours of your time." N124BC (talk) 02:14, 12 February 2012 (UTC)).

If you disagree with the edits I've made, please read this essay first: Wikipedia:Don't revert due solely to "no consensus". State exactly why you disagree. Also, take a look at Wikipedia:WikiProject Wikify, which, among other things, explicitly calls for wikilinking.

Or is the problem that I forgot to first recite some magic words?? Here goes: "I hereby declare consensus on wikilinking destinations." There. Done. --Chaswmsday (talk) 10:58, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Oh god, I just found the latest edit war on the ATL article. This is getting ridiculous. See my comments here. --RFBailey (talk) 23:04, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposed modification to WP:AVIMOS and WP:AIRPORT-CONTENT

The only way I can see of putting this issue to bed once and for all is to propose a revised text for the WikiProject Aviation Style Guide in respect to airport articles. I suggest replacing

4. List city names; do not wikilink them.

with the new text

4. List city names. Wikilinks should be made to destination airports; for instance, one should link to Calgary International Airport rather than Calgary.

Based on the reasons given by myself, bobrayner, Chaswmsday, Felix, CambridgeBayWeather and others in the discussions on this page over the past few weeks, this appears to reflect the consensus that has developed. Do others agree? If not, please give a reason as to why you disagree, not just "I don't like it", or filibustering by bleating "no consensus, no consensus, no consensus" which just disrupts attempts to reach one.

--RFBailey (talk) 02:06, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Also, WikiProject Aviation Style guide/Layout (Airports) should be revised.

Item 6 is equivalent to item 4 in AVIMOS.

I would modify to read, "Wikilinks should be made, if possible, to destination airports...". And I would add, "Each repeated occurrence of a destination within the table should be wikilinked as well".

To avoid (pipe-dreaming?) future arguments within this project, I would also add prose such as this:

It is the consensus of WikiProject Aviation that such wikilinks do not violate WP:OVERLINK. OVERLINK is mostly about unnecessary linking of common terms. OVERLINK specifically mentions tables as a place where links may be repeated. As the destination tables are re-sortable, there is no true "first occurrence" for any given link. Also, OVERLINK is not a policy, but a guideline, which specifically advises to "use commmon sense". Articles should be made usable for the average reader by wikifying them. By wikilinking several occurrences of the same destination, a reader will not have to manually search the table to find a desired link. Additionally, by not worrying about the "first occurrence" of a link, editing of the article will be more straightforward as destinations are added to or dropped from the table.

The above arguments, IMO, deal with any concerns about OVERLINKing. A concern I do find legitimate is the amount of effort it may take to wikilink the destinations in each article. For that reason, I personally would suggest that the instructions in the MoS be more permissive and not mandatory:

"It is preferred that wikilinks be made, if possible, to destination airports..."

I've added "if possible" above, because there have been suggestions that a given destination may not have an associated airport article in WP. If this is the case, it would be better that a stub article be created to resolve this issue; but I don't want to mandate that.

Suggestions? If anyone in the pro-wikilink crowd agrees with my modifications, we should probably consolidate the language into one spot, lest there be confusion... --Chaswmsday (talk) 21:25, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

A few points: first, I agree that we don't want to sound as if the links are mandatory---so I like the "It is preferred that..." prefix.

Second, we should definitely consolidate the two sets of guidelines so that they provide the same guidance.

Third, I'm not sure about adding the paragraph about overlinking: it sounds more like an opinion piece than a guideline, and we want to make the guidelines as simple as possible. We should say something about repeating links though: I suggest keeping it simple by saying

Each occurence of a destination airport should be linked: as the destination tables are re-sortable, there is no fixed "first occurence" of a destination in the list.

How does that sound? --RFBailey (talk) 15:41, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

A lot better. MilborneOne (talk) 20:48, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

I like that better myself; I don't want to include a lot of verbiage about OVERLINK. I just fear it will crop up as an issue in the future. E.g. "...But the article already wikilinked Detroit, San Antonio and Instanbul airports in the body, so we are forbidden to link again..." or "Let's just make the tables un-sortable." Is there any way to pin our rationale in the talk page, or provide a permanent link to it on the MoS page(s), just in hopes of reducing any future format enforcement zealotry? --Chaswmsday (talk) 12:53, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, we can always place a reference to the talk page discussion (and, later, to the talk page archives). If we say anything, it should just be along the lines of "Note that the overlinking guidelines do not apply to tables." and then just add a footnote to refer to these discussions. --RFBailey (talk) 20:17, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

And if you have ever had a need to disambiguate links, then you will find that the excessive over linking in many tables is a lot of extra work when you need to fix things. So links in tables can be problematic. And having everything is large tables linked is a horrid prospect. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:31, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

One always has to take care when making links to ensure they point to the correct target, so I don't see what's so different here to any other link. Also, describing this as a "horrid prospect" sounds a lot to me like "I don't like it": perhaps you could clarify exactly what is so "horrid" about this proposal? --RFBailey (talk) 23:20, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Also, we're deliberately not mandating that we have to go around immediately and add links everywhere; rather to avoid situations like this where someone comes along and deliberately reverts the hard work of adding the links. --RFBailey (talk) 23:33, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Reverting something that is not correct is always correct. It is not an issue of how much time it took to create the material. Wrong is wrong. Vegaswikian (talk) 03:16, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

In that case, it was assumed that there was consensus to add links (due to lack of additional comments) so one user went and added the links to Atlanta Airport's page. Then, one user (who we later found out got his account hacked) went and reverted it and started an edit war. —Comp dude¹²³ 03:33, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Vegaswikian: OK, so "a horrid prospect" is now "wrong". Precisely what is "wrong" about it? I have asked you to justify your opposition to this proposal several times now, and on each occasion you have evaded my question. If you want your point of view to be taken seriously, I suggest you explain yourself. Please. --RFBailey (talk) 04:04, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

I guess in the end, someone who thinks that they see a violation of WP:OVERLINK, which by the way does not mandate that multiple links be avoided in tables, is going to revert changes. So if they see adding those links is bad, then it is wrong for that editor and maybe more. If you go back over the last year or two, there is a definite trend against over linking. We had the discussion on common units and one on common terms. So changing to more links may not really have a broad consensus. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:36, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

OK, I misspoke earlier. WP:OVERLINK is a guideline, and thus cannot by definition be "violated". Please read the policy WP:Policies and guidelines, which makes the distinction between policies and guidelines. Also read the policy WP:Ignore all rules, and its followup essay WP:What "Ignore all rules" means (aka "Use Common Sense"). Also remember that it's one of our primary goals, as editors, to make articles useful for readers. To that end, please take a look at WP:WikiProject Wikify. Although not specifically tagged with the Wikify template, the articles in the Airport Project should be improved in the same manner as described in the Wikify Project. And finally, we're actually talking about the sub-category sometimes referred to as WP:REPEATLINK. Comparing that concept to past Overlink discussions is apples and oranges, or at least apples and applesauce. :>) --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:18, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Additionally, I would add to the discussion record that, just as with articles tagged in the Wikify Project, the Airport Project recognizes that there will be for a time a large backlog of existing articles with un-wikified destinations. We would not expect that everyone making a small edit to an article feel obligated to wiklink all of the destinations contained there. We would simply ask that, given spare time while editing, editors take a crack at wikilinking. Once these changes are made to the style guide(s), I'll personally commit to tackling some of the major airports myself. --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:40, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

In reply to Vegaswikian: common units and common terms are clearly a wholly different issue. In those cases, the question is about repeatedly linking to the same article (e.g. square metre), not about having a list of links to a number of different articles. Apples and oranges indeed.

And, yes, I also acknowledge that adding the links will be a lot of work, and will take time; however, you (Vegaswikian) seem to be suggesting that it is OK to go around wasting editors' efforts, because what they are doing is somehow "wrong". If a user spent two hours adding "Paris is the capital of Denmark" to a whole load of articles, then that would clearly be wrong and should be reverted. When a user is making a carefully-considered edit in an ettempt to improve the encyclopaedia, then it's a rather different story. --RFBailey (talk) 14:10, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

(unindent) The silence here is deafening, so I am going ahead and updating the guidelines with the following text:

List city names. Wikilinks may be made to destination airports; for instance, one should link to Calgary International Airport rather than Calgary. Each occurence of a destination airport should be linked: as the destination tables are re-sortable, there is no fixed "first occurence" of a destination in the list. Note that the overlinking guidelines do not apply to tables.

Hopefully this will not cause any riots. --RFBailey (talk) 18:10, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

OK, the guidelines have been updated since 24 February 2012. As there has been no further debate, I hereby declare "consensus reached" and will proceed with the re-wikification of Atlanta airports's destination table... --Chaswmsday (talk) 15:14, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

The discussion should be closed by an uninvolved editor, shouldn't it? If so, the outcome of the consensus cannot be guessed until then.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 00:40, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

New destinations

I am having a little problem with something. American Airlines announced that they will launch flights between Los Angeles and Washington National Airport from June 14, 2012 as it is officially announced by AA here http://aa.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=3465 (the flights will be available for sale March 4, 2012). However, User:Kairportflier continues to remove it from the destinations lists saying "Flights are NOT FOR SALE. Do not add until they are". Do we wait until new routes are bookable before adding or we add it when the airline officially announces it? It needs to stay on there as it is a sourced, announced new route from American Airlines itself. Snoozlepet (talk) 16:07, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Such a press release ought to be enough. It's not like it is a year away or subject to government approval. And there is no reason to believe it won't be on sale on the indicated date. HkCaGu (talk) 16:17, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

The press release is enough for verifiability to be met.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 16:32, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Just like Etihad Airways has announced flights to Washington DC to begin March 31, 2013 but the flight can't be booked at the moment. Snoozlepet (talk) 19:48, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

I managed to miss this discussion, but have commented on the matter here. This is what I said:

"The appropriate WikiProject guideline is WP:AIRPORT-CONTENT, which states the following:

For future destinations, add: "[begins date service begins]" - after the destination. Starting dates must be provided with full date including the year and references should be provided.

No further guidance is provided as to at what stage a future service should be added. Then it comes down to standard WP:RS and WP:V. My usual inclination would be to add the services once they have officially been confirmed by the airline, e.g. in the form of press releases, although the Dallas News story [4] which is reporting an announcement by USDOT looks like a reliable enough source to me (and I don't see why being bookable in the airline's online reservation system is such an important consideration).

If there is a "consensus" that has been reached anywhere, I don't know where it is, and don't feel like trawling through project talk page archives to find it. (My recent experience with WP:AIRPORT is that certain users active in that project don't have a good understanding of what "consensus" means.) Nothing in the protected edit Celestra made appears to violate any general Wikipedia policy or guideline, or any guideline specified by the relevant WikiProject. --RFBailey (talk) 20:39, 3 March 2012 (UTC)"

As there is also a press release from AA (I had a quick look on AA's website but couldn't find it myself), then there's absolutely no reason not to add LAX as a destination from DCA with the specified start date, even if tickets don't go on sale until tomorrow. --RFBailey (talk) 23:07, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

AirTran/Southwest SOC expected tomorrow!

Just an update to remind everyone that the SOC is expected tomorrow unless something unexpected happens. Kairportflier (talk) 19:57, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

But we still haven't decided how to list the flights after an SOC is achieved tomorrow. Snoozlepet (talk) 20:08, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be a crisis, if the existing listing makes sense to readers.

I would also argue that there is very little to decide, other than minor stylistic concerns - sources make the big decisions for us, we just relay what sources say. No? What do sources say in this case? bobrayner (talk) 21:23, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

I noticed at BWI the AirTran gates that also have the Southwest logo say "Operated by AirTran"... I think in this case Southwest Airlines operated by AirTran Airways may be the way to go. (It is factually a Southwest flight but its on AirTran branded planes).

Example... This is what LGA would look like Post SOC...

Airlines	Destinations	Terminal
Southwest Airlines	Baltimore, Chicago-Midway, Denver [begins August 12, 2012], Milwaukee [begins August 12, 2012], St. Louis [begins August 12, 2012]	B (Concourse B)
Southwest Airlines operated by AirTran Airways	Akron/Canton, Atlanta, Denver [begins June 3, 2012], Milwaukee, Newport News/Williamsburg [ends March 9, 2012], Orlando [ends June 2, 2012]	B (Concourse B)

~Kairportflier (talk) 21:57, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, since the two airlines will not be totally integrated for another year or two. "Southwest operated by AirTran" should be used in this case. Same for United and Continental (United operated as Continental should had been used) but their reservation system, FFPs will be combined in 4 days. Snoozlepet (talk) 22:04, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree with the UA/CO but in 4 days we would have to switch it back to what it is now so I think we should just leave it and learn from our mistakes. I also want to note that we should wait until the SOC is announced tomorrow not at 12am (Central Time) tonight (tomorrow). Kairportflier (talk) 22:11, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Why must our edits be precisely synchronised with one obscure piece of regulatory paperwork? There's a lot more to the merger than a SOC. bobrayner (talk) 15:28, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Do we remove AirTran Airways as a subsidiary of Southwest in the Southwest info box? Kairportflier (talk) 23:17, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Not until the brand is removed completely. N124BC (talk) 23:44, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

FYI, it is apparently one certificate and two call signs. TRS is still being used. This is the same as NWA/DAL which lasted for a month. Back then legally it was known as NWA operated by DAL. Now shouldn't we call it Airtran operated by Southwest? Or Southwest operated as Airtran? (This will dictate an alphabetical order.) Or simply leave it as it is, Airtran by itself as "A"? HkCaGu (talk) 05:12, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

If the flights are branded as AirTran, but the operating certificate is in the name of Southwest, then surely the flights in question are "AirTran Airways operated by Southwest Airlines"? That would tally, for instance, with "United Express operated by Shuttle America"? --RFBailey (talk) 23:00, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I concur completely. N124BC (talk) 20:21, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

We need to think how we want things to appear alphabetically. If we want Airtran flights to show up under A, it's "Airtran operated by Southwest". If we want them under S, then it's "Southwest operated as Airtran". HkCaGu (talk) 22:35, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

AirTran Operated by Southwest. Let's do it. N124BC (talk) 00:44, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

"We need to think how we want things to appear alphabetically." Why is that so important? Surely we should let the alphabetical order be dictated by what we want the description to be---not the other way around. --RFBailey (talk) 18:06, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Legally the flights are Southwest Airlines flights; however they are being operated under the AirTran brand. Therefore, just like with regional carriers, shouldn't it be "AirTran Airways operated by Southwest Airlines". Hm? N124BC (talk) 21:24, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Or perhaps just "AirTran Airways"? Thus allowing AirTran Airways to describe the ownership situation. As long as passengers can still book flights on an airline branded as "AirTran", what does it matter which AOC it uses? Wikipedia is a general-use encyclopedia, not the FAA database. I rent a vehicle from National Car Rental, not from Enterprise or from "National, operated by Enterprise Holdings". If I live in California, I shop at Ralphs, not at Kroger or at "Ralphs, operated by Kroger". Or at the bizarre "Kroger, operated by Ralphs", which totally misses the mark.

For that matter, why is the AirTran article written in past tense?

Besides, if for some unfathomable reason, we're bound by the FAA, I just checked their database. AirTran shows certificate[5] ZZDA612U, Southwest shows[6] SWAA304A ! --Chaswmsday (talk) 13:02, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

I think the AirTran Airways operated by Southwest Airlines makes best sense because that is completely factual. It is an AirTran branded flight operated by Southwest Airlines officially. Kairportflier (talk) 18:53, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Isn't all of this past tense stuff premature? And isn't this information better conveyed at AirTran Airways rather than within each airport article's destination table? From Southwest: "Southwest Airlines and AirTran Airways Customers will continue to experience the same great service from each airline."[7] But I went ahead and fixed it in Hartsfield-Jackson anyhow. --Chaswmsday (talk) 08:57, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

I still believe AirTran remains a separate brand, that the SOC isn't the single deciding factor and that "operated by Southwest Airlines" is unnecessary. However, per @Kairportflier's suggestion, I believe I've changed most of the airport articles' destination table wording from "Southwest operated by AirTran" to "AirTran operated by Southwest". That wording is at least preferable to the other. --Chaswmsday (talk) 11:36, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

List of hub airports page

I don't know if this is the right page for this but on the "List of hub airports" page, should defunct carriers (as well as current carriers) be listed on there? Snoozlepet (talk) 05:58, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

I dont think the page should really exist nothing notable about being a hub, also having the names of the hub operators is just repeating information from the individual articles so I am not sure of the value of the list. MilborneOne (talk) 08:43, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

That's a good point; I too am a little skeptical about the value of the list. However, if/while we do have this list, then it's reasonable to include historic hubs, defunct carriers &c (as long as this is made clear to readers). bobrayner (talk) 16:31, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Listing Montreal as a destination

When listing Montreal as a destination on an airport article, is it necessary to add the "-Trudeau"? I thought adding a name to the airport was only necessary when differentiating between multiple airports in the same city. Granted, Montreal has two airports but Mirabel has no passenger services, only cargo. Thoughts? Thankyoubaby (talk) 02:23, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

You are right, since Montreal-Mirabel only features cargo services, the -Trudeau disambiguation for Montreal is unnecessary. Greetings, Gertjan R 16:01, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for that verification, I will start to make some changes. Thankyoubaby (talk) 17:01, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Be careful as there is a second airport in Montreal that handles scheduled traffic. Some airports such as Québec City Jean Lesage International Airport have flights going to both Montreal airports. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 19:51, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Isn't that airport listed as Longueuil in destination lists, as in the list of airports in Quebec? (The reason why I didn't notice it. If listed as Montreal (-Longueuil or -Saint-Hubert?), there should be disambiguation indeed, Thankyoubaby.) Greetings, Gertjan R 21:07, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

There is only one airline flying to Montréal/Saint-Hubert, Pascan Aviation, and they call it Montreal (Saint-Hubert). Of the 14 airports they fly to all have Wikipedia articles. Four have no destination lists and the other ten have Montréal-Saint-Hubert. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 10:26, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

We might know that some airports around a city are freight-only or have minimal traffic or whatever, but readers might not. If in doubt, disambiguate. bobrayner (talk) 11:10, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

The existence of scheduled flights (however small in number or obscure the airline) to/from Saint-Hubert from places such as Quebec City, Val d'Or, Bagotville, etc., which also have flights to/from Montreal-Trudeau suggests that disambiguation is needed here. Also, listing Saint-Hubert as "Longueuil" in destination lists would be like listing Pearson as "Mississauga" or YVR as "Richmond": factually correct, but generally unhelpful. --RFBailey (talk) 22:02, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Aeroflot operated by Vladivostok Air

I noticed that some Russian airports where both Aeroflot and Vladivostok Air operate, the listing has been changed to "Aeroflot operated by Vladivostok Air" where Vlad Air flights are operating under the Aeroflot brand. Are the two airlines in the process of merging or is it a codeshare/partnership with Aeroflot? Snoozlepet (talk) 04:30, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Aeroflot became the major stakeholder of Vladivostok Avia through its subsidiary Aeroflot-Finance in November last year.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 10:23, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Busiest Routes

Many articles have a "Busiest Routes" section. However, I'm curious as to why so many of them are rendered using a 85% sized font here and here? In most cases even if there are images next to the box it is not hitting against it or causing any problems that I can see (on 5 different computers and 6 monitors). I would also question the need for flags as per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Icons#Flags. They add no additional information, a link to the country is always provided, and are just bits of colour. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 00:46, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

One wonders if those section are even encyclopedic. When you consider the inherent bias for travel to hubs, is there any value to retain these sections? Vegaswikian (talk) 01:35, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Just a gentle reminder:

The examples and perspective in this discussion deal primarily with the United States and may not represent a worldwide view of the subject.

While such a bias may well be true in the US, where the hub-and-spoke model dominates, that's not the case elsewhere. In particular, in Europe, the widespread use of point-to-point model (in particular when employed by the likes of Ryanair, and by charter carriers) means that such listings may provide more useful information. --RFBailey (talk) 06:00, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Well, that bias extends worldwide. Take an airport like Narita International Airport which is a hub for two US airlines and two Japanese ones, which does not have this table. So the bias is worldwide and not restricted to the US. The impact on traffic data will vary based on how any airport is used by the airlines that it serves and how they deal with flights. There are US airports where this type of data could be interesting. But is it encyclopedic? Would it be better to discuss the reasons and impact of the passenger data in general with an analysis of why specific patterns exist? Just presenting numbers does little to understand what the numbers mean or what drives them or to educate readers. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:18, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

New destinations

When an airline begins a new route, the airline may announce routes days before tickets go on sale. Should we list the destinations when it is announced or should WP:WAIT be applied (meaning wait until the route actually go on sale)? Also, for sources, what should we use (a news article or an official press release from the airline)? Snoozlepet (talk) 02:10, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

As a rule of thumb (not policy), I'd suggest waiting until the route actually goes on sale, unless the announcement of the new route gets major coverage in the news (an LAX-Pyongyang route would definitely do that, but yet another LAX-ORD route probably wouldn't). - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 03:38, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Given that we're not a travel guide, availability of tickets for purchase seems an irrelevant criterion to me. If there's a reliable source for a new route (e.g. a press release), then I can't see a good reason not to list it. (See the above discussion about new routes from Washington-National above.) --RFBailey (talk) 05:55, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree with RFBailey. Gertjan R 07:48, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, as long as there is a source (such as a news article but preferably a press release) then it should be listed regardless. Snoozlepet (talk) 15:30, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

This is supposed to be an encyclopædia. We shouldn't withhold information on some self-imposed embargo based on industry-specific criteria. If it's verifiable then I'm happy for the route to be mentioned - but do bear in mind that we don't have a crystal ball so if there's any room for doubt (some airlines don't always deliver what they promise) we should be careful to frame predictions in the airline's voice, not in wikipedia's voice. bobrayner (talk) 08:38, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

My thoughts were based on verifiability. Until the tickets are available for purchase, it's not verifiable that such a route exists, only that the airline has said it's going to exist. Furthermore, we should not be depending on press releases, as they're not independent sources. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 14:00, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Wait, what? Usually new route announcements are relayed by secondary sources - whether local media or specialist media (ie. Flightglobal). Are you really arguing that the availability of a ticket in a booking system is a better source than some secondary source's coverage of the new route?

Incidentally, when I last flew with Afriqiyah, their tickets weren't available at all in conventional booking systems - to buy a ticket you had to email/phone a real person and discuss your travel plans with them - should we pretend that such airlines have no destinations even though there are strong sources which say the opposite? bobrayner (talk) 15:05, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Oh, goodness no. Of course not. What I'm saying is that if you're going to write about a new route that's been announced but is not yet selling, a) use a secondary source, not the actual press release and b) phrase it as "[Airline] announced that they would begin serving [route] on [date]," not "[Airline] will serve [route] beginning on [date]," until it is actually doing so (or contractually committed to doing so by having sold tickets), to be in line with the spirit of WP:CRYSTAL. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 20:05, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Then I apologise; I misunderstood you. Sorry. bobrayner (talk) 20:59, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Apology accepted but unnecessary; my initial phrasing was poor enough that I completely understand where you got that idea, so my apologies in return for being unclear. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 16:06, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Santa Cruz Airport, Portugal

Hello people. This time I need your comments regarding the proposed deletion of the above article. Can you please drop some lines with your thoughts. In my opinion, some people is confusing deletion with cleanup. Thanks in advance.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 00:42, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

PROD tag removed. —Comp dude¹²³ 15:51, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Linking destinations

Is there really a consensus on this? In my opinion, our destination lists are not that agreeable to look at anymore with this overload of wikilinks. Gertjan R 07:52, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

But I think it looks better and is of more use to the reader. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 20:18, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

I still believe that it is overlinking. As an aside, it appears that some other projects may be moving to reduce links, if some of the lists in articles is an indication. Like boxing and tour groups. Don't know if it is the small sample I'm seeing, but not having those repeating blue links looks nice. Vegaswikian (talk) 20:58, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

There's a side effect that the links may discourage IP vandalism, which I think is the number one concern of destination tables for now. HkCaGu (talk) 23:40, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

The articles are overlinked and its not nice for a reader. There is no need to link destionation names. I think it needs to be back to normal.Jamie2k9 (talk) 23:45, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

IP vandalism should not dictate the style we follow in articles! Vegaswikian (talk) 00:09, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

[bangs head repeatedly against desk] The project guidelines on the subject were updated as the result of considerable discussions on this page, when I thought that we'd finally put the issue to bed. There was a discussion on updating the project guidelines and where a consensus was reached. Remember, we're trying to write an encyclopaedia, not win a beauty contest: "I don't like it" or "it doesn't look nice" are not valid arguments. The links are there to provide, well, links to relevant articles and be of use to the reader. Besides, the issue of IP vandalism (with fictitious destinations being added here, there and everywhere) is a much more important issue to be dealing with, rather than repeating old arguments and reopening old wounds. --RFBailey (talk) 02:37, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree with RFBailey, and I must also add that because wikipedia is not an advertisement or travel guide, making it look nice is not—and should not be—our top priority. Then again, we must make sure it doesn't look really ugly or cluttered-looking as people will have a hard time reading it. But I don't think that the links make the tables look ugly or cluttered. —Comp dude¹²³ 03:20, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Also I may add that while we are linking destinations, if there are duplicate entries for one airline (for instance an airline operating out of different terminals), then only the first line should be linked since they all redirect to the same page but since I was told that all destinations needs to be linked. While we are on the subject, since destinations such as "New York-JFK, Chicago-O'Hare, Washington-Dulles, etc." are linked but are redirected to the airport page. For these, do we still need to do a dab for them? Snoozlepet (talk) 03:30, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

The reason for linking multiple entries is that because the tables are re-sortable, there is no fixed "first occurence" of a particular link: if one sorts the table by terminal rather than by airline, the first occurence will move somewhere else. Regarding disambiguating New York-JFK, Toronto-Pearson, etc., we should still do a dab for them: while the links are there to serve a purpose, one shouldn't actually need to click on the link (or read the alt-text) in order to see which airport is being referred to. Also, there is the case of multiple airports in the same city being served (e.g. airlines which fly to both JFK and LGA from the same airport): in that case, we'd still need to clarify. --RFBailey (talk) 05:23, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

If the City-Airport name already redirects to the airport, I think we can just double bracket that shorter name. HkCaGu (talk) 05:53, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I think I mistunderstood: I thought that the suggestion was to just to do say "New York" if there was a link. Oops. --RFBailey (talk) 16:30, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Personally, I'd agree with RFBailey on this one. Also, wikilinking is one of wikipedia's strongest points - it makes it much easier for readers to browse around different articles. I'd be really wary of removing links to destinations, as these are a perfect example of other related articles that readers might want to browse to. However, there may be a few cases where unlinking is appropriate - if we have a table with the same text over and over and over again, then maybe it doesn't need linking every time. And so on. bobrayner (talk) 10:19, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

As someone who reads airport articles a lot more than editing them (yes, I have edited them from time to time, but not so much these days), I urge you to please, please keep linking. I have for years found it a pain in the butt to try to find the articles for the places mentioned in destination lists and when I tried adding links, got rather curt messages telling me to stop. Aesthetic beauty is not our first priority; helping our readers is. And take it from this reader: Links do help. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 13:27, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

That was always my point. Indeed, such annoyances were what led me to join in these discussions in the first place. --RFBailey (talk) 16:30, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Hello everyone. Im normal user also update information for bulgarian airports but i think the new project with destinations links is terrible to many links.I do not see sense and do not forget that on top have a search.Тhere is another point: the encyclopedic would benefit only for pages like Frankfurt Airport, Madrid Barajas Airport and etc large airports because have more destinations and would be interested to visit the link but airports who listed only 5 airlines and they operates to same destinations just lost the meaning of such links. Regards and sorry my english is not very good. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lzdimitar (talk • contribs) 22:22, 4 April 2012‎ (UTC)

AR discontinuance of flights to AKL

Hello. I know it sounds a bit silly to remind the community not to add discontinuance/resumption dates for services in airports articles unless a reliable reference is provided, but many editors, some of them experienced ones, are bypassing the verifiability policy by adding an end date for the Aerolíneas Argentinas services to Auckland Airport without backing them up by at least a reliable source, and the same thing is happening at Ministro Pistarini International Airport and Sydney Airport. Am I wrong, or these changes does not require a reference supporting them?--Jetstreamer ^Talk 18:41, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Thousands of edits are done over the years based on schedules alone. Too many of these changes are not going to see a press release or a news article, especially terminations. (PR people aren't going to tell the world that their airlines are shrinking.) An ultimate example would be mainlines shifting routes among regionals--you just have to use the schedules. Schedules and bookability are the ultimate sources for verifiability, and unless there's something worth "ref"-fing, many editors will just explain in the edit summary. Sources are provided most often for announcements preceding schedule/reservation system updates. The ref requirement is intended for, I think, suspicious edits often performed by IPs without edit summaries, and what we can't find AND don't believe. HkCaGu (talk) 00:06, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Sorry for insisting with this, but I still believe sources should be included, provided they can be found. We cannot forget that all non-trivial information in each article should be supported by external references. Otherwise, it will render somewhat contradictory for the newcomers to find no statements for the cases we're discussing, when a core policy is to have it backed by reliable sources. So, I'd propose to tag each date lacking a source with a {{fact}} template.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 00:22, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

International Airport Irkutsk

International Airport Irkutsk article is badly in need of some attention anybody know why it isnt at Irkutsk International Airport? MilborneOne (talk) 18:43, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

Airline Table: Where does the comma go?

This is an example from Chicago-Midway. When we reference a city being added, do we put the comma before the reference or after because it looks un professional to have a mix. Kairportflier (talk) 03:26, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Airlines	Destinations	Terminal
AirTran Airways operated by Southwest Airlines	Atlanta, Branson, Cancún [begins June 3, 2012],<ref>http://swamedia.com/releases/36ac2da3-db35-4ffe-abb5-f14504094881</ref> Fort Myers, Orlando, Sarasota/Bradenton [ends August 12, 2012]	A
Southwest Airlines	Akron-Canton [begins August 12, 2012]<ref>http://www.blogsouthwest.com/blog/welcome-akron-canton-dayton-and-des-moines%E2%80%A6and-lots-more-schedule-changes-summer-and-fall</ref>, Albany, Albuquerque, Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Birmingham (AL), Boston, Buffalo, Charleston (SC), Cleveland, Columbus (OH), Denver, Des Moines [begins September 30, 2012]<ref>http://www.blogsouthwest.com/blog/welcome-akron-canton-dayton-and-des-moines%E2%80%A6and-lots-more-schedule-changes-summer-and-fall</ref>, Detroit, Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Greenville/Spartanburg, Hartford/Springfield, Houston-Hobby, Indianapolis, Jackson, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Little Rock, Long Island/Islip [ends June 3, 2012], Los Angeles, Louisville, Manchester (NH), Minneapolis/St. Paul, Nashville, New Orleans, New York-LaGuardia, Newark, Norfolk, Oakland, Oklahoma City [begins June 3, 2012],<ref>http://www.southwest.com/html/cs/investor_relations/if_news_releases.html?int=GFOOTER-ABOUT-PRESS</ref> Omaha, Ontario, Orange County, Orlando, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Portland (OR), Providence, Raleigh/Durham, Reno/Tahoe, Sacramento, St. Louis, Salt Lake City, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose (CA), Seattle/Tacoma, Tampa, Tucson, Washington-Dulles	A & B
VivaAerobus	Monterrey	A
Volaris	Guadalajara, Mexico City, Morelia, Zacatecas	A

Per the manual of style, after the punctuation and so as it appears in the first example you showed (following the comma). SempreVolando (talk) 04:19, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank You! I will for now on be on the look out! Kairportflier (talk) 05:19, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Airlines and destinations

After seeing this I have made a change to the Wikipedia:WikiProject Aviation/Style guide/Layout (Airports). CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 23:01, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

What a nice collection of flags...--Jetstreamer ^Talk 23:08, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Should we clarify about the "do not separate"? In real practice, we do not separate unless they are in different terminals. HkCaGu (talk) 01:05, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Is there even a consensus to change it? Snoozlepet (talk) 04:33, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Snoozlepet, can you just clarify which you mean? I assume you mean the policy but I wanted to be sure. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 19:40, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Was that format/policy discussed before? Snoozlepet (talk) 01:29, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Aviation/Style guide/Layout (Airports) was discussed but the change I made was not. I made the change and was fully aware that if somebody didn't like it they would change it back. Are you saying that flags in the destination box is a good thing? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 05:47, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

No, what i meant was that whoever changed the format on that page should have discussed it first before changing it. I think that the flags need to go as they are messy and hard to read. Snoozlepet (talk) 17:05, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

The flags are gone. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 15:46, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

BMI rename

BMI was reverted back to its former name, British Midland International as part of Lufthansa's purchase of the airline. However, some airports that BMI/British Midland International fly to are still listed as "BMI" but should we change it "British Midland International" as the actual name of the airline or leave it as "BMI" as the airline still referred to? Snoozlepet (talk) 04:32, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

"BMI" wins WP:COMMONNAME by a large margin, I think. Independent sources still refer to it as BMI. For instance: [8] bobrayner (talk) 12:47, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Mattala International Airport

The airports actual name is Hambantota International, as it will serve that city, its only located in Mattala, so does the article title need correcting? 119.155.49.99 (talk) 12:22, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

The common name appear to be Hambantota International Airport so I have moved it. MilborneOne (talk) 13:23, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Flags in "top destination" lists

Some articles about U.S. airports have lists of the busiest domestic routes from those airports, with the city names sometimes accompanied by their respective state flags. See, for example, Charlotte/Douglas International Airport#Top destinations; Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport#Operations and statistics; and Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport#Top destinations. It's my impression that those flags do not belong in these tables per MOS:FLAG, which states, "Subnational flags (regions, cities, etc.) should generally be used only when directly relevant to the article. Such flags are rarely recognizable by the general public, detracting from any shorthand utility they might have, and are rarely closely related to the subject of the article." Should those state flags be removed? (By the way, I am taking no position as to the use of country flags for airports with lists of international destinations -- I'm just talking about U.S. state flags for domestic U.S. destinations.) --Metropolitan90 (talk) 03:01, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it would look strange to have an international table with flags and a domestic table without on articles that have both, such as Los Angeles International Airport#Traffic and statistics. My preference would be to remove them entirely from both, but if you're going to keep flags on international tables, then they should be kept on domestic tables too (at least on articles with both tables). -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 03:43, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree that subnational flags should be removed. bobrayner (talk) 09:22, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Remove all flags. They serve no purpose except to decorate. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 20:08, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Definitely get rid of state flags, which are mostly practically misrepresentation as many major airports serve multi-state areas--and state flags are relatively obscured. (An average American will more likely recognize more foreign national flags than state flags.) National flags can be useful and have a "glance-able" effect, and since there are maybe only ten, it ain't excessive. And I'd rather see the city's name short and sweet--no comma-ism, no full long airport names--and flags help. HkCaGu (talk) 05:31, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

There may only be ten in that example but others have 20-25. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 15:53, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Air India destinations at Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport (ATQ)

We seem to be having a problem at the ATQ airport article, Its regarding an Air India flight, the flight goes from YYZ-DEL (AI188), than a separate flight takes it from DEL-ATQ (AI971). Should Toronto-Pearson in the destinations area on the airport article? One user thinks so and another doesn't, could someone provide their opinion on whats the policy for this? Thanks. Gsingh (talk) 00:16, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Gsingh, you seem to have a confusion. AI operates AI 187 on the ATQ–DEL–YYZ sector using a B777-300ER and it also has traffic rights on ATQ–DEL sector, so YYZ is an AI destination out of ATQ. — Abhishek ^Talk 01:56, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

I've read up on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports/page content page where the policy for destination listings are, it says only Non-stop or Direct flights may be put on the destination area. The direct flight article states, A direct flight in the aviation industry is any flight between two points by an airline with no change in flight numbers. Now the YYZ-DEL flight is AI188 and the DEL-ATQ flight is AI971 according to Expedia.com. If this is incorrect please clarify. Gsingh (talk) 02:12, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Why are you depending on expedia instead of having a look at Air India's own website? As said, earlier, the ATQ–DEL–YYZ is AI 187 throught its journey which is a direct flight with a stopover at DEL.— Abhishek ^Talk 02:32, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Already tried before, some error comes up and it goes back to the homepage. Air India seems to be quite dated and buggy from my previous experiences with booking online tickets with them. Gsingh (talk) 02:52, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Go to the schedules page and check, and FWIW, you can even check on flightstats.com, it always has the updated info. — Abhishek ^Talk 03:13, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

I already checked Air India's website (timetables) and YYZ-ATQ is same flight number/same aircraft all the way through (just like AI's EWR-BOM-AMD and ORD-DEL-HYD). The airline's website is working just fine (it still shows YYZ-DEL-ATQ as same flight number (AI188)). Snoozlepet (talk) 04:52, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm glad this is publicly being discussed as I have dealt with this issue on a repeated basis. The route operates as Amritsar-Delhi-Toronto, vice-versa. The flight number on the route is the same for all traffic sectors with AI having traffic rights on each of these sectors, therefore it is technically a non-stop service that should be listed on the page. Thoughts? --Gdandsnahb (talk) 00:38, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

This is also a thru-hub flight, in that it operates from a spoke (ATQ) through a hub (DEL) onto another spoke (YYZ). Isn't listing such flights not allowed. It's been cited as the reason to not list Shanghai as a destination on the Mumbai Airport table, because the flight will go from a spoke (BOM) through a hub (CTU) onto PVG. Why is that any different? And that's just one example. 120.63.155.29 (talk) 03:16, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Bangladesh Airport Vandal

This guy with the IP address 58.97.xxx.xxx. has been continuing to vandalize Shahjalal International Airport. I've gotten quite fed up with it, so I've finally reported this guy to AIV, specifically requesting a rangeblock for 58.97 IP addresses. —Comp dude¹²³ 15:49, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Since this has been going on for quite some time now, the article is now semi-protected for 2 weeks. Snoozlepet (talk) 22:23, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. I'm not sure if this IP has been vandalizing other pages; I only know about Shahjalal because I watchlist that page. I really hope this user will stop. —Comp dude¹²³ 01:16, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

"Accidents and incidents" at Lanseria International Airport

I'd appreciate an experienced editor taking a look at the content of the abovementioned section. I'm not at all confident that all the incidents pass the notability requirements - is a belly landing by an airliner with no serious injuries really significant enough? Does the notability requirement for such content differ between aircraft type, airline/operator and airport articles? Does the size of the airport make a difference? An "it happens about once a week at Heathrow or JFK" type of incident might be a "once in a lifetime" event at a small GA airport served by a single commuter airline. Roger (talk) 08:09, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Had a good general tidy up and removed some of the non-notable accidents. MilborneOne (talk) 11:59, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I followed your cleanup by fixing a few more minor issues. Roger (talk) 13:27, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Traffic and Stats

When we write Traffic and Stats on airport pages we really need a uniform format for how we spell out the City. Do we write out the whole city and state do we abbreviate the state and where do we put the parenthesis for example when we write National or Dulles, LaGuardia or JFK etc... These are the ones I have seen. We should really have a more uniform format. Kairportflier (talk) 00:11, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Options:

**Busiest Domestic Routes from ORF (January 2011 - December 2011)**
Rank	Airport	Passengers	Carriers
Option 1	Chicago, Illinois (Midway)	65,000	Southwest
Option 2	Chicago (Midway), Illinois	65,000	Southwest
Option 3	Chicago (Midway), Il	65,000	Southwest
Option 4	Chicago, Il (Midway)	65,000	Southwest

Your Comments

I like option one the best. The others make it appear as though Midway is part of the city's name, which is obviously not true. —Comp dude¹²³ 15:33, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

We don't need more and more detailed rules. Just concentrate on writing readable, neutral, accurate content. This looks like a rather US-centric approach; I believe that abbreviating a state is usually a bad move as people in the rest of the world won't recognise the abbreviation, and a strict style guide which assumes that all airports are in the USA would be ludicrous. Does it even matter which state it's in? You might want to consider country instead, but this doesn't have to be a strict format written exactly the same way across every article. Just use common sense. For instance, everybody knows where London Heathrow is; adding a country would be redundant and adding a county* would just cause confusion. Brussels airport is in Flanders rather than the Brussels capital region. Readers know which country Paris is in, but CDG straddles three départements - Seine-et-Marne, Seine-Saint-Denis, and Val-d'Oise - even if you could fit that in a table, it's not going to help readers. And so on. bobrayner (talk) 15:38, 24 April 2012 (UTC)
*Borders were moved in 1993 so it's now wholly within the London Borough of Hillingdon, in case you're interested.

Yes that's why I suggested the first option because it went after the state and did not abbreviate it. I agree, this policy should not be simply centered on the US. —Comp dude¹²³ 15:52, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

How many other Chicagos with major airports are there anyway? Disambiguate only when really necessary. Roger (talk) 08:42, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

At second reading - the table heading says "Airport" not "City" so the airport's name should come before the city: "Midway International Airport, Chicago" (append Illinois if necessary). Roger (talk) 08:47, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Airport lounge‎;

I reverted a mass deletion of information at airport lounge‎. I don't have an opinion about the validity of the list that was deleted, but I think it needs discussion on the talk page. So if you are interested, you can comment there. I did not set up a section heading. Vegaswikian (talk) 01:18, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

It's unfortunate that we don't have sources for the bulk of the article. There are lots of sources for trivial list entries like "airline X has a lounge at airport Y" but there's no interest in sourced discussion of what an lounge is. bobrayner (talk) 13:14, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Focus Cities

Is there anyway we can add Focus Cities to the info box for airports the are focus cities to Southwest specifically but also other airlines. It is common enough that it would over all help. Thanks! Kairportflier (talk) 01:15, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

The reason why Focus Cities are not in the Airport Infoboxes is due to large concerns of "edit wars" from IP users at the time (discussion is in the archives somewhere), especially on Airline articles where they claim __ is a FC when there are no primary sources stating otherwise. At the time it was only agreed that "hubs" was put in the infobox. Sb617 (Talk) 08:30, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

AIV completely useless on airport vandals

I've been battling the Iberia, Ankara and Bangladesh airport IP vandals for the last few days (see my edit history at Special:Contributions/HkCaGu. AIV has been completely useless. If some administrator seew this, please block these IPs for a while. HkCaGu (talk) 20:02, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

If sufficient warnings have been made, report them to Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism Slasher-fun (talk) 20:26, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Uh, that's what I did. HkCaGu (talk) 20:30, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I tried that too (for the 58.97 IP vandal), but in less than a day my request got deleted. I would suggest posting something on WP:Long term abuse, but I don't know if that's the best place to put it. Or you could try WP:AN/I. —Comp dude¹²³ 04:10, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

The first time I reported him, he was not blocked but the page he was vandalizing, Shahjalal International Airport, was semi-protected for several days. Once the protection expired he started vandalizing again, and so I reported that user again (specifically mentioning that the page had been semi-protected but that the protection had expired). And again the user was not blocked because again the aforementioned page had been semi-protected. Anyway, it is time to take this to WP:AN/I or WP:LTA. —Comp dude¹²³ 04:12, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I do watch this page but if you get no response from anybody you can always drop me a message on my talk page and I will do what I can to help if I am around. MilborneOne (talk) 12:31, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Take it to WP:AN/I. With multiple vandals, you're more likely to get comprehensive solutions there. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 16:43, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Alright. I think that's what should be done. At this point ANI is going to be much better than AIV at solving this problem. —Comp dude¹²³ 16:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Article links to destinations

I have been wondering if there is, or if there should be, standard guidance of how to link destinations in article text. I have noticed that we almost always use a city name in running text. While this is frequently accurate, it is not always. EWR is a NYC airport that exists in two NJ cities. Since the new destination tables have changed, it seems to make sense to use the same links in all articles. So if you are talking about service to New Orleans we would link to Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport or Moisant Field or Louis Armstrong International Airport or New Orleans International Airport. By linking to the field name is would make the articles more historically accurate. I guess this could come down to a question of which is better:

Clearly 2, is likely to be the least preferred. I think that I prefer 3. A B class article like Newark Liberty International Airport uses 3 in the heading and has mixed use in the rest of the article. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:25, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I actually prefer a fourth version, similar to 3: Cedar City Regional Airport. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 17:56, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

In article text the focus tends to be on the cities that have service. Since the service is to the airport, then that is what should be linked since that is where the flights actually go to. There is no explicit need to mention both the city and the airport. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:31, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Heliport external link spammer

I have been battling Special:Contributions/Ncho77 who has been adding external links from a helicopter school to various helipad articles. I'm nearing WP:3RR so I need help. HkCaGu (talk) 19:43, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I think that any unbiased reviewer will see that you've taken an aggressive and derogatory attitude toward someone simply looking to contribute towards wikipedia. If you feel that the edits are not informative please try to work it out with discussions rather than threats, intimidation and abuse. -- -- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ncho77 (talk • contribs) 20:16, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to request the following: 1) HkCaGu, stop reverting. 2) Ncho77, stop adding these links. 3) Each of you present your arguments for why these should or should not be included in a calm, reasonable, and civil tone. - Jorgath (talk) ^(contribs) 02:53, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Skytrax

Any objections to Skytrax removals for airports like for airlines? Aviones de pasajeros (talk) 21:57, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I've objected at Talk:Vancouver International Airport because it is not simply a rating. but an award that the airport has won, and which is reported on widely by the media, making it notable. See also Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airlines#Skytrax where I raised the same objection. Ravendrop 22:41, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I discuss there with you. Aviones de pasajeros (talk) 22:45, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Accidents and incidents in general

Does an accident or incident have to happen close to the airport to be included. My feeling is that is should but Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports/page content does not actually say. I noticed an editor adding an incident that occurred en-route to Charlotte/Douglas International Airport with the aircraft landing in Bangor. I removed this and the editor asked why then was US Airways Flight 1549 in the article as that aircraft landed in the Hudson River just after take off. I removed that as well even though some relevance could be claimed as the frame is displayed in the Carolinas Aviation Museum but as far as I could see still has little to do with that airport. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 22:13, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This has already been discussed some time ago. Actually, MilborneOne and I were involved in the discussion. You may want to check out the archives. --Jetstreamer ^Talk 22:27, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for some reason I missed it when I looked. I assumed that it would have been earlier than February 2012, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Airports/Archive 11#Accidents/Incidents. Based on that I updated the style guide. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 05:10, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

BMI related

Why are airports that are served by BMI showing British Airways operated by BMI, many of BMI destinations are still not BA, only nine routes have been transferred to BA so far, nor do the remaining carry BA code or flight numbers except for code share ones. 111.119.168.67 (talk) 18:26, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Because people have made assumptions and not realised that BMI is still running under its own licence and callsign etc., Probably be merged with BA but not until the end of the northern summer season. MilborneOne (talk) 18:46, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Needing some clarification on citations

Okay, so, could someone please stop by the talk page for Nashville International Airport and provide a little 3rd party intervention in a mild dispute another user and I have been having regarding citations, proper content, formatting, etc.? I don't want this to devolve to a shouting match, and I'd like someone else to step in and either tell one of us we're wrong, or, as is more likely the case, where in the middle the solution lies. Many thanks! nf utvol (talk) 03:18, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Lists of scheduled airlines and destinations

I find that these lists for airports don't have clear sources labelled. I don't know if the problem is wide-spread, but I think the project needs to develop a standard for citations and sources for these lists on airport sites. I don't believe that editors are intentionally misleading anyone, but I think there should be references for these lists. (There are bots that can detect dead links, etc. and alert editors to such) Can we add a requirement to provide a reference for each airline in a table? This would be added to the requirements in Wikipedia:WikiProject_Airports/page_content. Another column per row or a second row per airline or a list of sources below the table? I don't think that clicking through to an airline article and looking for a web site (the first row) is sufficient. What do people think? ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 14:55, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Each destination served should be properly referenced at the corresponding airline destinations article, so in principle there's no need to bomb the list of cities flown from any particular airport with references. Nevertheless, the fact that future destinations are unsourced is common, and I agree with you in this particular case in that there should be more explicit guidelines regarding this. The frequent answer I get from many editors to this concern is "the airline's booking engine says so". Unacceptable.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 15:16, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I was thinking of one reference per airline. You really think that will be too much? A lot of airlines don't have destinations articles. I know there are a large number of large airports, but I feel somewhat that this is a responsibility that goes along with doing these listings, never mind future destinations. ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 16:07, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

As far as I know the common practice is that destinations have to be referenced on the Airline page. Destinations should first be included on the Airline page before being added to airport pages. If airport pages contained refs for all airlines it would get far too big and complicated to edit. If an airport page contains destinations for an airline that are not mentioned on the airline destination list, raise the issue in a talk page or proceed to correct the issue yourself. Speed74 (talk) 17:35, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

If you have an airline destination, that does not mean it is a (direct) flight from that airport. There should be a caveat then, that these destinations should be referenced at the airline's page on every list. The way things are now, it seems circuitous to check the accuracy. Secondly, it degrades the value of a list if you have to go to another article to get a reference that can vouch indirectly for the validity of its contents. Don't we have a responsibility to be encyclopedic rather than expedient? At least provide something for the reader. It can't just be information that editors know how to validate. As it stands now, the lists are somewhat unreliable, are they not? ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 17:58, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

You have to remember that this is an encyclopedia and not a travel guide, it doesnt need to be "reliable" just accurate at the point of inclusion. The lists are just to give the reader a feel for the types of destinations of services from the airport not for planning a holiday. No reason why the destination list has to be up to date, no reason why historic information cant be included (properly referenced) if it show the development of services. MilborneOne (talk) 18:06, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I would mostly agree with MilborneOne, but if it's information that's likely to go out of date eventually, it's probably better to use something like {{as of}} instead of giving readers a false impression that recently-cancelled routes are still served &c. On the other hand, I'll disagree strongly with the notion that "If airport pages contained refs for all airlines it would get far too big and complicated to edit" because content must be verifiable; deliberately withholding sources is a Bad Thing. This is meant to be an encyclopædia. Adding an inline ref with any content you add is hardly an overwhelming burden. bobrayner (talk) 18:36, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

That's the gap I would like to bridge - content must be verifiable - and - practicality -. But, what is the best way to do it? I personally don't think one ref per airline is onerous, as a standard, but I only edit on the two Toronto airports. Right now, it is definitely not clear (from a reader's pov) how and from where these lists are generated. If it means that destinations are not as up-to-date, but they are referenced, is that not the Wikipedia way to go? ʘ alaney2k ʘ (talk) 18:59, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I remain of the opinion that attempting to add refs for all routes served by airlines would be far too complicated for what it's worth. Wikipedia does not require inline citations in all articles - as long as the material can be easily verified by anyone (by any means, eg. a more specific article - the airline articles) and is not challenged it is fine. In case of disputes you can refer to the airline page and then change airport pages accordingly, or, if it is necessary, sure add a ref, but this is not necessary in all cases, and would severely increase "byte" size of articles if included for all routes. And, as MilborneOne has pointed out, users shouldn't be referring to Wikipedia as a travel guide, and it is only natural that information might occaisonally be out of date - even references don't prevent this. Speed74 (talk) 20:27, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

We should try to avoid the risk of presenting out-of-date information to readers as though it's current. Refs can reduce that risk, as can {{asof}}. (Of course, the practice of showing only months for when a route starts/ends, rather than month & year, greatly increases that risk) bobrayner (talk) 20:14, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

AirTran/Southwest Start/End Dates NOTICE

I noticed that there were some major issues with start/end dates for AirTran/Southwest on wikipedia. I believe I fixed them all but just incase I think it is important for you to take note.

Any Southwest/AirTran flight that say ending on June 3, 2012 actually end on June 2, 2012. NO Southwest/AirTran flights end on August 3, 2012. Any AirTran/Southwest flights that say starting on June 3, 2012 are CORRECT, do not change those.
Any Southwest/AirTran flight that say ending on August 12, 2012 actually end on August 11, 2012. NO Southwest/AirTran flights end on August 12, 2012. Any AirTran/Southwest flights that say starting on August 12, 2012 are CORRECT, do not change those.

If you see any I missed please fix them, if any IP or Users undo these edits please redo them because I took a long time to research each route. Thanks! Kairportflier (talk) 18:29, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Disambiguating Las Vegas?

Over the past few days, I've noticed several edits like this one, where links to LAS are changed from Las Vegas to Las Vegas (NV). Is it really necessary to disambiguate Las Vegas, Nevada with Las Vegas, New Mexico, as the latter city's airport has no commercial service? -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 04:50, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

While most uses of LV need disambiguating, this is not one of them. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:04, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

It confused me as I had to work out what (NV) was, presume it could be North Vietnam or something. Some of the other entries in Kahului Airport also use two letters in brackets which to most of us have no idea what they mean. MilborneOne (talk) 11:41, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

+1. The two-letter abbreviations may be fairly widely (not universally) known inside the USA, but this is an encyclopædia for a global audience. If you must say what the state is, use the actual name. Las Vegas probably doesn't need disambiguating here (though some other cities might). bobrayner (talk) 11:50, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree, it doesn't need to be disambiguated. —Comp dude¹²³ 16:04, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Emirates flight to Dubai at Auckland Airport

A couple of IPs continue to remove Dubai (or list it as "via" of some sort) as a destination from Auckland. I checked Emirates's website and they do fly directly betweeen Auckland and Dubai with a stopover at Melbourne...same flight number and same plane (EK407/408) but the airline does fly nonstop from Auckland to Brisbane and Sydney (and have connections to Dubai from BNE and SYD under different flight numbers). Should we list or remove Dubai as a destination for Emirates from AKL? Thanks! Snoozlepet (talk) 06:50, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I already provided a link to EK's timetable in the article's talk page to support the inclusion.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 10:33, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Narita International Airport

Can someone please keep an eye on this? Someone continue to add airline alliance to the terminal column and adding bogus flights/airlines that do not serve Narita. Thanks! Snoozlepet (talk) 19:13, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I have semi-protected it for a while, although they may find somewhere else to play. MilborneOne (talk) 19:58, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

London Airport System

Just for information I proposed for deletion a new article on London Airport System which appears to be a made up subject from original research etc., if others can keep an eye on it, thanks. MilborneOne (talk) 17:38, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

It's a difficult call. There are some sources which consider London airports collectively (ie. for infrastructure investment, capacity planning, traffic management &c) but I'd agree that the grouping in the article (and the title) has a whiff of OR. bobrayner (talk) 19:32, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

We do have a summary at Transport in London. MilborneOne (talk) 19:59, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

Its creator, User:Mappy10101 (who incidentally was not pointed to this discussion) has clearly put a lot of effort into it, and I don't like to see such efforts being wasted. The title is a problem: there is no collective "London Airport System". Perhaps "Airports in London" or "Airports serving London" would be better (as a descriptive article title, rather than a proper name). I don't think that simply adding up passenger numbers should count as synthesis, nor do I count sorting total passenger numbers into rank order as "original research". The data all appears to come from official sources. I agree that the writing needs improvement and that there are a few small factual errors (e.g. the new Berlin airport hasn't actually opened yet) but those can easily be fixed.

Perhaps it would have been better if this user's efforts had been directed elsewhere, but proposing a detailed, properly-sourced article within two hours of its creation does smack of biting. Anyway, I think there's sufficient doubt here that an AfD discussion may be called for. --RFBailey (talk) 21:18, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree that moving it to a more descriptive name - away from the deceptively "officialese" current title would be a better option than deletion. An article such as this is not entirely useless - imho we could do with more such articles covering large metropolitan areas served by multiple airports. Roger (talk) 06:53, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Given that there appears to be sufficient doubt about the proposed deletion of the article, I have removed the {{prod}} template. I have also moved the article to Airports of London. If someone wants to nominate it at AfD, then they're welcome, but I'd prefer to clean up the article rather than see it deleted. --RFBailey (talk) 00:13, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Further to the above, I've given the article a bit of a tidy-up (got rid of the inappropriate infobox, fixed some factual errors, tagged a couple of things, etc.), but it still needs a bit more work to get it up to scratch. Hopefully this will spur some others into action! --RFBailey (talk) 00:35, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Not that much difference you cant just add stuff together from other articles and make up something that doesnt really exist it would need most of the table culled and content to be more like the airport part of Transport in London to stand any chance of being encyclopedic. Oh and I will leave the accusations on my actions above on one side for now. MilborneOne (talk) 12:12, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Sorry if I sounded as if I was making accusations---I wasn't trying to. But it is common courtesy to point creators of articles that are WP:PROD'ed to a relevant discussion. I agree that the massive table, aside from being difficult to maintain, is probably not encylopaedic, but the summary tables are well-made and properly sourced, and would only require updating once a year. I agree that "London Airport System" (proper noun) does not exist (which is why I changed the article name), but I fail to see how the content (primarily the statistics) is "made up": it's taken from CAA data.

I do think the article has a worthwhile case for staying--if you really disagree, then take it to WP:AFD by all means. --RFBailey (talk) 03:07, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

proposed change for Destinations served: nonstop vs multi-stop flights

In reading the above topic on Emirates' serving Auckland from Dubai, and the schedules and destinations topic, would it be worth a small change in the way destination sections are presented? I always thought that a destination meant "served by a nonstop flight," based on having viewed numerous wiki destination lists where this is the case. Where I live in Boston, the destination section for Logan airport does not list any "direct/no change of plane routes." Examples I just looked up in the current United Airlines PDF timetable include Boston to: Austin, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Mexico City, Sacramento, San Diego, Seattle and Phoenix. If all of these are not included, it creates a conflict of standards with other airports, (there is also London Heathrow - to Sydney and Auckland.) Or is there some other criteria that is used to decide when to include multi stop/same aircraft routes and not others?

I can see a case for doing it both ways. If multi-stop routes are listed, in order to clear up the potential for definitional confusion, I would want to know which ones are which. From reading the above, I agree more information is not always a good thing, but this seems to me a compromise between the more cumbersome task of extensive citations, vs a simple across-the-board symbol to differentiate nonstop from onestop.

Thoughts?

Chris

Chris874664 (talk) 19:56, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

A destination is a city that can be reached, by plane in this case, from any other airport in the world through a direct flight. It doesn't matter the number of stops, but changes of aircraft are not considered direct flights unless flight numbers are kept following the change.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 20:03, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I just finished an edit, but you beat me to it. Wondering if you like the idea of a symbol differentiating nonstop vs multi-stop routes? Based on what I've seen, it would probably only apply to relatively few listings.

I'm not sure that Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports/page content#Body supports the "changes of aircraft are not considered direct flights unless flight numbers are kept following the change." The page content says "That means the flight number and the aircraft, starts at this airport and continues to one or more airports." which I would see as being both have to stay the same. Thus FAB 842 which goes CYZF to CYCB and back to CYCO is a direct flight because the flight number and aircraft is the same but MPE 446/447 running the same route is not a direct flight because the number changes. At the same time I would think that Flight 123 that arrives in CYCB as a B737 which then continues on to CYCO as Flight 123 but using a DH8A is not direct flight either. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 20:24, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

To CambridgeBayWeather:

That's my impression too. Otherwise most destination lists would be woefully incomplete right now. In a certain sense, same-aircraft/flight # throughout multi stop routes are no more "serving" a destination than is a connecting flight. Does getting off one plane and getting on another mean you are getting to your destination less "directly"? Given how long stopovers can be, connections are often faster. Aeromexico started a direct Boston-Cancun flight a few years ago, with a stop in Mexico City. Only someone who likes spening a lot of extra time in an airplane would have selected that flight. That's why it's more logical and consistent to me to have the destination section limited to nonstop. The next best option is putting a symbol by non-nonstop destinations. But granted, this is all a grey/semantic area.

Chris

We need to use the well understood and industry definitions for direct flights. While that may be confusing to some, it is correct and is supported by reliable sources. Coding various entries can be confusing and add confusion in the tables. Also by providing that level of detail, we may have issues with not being a travel guide. Also, you should sign your posts with ~~~~. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:24, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Chris, I wasn't saying to drop drop flights just because they stop in one place on the way to another. I was disagreeing with Jetstreamer that a flight number used for two different aircraft isn't a direct flight. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 23:04, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

to CambridgeBayWeather: agreed Chris874664 (talk) 02:27, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Vegaswikian: "We need to use the well understood and industry definitions for direct flights"

I'm agreed on that point. What I was getting at is, since "direct flights" are not necessarily the best or most direct way to get somewhere, is the inclusion of multi-stop routes a good idea to begin with? Chris874664 (talk) 02:27, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Direct flight are just that, direct flights as used by the industry and understood by many travelers. Wikipedia is not the place to research the best or most direct way to get somewhere. That is the purpose of a travel guide or a travel website. This is an encyclopedia and what gets included here is based on that. Many editors are not happy with the destination lists since they consider them to be too much of a travel guide so moving the data more towards a travel guide is unwise and unneeded in my opinion. Direct, nonstop and multistop flights are all different as you point out. We only list direct flights nonstop or not. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:12, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

To Vegaswikian: This is why I proposed, as another alternative, leaving out multi-stop routes. These routes switch around much more frequently, their inclusion creates confusion, and has resulted in lack of standardization in wiki entries, as I mentioned earlier. More to the point, a simpler non-stop only policy would make it LESS travel-guide like. Just my thoughts.

Chris874664 (talk) 15:04, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Then we would need to check every flight, and I do mean every flight, against the airlines schedules to see which direct flights have intermediate stops. We would also need to review that on a regular basis since small changes are made all the time to the schedules with some of them not announced in press releases. Take the case of SWA, they may offer 10 flights a day between point A and point B. One of those could be direct and non stop while the other are direct through different airports. All they have to do is drop that nonstop flight and using your information we would need to update two airport articles. Since they are not changing their direct service, they would not issue a press release since service is not changing. Using the current correct definitions they would still offer direct service and we would not need to make any changes. This would be a nightmare to insure that the information is correct. How many direct flights are there every day and how often would they need to be verified? It would be a maintenance nightmare! Vegaswikian (talk) 19:16, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Vegaswikian: If that's the case, fair enough. I'm curious which sources of information at present make it easy to get a complete list of "direct" destinations, but don't tell you the stops w/o further checks. I would certainly be interested in consulting other sources besides the OAG, the only one I use regularly that gives such comprehensive lists at a glance. If you know of any others that don't require expensive subscriptions, I would love to know.

Thanks

Chris

Chris874664 (talk) 23:13, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

The airline timetables. Also look at how I modified your responses above so that the responses are below the comment that they are discussing. You need to do this in the future to make reading the thread easier. Also, no need to add your name since it is really in the system created signature. Vegaswikian (talk) 00:17, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

As far as responses being below, sorry I did not know how to do that. I will try to do so with this response. I know you don't need to add your name, but I do it for a personal touch, thanks. I find the present system of indentation also could be made clearer. Compared to other forums, this lack of separation between comments seems particularly un-userfriendly for a site as high quality as this. Just my opinion :)

As far as airline timetables, the ones that am most familiar with, such as AA or UA, distinguish between connections, and show either 0, 1 or some other number for stops. So why is more work required in sifting out nonstops from directs, than directs from connections? I probably am missing some other consideration, so please fill me in.

Thanks again for your patients with relative newbees. (I'm still not doing the indent thing right, I don't think.)

Chris874664 (talk) 01:13, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

RAF Driffield

Hello

I was looking at the RAF Driffield article and the language which is used looks like a copyright issue.

Do you own or do you know any editor who may have this book?

Halpenny, Bruce. Action Stations: Military Airfields of Yorkshire v. 4.Patrick Stephens Ltd, 1982. ISBN 978-0850595321.

Thanks

Gavbadger (talk) 19:50, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I should be able to borrow a copy from a friend. Or look at the university library copy.--Lidos (talk) 11:36, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Thank you, i believe it is mostly copyrighted as i own the Action Stations: Cotswold and Central Midlands and the language and wording seems pretty much the same. Gavbadger (talk) 16:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

RAF Kinloss

Comments please from WikiProject members at Talk:RAF_Kinloss#Article_title. Thanks. (btw I am at the barracks where 39 Engineer Regiment are coming from.)--Lidos (talk) 07:29, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Two articles for one airport

As far as I can tell Boulhaut Air Base and Ben Slimane Airport in Morocco are different names for the same airport; the co-ordinates given for the base are shown as being adjacent to the airport on Google Maps. The articles aren't large, should they be merged or kept separate? YSSYguy (talk) 09:41, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Do sources treat them as separate entities? bobrayner (talk) 10:08, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I can't find much in the way of sources for either, especially as the ghits on my computer are cluttered up with WP itself and mirror sites. I'm applying a bit of deduction and common sense WRT their being the same, one reason being that the town of Ben Slimane used to be called Boulhaut, another being the text in the air base article itself, and another the extremely long runway for the airport. All these along with the Google maps locations using the coords in the articles - the coords are about 2km apart with one being located on the airport apron and the other the main road running past the airport - are what leads me to believe they are the same. The main reason I posed the question is that there are often two articles on WP covering an airport's days as a military base and its civil usage; I'm more wondering if it's policy to do this or if it's on a case-by-case basis depending on the amount of info for both. YSSYguy (talk) 11:12, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I don't think we have a formal policy on it. In this case, if Ben Slimane Airport doesn't actually get any in-depth coverage from independent sources, doesn't it fail the GNG? Might be better to merge into Ben Slimane?

Sourcing can be difficult. Sources based on one row of an old DAFIF table may be fairly reliable but they don't really demonstrate notability. Other sources out there might not be wholly accurate; mapping in Africa is always problematic; and we might suffer from circular sourcing too - there are lots of sites out there which scrape standardised data (ie. the stuff you find in infoboxes) from en.wiki. bobrayner (talk) 12:14, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Occasionally a single airfield is shared by a civil airport and a military airbase. Hoedspruit in South Africa is an example of this. Roger (talk) 16:08, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

It's fairly common in much of the world - few countries have the luxury of being able to afford completely separate military and civil aviation infrastructure. For example, Zaventem/Melsbroek. I think our treatment of these articles should be led by sources. bobrayner (talk) 16:46, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Why the operated by bit necessary?

Since wiki is not a travel related site why do airport article entires show some airline services operated by another airline on their behalf, Austrian Airlines operated by Tyrolean, Lufthansa operated by Lufthansa Cityline etc. its irrelevant to even an aviation savvy person, why is an encyclopedia including such trivial details. 118.103.234.34 (talk) 18:56, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Factual accuracy. We don't want to claim that Austrian Airlines flies somewhere when in fact it is actually a Tyrolean plane that flies the route. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 19:30, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Because wikipedia is not a travel guide, we need not be limited to the kind of information needed to buy tickets. We can - and should - provide encyclopædic coverage. This can include things like operational history, choice of aircraft, previous accidents, codeshares &c though we shouldn't mention every little detail. bobrayner (talk) 21:29, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

So are you against what I said or for it bobrayner? 111.119.187.211 (talk) 18:11, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I am happy to include details of which airlines operate flights on other airlines behalf. Presuming it's supported by sources, of course. bobrayner (talk) 18:21, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The fact is that airline destination lists do include sources, but only for start and end dates. Most (all) of the destinations served from any particular airport are thus unsupported the way airport articles are currently presented.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 18:31, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The difference is in verifiability. Start and end dates can be hard to verify as the reader has to track down news articles or press releases, or dig through a booking engine to figure them out. Also, fake upcoming service seems to be a recurring form of vandalism. Verifying that a currently operating service exists and if it is operated by another carrier is much easier as that can typically be found on airline websites and online booking services. That said, I wouldn't object to more thorough referencing, though I think having an inline citation next to every destination is a formatting and editing nightmare; we ought to try to find a better way to do it. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 20:04, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

Atatürk International Airport

Hi guys! An anonymous user editing from multiple IP accounts keeps adding images that were not taken at the airport. I already removed them twice and warned him/her in their corresponding talk pages. Asked for protection of the article as well. I'll be watching the article from now on.--Jetstreamer ^Talk 20:27, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Airport vandals reported to AN/I

Hello guys. I have finally posted a message on Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding users with IP addresses 180.149 and 58.97 whom have been vandalizing airport articles. The thread is Vandalism of Airport articles. Just wanted to let you all know about this. —Comp dude¹²³ 22:33, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Discussion has been moved to here from AN/I, so to provide some context I've included comments from there below:

—Comp dude¹²³ 03:15, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Discussion from AN/I

Hello, for some time, airport articles have been subject to vandalism by an IP editor with the address 180.149 and 58.97. One of the pages where this is taking place is Shahjalal International Airport. Let me give some background on what is going on. On every airport article, there's a section listing the airlines serving the airport and the destinations they fly to from that airport. This IP editor has been added a lot of made-up and non-existent destinations and also blanked a section in this edit. See the user's most recent contributions. Other editors including me have reported this IP user and the user 58.97 to AIV and the page Shahjalal International Airport was semi-protected every time, but the user was never blocked. So as soon as the protection expired, the IP user continued his vandalistic edits like nothing happened. I request that an admin do a range-block for IP addresses within the range of 180.149.xx.xx and 58.97.xx.xx. Everyone in the Airports wikiproject will be so glad that somebody finally did this! Thanks for your consideration, Comp dude¹²³ 22:22, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Range 58.97.192.0/18 (up to 16384 users would be blocked); range 180.149.0.0/19 (up to 8192 users would be blocked): There's lots of edits coming from both of these ranges; they're not all your airport guy, and lots of them are constructive edits, so range blocks will not be practicable. In my opinion the way to go would be to protect the individual airport articles that are being targeted. -- Dianna (talk) 23:05, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Please read my message again. Semi-protecting a page hasn't worked. Once the semi-protection expires, the user starts vandalizing the page again. In the meantime the user will just go and find other airport articles to vandalize, and it's impractical to go semi-protect all of them. Just block the user please. The reason why I was suggesting a range-block was because the IP address the vandalism comes from always changes slightly. But perhaps that's overkill. Again, I would like you to do nothing but block the user. Semi-protecting the articles simply does not work, but blocking will. Thanks, Comp dude¹²³ 01:24, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

I appreciate entirely that it's long-term and very frustrating whack-a-rat for you guys, when you'd rather be contributing new content. But if the vandal skips over the ranges you describe, we'd have to long-term block over 24,000 addresses, and we just can't do that. We've no more power or insight than you do over who the individual is, all we see is the same IP addresses. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 02:34, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

If this continues, I'd suggest requesting blocks on Wikipedia:WikiProject Airports' talk page. Maybe some of the admins there can work together to manage these? In any case Shahjalal is now protected for a longer period of time. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:25, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Please just block the IP addresses that have vandalized Shahjalal Airport page and others. Keep in mind that there are multiple pages that have been vandalized and it's impractical to semi-protect all of them because the user will find other pages to vandalize. Trust me, he will. For the fifth time, just block the user! Enough with semi-protecting pages; block the user! As I said previously, go thru the history of the page and that of Shah Amanat International Airport (another page that's been vandalized) and block all the vandalizing IP addresses. Block 'em! Thanks, Comp dude¹²³ 17:56, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

I posted over there, bringing the discussion back here. Since the range blocks seem impractical, looks like the only option may well be limiting these articles to registered users only for now. So, the best bet may be to list the affected articles here and then one of the admins in the project can do the blocks without additional discussion. Shahjalal International Airport was already protected twice and is now protected for 1 year. Other admins can adjust as needed. In cases like this Wikipedia:Pending changes would seem to be a desired option, but that is not available. ANI gets archived very quickly compared to this page so we should be able to see the history more easily here. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:36, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Semi-protecting doesn't work; that's why I brought this issue to AN/I in the first place. See my comment there. —Comp dude¹²³ 00:36, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

So let me summarize: AIV is useless because they require someone to be "currently active", not 25 vandal edits 24 hours ago. AN/I is useless because they won't range block and unable to protect a project. So for months I as a non-admin have been slamming each IP with a Vandalism4im warning and report to AIV if it doesn't stop. (Too often they do.)

So may I suggest, instead of me slamming a "4im" warning, that an in-project administrator can slam an immediate one-year block for each IP that pops up from these ranges doing airport edits? HkCaGu (talk) 02:04, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Or semiprotect and block the one IP? Vegaswikian (talk) 02:22, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Both would be best, but simply semi-protecting an article doesn't cut it. On a side note, it's kind of annoying that now this discussion is now taking place in two places. I'd say for now let's keep discussing here, and tell people on AN/I to come to this page to discuss the issue. —Comp dude¹²³ 02:40, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

@Vegaswikian you said on your comment at AN/I that you'd suggest having an admin keep an eye on this sort of vandalism. The problem is that there isn't really an admin who frequents the Airports wikiproject, and I'm sure you, Vegaswikian, probably keep an eye on a lot of articles and can't really focus on just one topic like this. Other than possibly MilborneOne (talk · contribs), (who is more focused on just aviation but not as closely as me) I don't know of any other admin that could keep an eye on this user. Perhaps one of us should request adminship, though I'm not exactly sure what it takes to become an admin. —Comp dude¹²³ 03:39, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

For this vandal I'm suggesting that you report the instances here. There are at least 3 admins that I recall being involved with this project. So I'm hoping one of us will be able to respond to these requests in a reasonable length of time. Or you can go back to ANI wish does not seem like the right forum for this. Right now one article is protected, are there more that have been vandalized in the last day? Vegaswikian (talk) 05:15, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

There are a LOT more pages being vandalized than you might think. Another user told me on my talk page that Shah Amanat International Airport was another Bangladesh airport prone to vandalism by this IP user. HkCaGu has been fighting these vandals much more closely than I have; just look at his contributions and see how many pages are being vandalized. It seems to be such a large extent of articles that it'd be impractical and time-consuming to semi-protect all of them. He is also much more closely involved in this project than I am, and his contributions are proof of the extent of this vandalism. —Comp dude¹²³ 05:42, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Take a look also at the Philippine vandal: Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of 112.204.10.208 HkCaGu (talk) 06:08, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Ugly. Note that some of those were blocked. If they come back, post here. Vegaswikian (talk) 06:49, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm here almost every day but I usually only check this page once or twice. You should post here and then make a comment at my talk page so that I notice it. I am more than happy to block or protect, either way. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 13:09, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, here's the latest incarnation of 180.149.7.195: Special:Contributions/58.97.175.7. HkCaGu (talk) 14:08, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Blocked. Vegaswikian (talk) 19:32, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Didn't know that CambridgeBayWeather was an admin too. That would be great if him and HkCaGu could work together to block this vandal. —Comp dude¹²³ 19:15, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

We do have a few admins that work regular on the project and have a lot of airports watched, although I appreciate it can be frustrating if one of us doesnt notice! Perhaps a list of project members who are admins may help others, if they get no response here they can see if one of us is active and drop a line on our talk pages. MilborneOne (talk) 19:57, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Here are two latest IPs of the same person from Bangladesh: Special:Contributions/58.97.155.175, Special:Contributions/180.149.8.45. Should we also discuss what time period it should be for a block? I'm still advocating one year, especially we're not range-blocking, but I'd like to hear it from an administrator's perspective. HkCaGu (talk) 16:41, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

We would not block an IP for that long as it is likely to be re-allocated to a different user after a time, some of the dynamic IPs can be re-allocated daily when the user logs on. I have semi-protected the two article that were edited per your last. MilborneOne (talk) 17:43, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

I think one month would be an acceptable length for a block. It's long enough that the vandal won't come back and start vandalizing from that IP, but it's short enough that it would have limited effects on other IP users who come on here. —Comp dude¹²³ 17:50, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Note that Vegaswikian blocked Special:Contributions/58.97.175.7 for three days. Perhaps even that may be sufficient, considering how often the IP addresses change. —Comp dude¹²³ 17:52, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

The Ankara vandali a.k.a. User:Efekamer just registered Special:Contributions/Sucuk, and then back to an IP, Special:Contributions/178.247.43.102. HkCaGu (talk) 23:02, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Two new ones: Special:Contributions/88.244.186.77 and Special:Contributions/178.247.167.250. HkCaGu (talk) 14:35, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

From this I was looking at protecting Esenboğa International Airport, but I see that there appear to be a large number of constructive edits from IP accounts. Recommendations? Vegaswikian (talk) 17:59, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I haven't seen any significant constructive IP edits in the recent month or two. It's been largely the same guy--and many others reverting him/her. HkCaGu (talk) 20:07, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

S/he's right back again: Special:Contributions/178.244.171.0. HkCaGu (talk) 20:20, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Any new vandalism or has it stopped? —Comp dude¹²³ 19:27, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Allowable sources?

Specifically with regard to the "Carriers and Destinations" sections of airport articles, what sources can legally be cited? Is there a problem with getting flight data from sites that aggregate schedules from individual airlines and reservation systems? Even Google provides an (un-sourced) list when you give it flights XXX YYY with two airport codes. Or should we stick to the timetables/flight schedules published by individual carriers? At what point are we violating copyright?

If copyright is not an issue, is there a site that provides what we need – accurate lists of direct flights to/from a given airport? I know about flightstats.com, which will give you today's flights, but no history, and so is a poor choice for the non-daily flights common to most of the world. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 19:49, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

My preference is to use news articles regarding the beginning/ending of service. Failing that, a press release. I've seen some people make edits to add or remove destinations with an edit summary along the lines of "per UA schedules" which I'm not fond of because it's hard to verify. As is poking around the airline web sites' online schedules, which I'll sometimes do to verify an unsourced change. Frequently airlineroute.net has become popular, but I don't think we can consider them a reliable source, as they state right at the bottom that they don't warrant that the information is complete or accurate. Posts on discussion forums like airliners.net that claim a change is being made, even if it states its per GDS schedules or something, can't be used. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 20:54, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree that a press release would be ideal. But I would see no problem with using the carriers' official website. After all, there is no big problem of needing secondary sources, as such information would be hard to make sound NPOV in any way... --Wingtipvorte^X PTT ∅ 21:08, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Physical Addresses in infobox

I know that some US airport pages but I don't know which have the airport's physical address listed for the location instead of the city/town the airport is located in the infobox. I was wondering if it is necessary to include it. Snoozlepet (talk) 20:37, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

I really can't see how that is encyclopaedic for the most part. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 22:45, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Agree, it's more encyclopedic to have the name of the city/ town that the airport is located in. Listing the street address isn't helpful for identifying the airport's location if you live on the other side of the world. —Comp dude¹²³ 00:31, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Agree. An airport is bound to have multiple street addresses because of the numerous elements (passenger, cargo, hangars, etc.) surrounding the runway complex. HkCaGu (talk) 01:31, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

There is a difference between the location and the address. The two are not always the same and some editors confuse the two. In the infobox it specifically calls out location and not address. So addresses can be removed in my opinion. Vegaswikian (talk) 01:47, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

In the infobox template documentation, I mentioned that you aren't supposed to put the street address in the location field. That will hopefully clear things up in the future. —Comp dude¹²³ 21:12, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Seasonal routes: add summer/winter?

In many cases, summer seasonal and winter seasonal flights are mixed into the Seasonal: section. I've seen some cases where there are two lists, a Summer seasonal: and a Winter seasonal:, I think this practice should be used to clarify the seasonal routes list. What do you think? Slasher-fun (talk) 16:22, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Using Summer and Winter can be confusing as seasons differ around the world (or should that be up and down the world). MilborneOne (talk) 18:27, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Agree with MillborneOne, what season does one tag flights in December-January between e.g. Australia and Japan, or France and South Africa? It's better to use actual start and end dates or at least months. Roger (talk) 18:41, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

True, didn't see that issue. But we cannot specify start and end month for each seasonal route either... Maybe that information should be provided depending on the airport hemisphere? A LHR-JNB between October and March would be "winter seasonal" on LHR article and "summer seasonal" on JNB article. Slasher-fun (talk) 19:47, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

(ecx2)Are all seasonal routes really by season and are they only for the summer and winter? Don't some airlines offer special service for 'annual' religious festivals and gatherings? Vegaswikian (talk) 18:42, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Summer season in timetables goes (in northern hemisphere) between the last weekend of March and the last weekend of October (and the opposite for winter), it's not the real 3 months summer and winter seasons. For example, a flight between May and September is considered as (north) summer seasonal. The special flights for religious/etc. reasons are mostly charter flights or extra flights on an existing route, I don't see much airlines opening a regular new route just for a few flights a year. Slasher-fun (talk) 19:47, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

I think this is getting to detailed and is simply not needed. I say keep it the same. Kairportflier (talk) 19:57, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

The same as what? Roger (talk) 20:01, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

My bad, I think we should keep it the same as what it currently is, put all the seasonals in one seasonal. Kairportflier (talk) 16:20, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

Focus Cities on pages

Is there any way we can add a focus city section in the info box of an airport page similar to the Hub section because it is important and when it comes to Southwest, this info has not been able to be in the info box. Thanks for the responses! Kairportflier (talk) 01:28, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Same thing, some airlines (especially low-cost airlines) don't have a hub system, but still have airport where crew are based; this is for now mentionned as hub airports. Slasher-fun (talk) 16:20, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

It is not at all the same thing and we should have a way to differentiate them as we do on airline pages. Kairportflier (talk) 19:55, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

By "same thing" I only meant "same kind of issue" :) Both should be separate from the "hub for" list in the infobox. Slasher-fun (talk) 22:32, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

My position hasn't changed on this one. Focus Cities and Hubs together bloats the infobox, and adding Focus Cities would lead to pointless edit wars, especially with Airlines that don't use a hub and spoke system and only use "unofficial" focus cities. Hubs and Bases are enough. Sb617 (Talk) 01:17, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Sb617, Hubs and Bases are not it though, if you do hubs and bases why don't you do focus cities. The best example is Southwest. You cant have an edit war about that nor can you dispute it, it has been said many times they are focus cities so to not put it is to leave vital info out of the info box. Kairportflier (talk) 05:05, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I've done a search through google on Southwest.com typing in "site:southwest.com and "focus cities"", and they don't point to any official sources of Southwest officially mentioning "Focus Cities". If anyone has a source, I'd be happy to look at it if it is pointed out in reply. The Southwest financial reports to my knowledge just report their "largest cities", and the general consensus if I recall correctly (someone may able to point me to the archived discussion otherwise) was to use the "largest" cities served as Southwest's Focus Cities. So technically Southwest doesn't officially call them "focus cities", although technically they are and therefore they were included through a past discussion on Wikipedia.

So pretty much my stance hasn't changed in this case. If people really want to mention "Focus Cities" on the Airport articles, mentioning them in the opening paragraphs is sufficient enough. No need to bloat the infobox further, let alone have pointless edit wars over focus cities (especially from hub orientated airlines that don't use focus cities at all). Sb617 (Talk) 09:20, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I don't see what's wrong with making a focus city for: Foo Airlines field in the infobox. I'm fine with it, and I don't see why it would increase "pointless edit wars." It doesn't happen much on airline pages, so why would it happen more here? —Comp dude¹²³ 20:14, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree. I think that the "Focus City for" in the infobox is fine just as long as there is a source saying that an airline does operate focus cities at those airports. Snoozlepet (talk) 04:23, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

So it looks like all of the objections mentioned have been answered, do we have any other objections or can we go ahead with this. Kairportflier (talk) 02:52, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Update

Update: We have lift off! Now you can add focus cities! I did the first one at BWI and will be updating other airports now. Have a good day! Kairportflier (talk) 16:56, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

Airport codes in boldface

See Template talk:Airport codes#Airport codes in boldface. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 18:09, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Airport titles

Hello. I'd like to standardize the titles of airports, because the style used at current is unclear. Some use slashes (Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport), some use hyphens (Raleigh-Durham International Airport), and some use en dashes (Seattle–Tacoma International Airport). They all have benefits and downsides, but I'd like to establish a standard, according the MoS on article titles. Thanks! David1217 ^{What I've done} 03:50, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

Hyphen vs en dash should be standardized, but I don't think we can standardize on those vs slashes, since we ought to defer with the official title used by the airport itself. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 05:11, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

The MoS does say to avoid slashes, but official usage probably overrules that. So should a large requested move be filed (assuming other people agree with your logic) to change the hyphens to dashes? David1217 ^{What I've done} 15:18, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

I think that widespread usage of a name in the real world should usually take precedence over internal en.wiki norms, if there are substantial differences (though I wouldn't lose sleep over a hyphen versus a dash). Of course, some article titles are not neatly lined up in a row, but that is rarely obvious or problematic for typical readers (as opposed to stalwart editors), and it merely holds up a mirror to the messy and inconsistent use of names in the outside world. Others would disagree with this stance, though. An RM could be a good approach; a place for people to discuss it and form a consensus... bobrayner (talk) 15:30, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

My preference would be for hyphens (-) over en dashes (–), as regardless of what is typographically correct, most people will type the hyphen since that is what is on their keyboards, as opposed to requiring a special sequence to type the en dash (Option-Hyphen on a Mac, don't know what it is on Windows). So if we used en dashes, we'd have to create redirects for the hyphen version in order for people to be able to type the article title in the search box, and I also imagine we'd end up with a lot of links to the redirect. -- Hawaiian717 (talk) 15:54, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

That's a good point - but redirects are cheap, of course, and we'd end up with several redirects regardless of how this question is settled, simply due to the nature of airports. (Example: Heathrow has a simple name with no ambiguous typographical marks, but there are still 32 redirects pointing to it). bobrayner (talk) 16:14, 3 August 2012 (UTC)

We probably should do an RfC or something before starting an RM. If we file an RM, that means we know whether we want hyphens or dashes, and we just need outside approval. Right now we don't even know what we want. David1217 ^{What I've done} 15:06, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

The last case at WP:NDASH(2) seems to say that the hyphen (not endash) is the appropriate punctuation for most airports, being "compounded proper names for single entities". Conveniently, this fits with common usage. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 19:36, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Okay, so shall we make these changes or what? I don't have anything against using endashes instead of hyphens, as long as the hyphenated version redirects to the endash version of the page. —Comp dude¹²³ 19:32, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Now an RfC. David1217 ^{What I've done} 19:42, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Compdude123: I think you mis-read the above. I've emphasized the key part. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 21:30, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Request for comment

Should the names of airports be standardized with:

Hyphens – Raleigh-Durham International Airport
En dashes – Seattle–Tacoma International Airport
Slashes – Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport
Spaces – London Heathrow Airport

So far, consensus seems to be to keep official usage, but to convert hyphens to dashes (or vice versa). Hyphens vs. dashes is the main question. David1217 ^{What I've done} 19:42, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I think we should use endashes as opposed to hyphens, as long as there's a redirect to aid searching (for example Seattle-Tacoma International Airport would redirect to Seattle–Tacoma International Airport). In the case of when there's a slash in the name (i.e. DFW), it should be the official name. —Comp dude¹²³ 20:38, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Hyphens are the correct punctuation the way I read WP:NDASH(2), since they are "compounded proper names [of cities] for single entities [airports]". I would use hyphens whenever the official name on the airport's website (or managing entity, or government aviation authority) uses anything like a hyphen (including en-dash and em-dash) in the name. For instances with any other punctuation, like slashes (e.g. Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport) or parens, I think we need to use that official punctuation. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 21:30, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

That's backwards, AlanM1. It's clearly en-dashes, for same reason an en-dash used in constructions like "Ireland–UK relations" or "the US–Canadian border". I agree with keeping official usage when it uses a slash, but hyphens should be converted to en-dashes here, per WP:NDASH/MOS:DASH. It's not a compounded name for a single entity, like "Jane Smith-Giles", it's a juxtaposition of the names of two independent entities, Raleigh and Durham, for example. That the airport itself is a single entity is irrelevant; the dashed names used in these cases are compound appellations for aggregate, multi-community areas, served by the airports, so they are punctuated as such, just like the "US–Canadian border", the "Berkeley–Oakland area", etc. — SMcCandlish Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ Contrib. 23:27, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

No, I don't believe it is, based on a full reading of the section. Your first example use an endash (correctly) to indicate that the named object is between the two places – the US–Canadian border is between the US and Canada.
I don't believe the second example is correct, since it meets the criterion I cited above, and describes not the place between Berkeley and Oakland, but the area including both of them.
Similarly, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is composed of two people's names, and is not meant to indicate motion from Hartsfield to Jackson or something lying between them. If, instead, it had an endash, that would imply that it is an airport for flying between a place named Hartsfield and a place named Jackson only, much like a Los Angeles–San Diego flight correctly uses an endash. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 18:34, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

The fact is that en-dashes/hyphens (I'm not going to get into which one is correct), slashes and spaces are all used by different airports in their own names:

Consequently, it will never be possible to enforce a uniform standard. --RFBailey (talk) 04:40, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm suggesting we leave them as they are named, except that any dash-like character should be a hyphen. The slashes aren't ideal, but they do work. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 18:34, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

Is there any sort of naming standard specifically for French airports? Most of them seem to be of the form (place &ndash airport name) e.g. Ajaccio – Napoléon Bonaparte Airport, but some omit the spaces (Castres–Mazamet Airport, quite a few use an unspaced hyphen (Valenciennes-Denain Airport), and several use neither (Brest Bretagne Airport). Colonies Chris (talk) 12:49, 9 August 2012 (UTC)
- French AIP doesn't use any dash or hyphen, but shows the city in bold and the "name" in normal letters (like in "Ajaccio Napoléon Bonaparte" or "Valenciennes Denain" Slasher-fun (talk) 13:38, 9 August 2012 (UTC)
  - On the basis of a quick Google check, it seems Wikipedia is pretty much alone in separating the location and airport name with anything other than a space. However, where the hyphen/ndash links more than one location an airport serves (as with Castres–Mazamet Airport), the hyphen or ndash is more widely used. That makes sense to me, and would be in line with examples such as Seattle–Tacoma International Airport. There's a fairly subtle distinction, I think, between airports that serve more than one location, as with Castres–Mazamet, which would be hyphenated or ndashed, and airports which serve one location but are located in another, such as Toulon-Hyères Airport, which probably should have the hyphen replaced by a space. Colonies Chris (talk) 14:44, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I would oppose rigorous standardisation on some internal rule; we should put more weight on how sources in the outside world spell & punctuate names. As an encyclopædia we should be more descriptive than prescriptive. However, the hyphen/dash distinction is no big deal to me (and there's much confusion in the outside world) so I'm happy to defer to the MOS on that point. bobrayner (talk) 14:17, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm alittle late but hold the phone. We should not standardize anything. We should be going with what the airport goes by. Go to the airport website, for example you will see DFW goes with the forward slash but SEA goes with a Dash (or hyphen, can't tell). We should be going by the airport not by what wikipedia wants. Kairportflier (talk) 01:20, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

And one more question: should a hyphen or en dash be used for airports that go [city name]-[namesake] or vice versa, like Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport and Lambert-St. Louis International Airport? David1217 ^{What I've done} 21:28, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

If sources show an overwhelming preference for one or the other (hyphen or en dash or some other small horizontal line) then go with what sources say. If there's no overwhelming preference in sources, I'm happy to go along with whatever punctuation is recommended for such cases by the small-horizontal-line experts who have written and refined the MOS. bobrayner (talk) 21:49, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I read the MOS to say that a hyphen is appropriate, as it is two proper names compounded to describe a single entity. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 18:34, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

There's been no comments for the last four days, so unless someone objects, I'll open an RM seeking to change the hyphens to dashes (since there hasn't been any real consensus here). David1217 ^{What I've done} 03:33, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

I've no objection in general to changing from hyphens to dashes, but in certain cases like one I mentioned above, Toulon-Hyères Airport, it should either retain the hyphen or (preferably) be replaced by a space, but definitely not changed to a dash. Colonies Chris (talk) 10:30, 18 August 2012 (UTC)

I object for reasons cited above. Hyphens are, in almost all circumstances, the correct punctuation here. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 18:34, 18 August 2012 (UTC)