Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Transport/Bus articles

Bus article talk moved here from my main talk page, some sections have been enboldened as constructive comments and relevant to the main articles as a whole.

various transport articles
i find what you have done as an insult,

please undo your vandalism or i will report you to an admin.

thanks

Me Myself and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 15:39, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Thats unfortunate, but I do understand your concern. If you wish to report me to an admin please do so, though please note the talk and consensus included several WP:Administrators and a WP:Bureaucrat at Talk:First Leeds. Bus company timetables and pricing structures are are not encyclopeadic or required on Wikipedia See:- NOT. Timetables are being removed from all bus company listings. You could create an article page and put them on Wikitravel with a link to there from the page. Richard Harvey (talk) 16:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, before you did the action, you could have placed a courtesy note on the editors that have done those pages before you even made an action, most buses in the west midlands, like london are notable and that is why they are on Wikipedia. Me Myself  and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 16:28, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I have held back for quite a while before starting on doing the deletions. I considered a message on various editors pages however there are far to many articles and editors to do that for each individual article EG: Category:Bus operators in England. Which is why the edit summaries quote:- NOT. Although the individual companies are indeed notable the actual routes are not suitable for inclusion here but would be for Wikitravel When I first queried an admin regarding redirecting the route articles, or just marking them for deletion. he said "This isn't just per your rationale, but per the policy you cited. I think WikiTravel is more suitable for that material. Ultimately, I'd just ask myself "would Encarta/Britannica have these articles on their sites?" Richard Harvey (talk) 16:38, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * ok, but if the west midlands must go, so must london, but you are gonna have a big argument from the guys at the london transport wikiproject!!! but a note or even a prod on the pages concerned would be nice, i and others have worked hard on these articles so spare some thought for the hard workers! Me Myself  and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 16:44, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the suggestion. West Midlands was only done so early as it happened a bus company was in the 'B' section - after doing the A's in the bus operators in England Category that led to Transport in Walsall. I'm currently waiting to be banned from visiting Scotland again having done the main Glasgow companies first. :( Richard Harvey (talk) 16:51, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I was being sarcastic about the london deletions but just think of those who have worked their selves to the limit to find out stuff for you to delete it without a bye your leave. i am insulted. if u create a account on the uk transport wiki, hell hath no fury!!! Me Myself  and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 16:54, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Note I see no problem with articles showing routes in this format:- Arriva London, its just the detailed routes, stops, fares, etc, which are all available on the individual bus company websites. that have made the various articles to large and then having individual articles on the routes was a bit OTT. Richard Harvey (talk) 17:00, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * so? it is a wiki, not a deletion ground!!! Me Myself and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 17:01, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

← reindentI do find what you seem to be doing a very big step. Yes, fares company addresses and stops might not be appropriate, but I think that routes help the reader to get a feel of the companies operations, after all, they are the most important part. I don't care whether I am wrong, I just strongly believe how you have gone about it is wrong. You seem to think that one discussion at Talk:First Leeds seem appropriate to go and change a hell of a lot of articles. I hadn't seen Talk:First Leeds, so of course - I haven't shown my opinions on the matter, as I presume many other haven't. The first I knew about it was looking at my watchlist today and it breaking my records of most changes in one day. I was not happy! I had no idea that this was going to happen. Perhaps this could have been discussed somewhere else than at Talk:First Leeds before loads of articles that aren't anything to do with First Leeds are changed. Arriva436talk 17:10, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * exaxtley, i agree with Arriva436. ANY MORE DELETIONS AND I WILL NOT BOTHER TALKING, I WILL ACTION, AND TRUST ME, MY TEMPER IS SKY HIGH MR HARVEY. Me Myself and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 17:14, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * And are you going to continue with the USA and Indian entries, such as Citizens Area Transit and Calcutta Tramways Company, and have you seen the Australia enties?

CS46 18:56, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Woah! Abuse isn't needed. It doesn't help at all and won't resolve the issue. I don't think that there is and ever will be a place for abuse on Wikipedia.

''':::I will reiterate what I have said: Yes, fares, stops, addresses etc can go, I don't care and have never put them on there. Route lists as long as they don't have things like "frequencies on a Sunday" etc and aren't too big should be dealt with on an individual basis.


 * I can see why you have done what you have Richard (I hope that's what I'm meant to call you otherwise I'd feel a bit silly!). I myself have become increasingly annoyed at people turning Wikipedia into Traveline, with forthcoming changes listed in articles etc. It just isn't needed and shouldn't be here.


 * Can I ask you to have a look at the compromise I have made on the Bluestar (bus company) page, namely putting route details in a small paragraph rather than a comprehensive list, avoiding disrupting the readiability. Is this okay? I look forwards to hearing from you on this.


 * In the meantime, I will hope that you received no more abuse, it's not nice. Arriva436talk 19:16, 10 July 2008 (UTC)'''


 * I'm deeply concerned at what has gone on here today, and reiterate what's been said by User:Arriva436. Abuse isn't needed, infact, it's expressly forbidden. The comments made by User:Dudleybus are inappropriate and are precluded in our policy on no personal attacks, civility at all times and staying cool. Those policies are non-negotiable . If there's a failure to work in the spirit of collaboration and find a way forwards with content issues that best serves our readers (which has failed above), then really, you're not welcome on Wikipedia. This all said, this content dispute is a minor issue that shouldn't have needed such strong words from User:Dudleybus.

'''::::I recommend a cool off period, a rethink about what has happened, and then restart a civilised negoitation that involves more parties, to achieve a consensus. Richard has cited policy (WP:NOT) and so I'm inclined to say that the ball is in Dudleybus's court (so to speak) in terms of justifying why this content should be kept. --Jza84 | Talk  19:28, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Very well said Jza84. I agree entirley. I partially agree with Dudleybus, so if he doesn't repond the I might. However, as I have already said, I only want to keep routes as these are the main part of a bus company. Fares etc. are however definatley violating WP:NOT, going too far unless they are particlually special. I will wait for a while and see what happens. I do also think that some of the Glasgow and West Midlands routes were particlually badly written, and support their demise. Arriva436talk 19:42, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

'''
 * Agreed. Certainly I don't think this issue will be resolved at a local level - I think we need a national approach here. Is there a WikiProject that could advise? --Jza84 | Talk  19:55, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Various transport articles (continued)
I started a new post because the one above is long and getting messy. It also seems to be getting heated and out of hand. Can I call a stop to all activity based on all this while it is discussed. There is too much action and no talk/consideration.

This case was brought to my attention, because it was thought administrator intervention was needed before things got onto a much bigger scale than need be.

Richard Harvey, my view on the matter may be of interest to you. Please read it, and take in.  Lra drama 22:50, 10 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Lradrama thanks for your message; I do understand the problem and have read your view on the matter which I agree with. At this point I would like to point out that I have not gone into this editing lightly, which is in WP:Good Faith, as I mentioned in a reply to User:Dudleybus above, after his first accusation of vandalism. Please note that I had followed the various editing through whilst conferring with an administrator as I did so, including the 'Redirects' of the First Glasgow bus route articles. It seemed logical to continue the 'Redirects' on other bus routes. I tagged Coastal Coaches, Clintona Minibuses and Cavendish Motor Services with to allow an administrator to decide if they met that criteria. User:Maxim decided Clintona Minibuses was correctly tagged and deleted the article, whilst Coastal Coaches didn't and removed the tag. User:Snigbrook then proposed that article for deletion. User:Ian13 decided Cavendish Motor Services did not meet the criteria and removed the tag. I stopped doing any further edits and sat back without responding on noticing the the second capitalised abuse from User:Dudleybus and advised the administrator I had done so - See:- User_talk:Jza84. I accept that User:Arriva436 was concerned and reverted the removal of the routes from Black Velvet (bus company) stating they are not a list but are in prose format. I agree they are, however of the eight routes shown one states it runs on Sundays and Bank Holidays only and four of the others state they are not due to start until September. I felt that they did come under WP:NOT specifically WP:FUTURE and so non encyclopaedic. As that would have left only three routes It seemed logical to remove all of them. If that is incorrect then I apologise! I will now leave further editing of these articles alone, until a suitable system is set up to allow a decision on what content should be allowed/removed from the articles. For reference purposes of what I have done so far: After dealing with all the Category:First Group companies and those listed in Category:Transport in Glasgow, I was working my way through the bus companies using Category:Bus operators in England as my guide and I have gone no further than Coastal Coaches. I also did those listed in Category:Transport in Walsall as an offshoot from one of the companies listed under Category:Bus operators in England. Richard Harvey (talk) 02:34, 11 July 2008 (UTC)


 * OK, and thankyou for explaining this. But on Wikipedia, the best thing in a situation like this is to discuss and improve, rather than delete large-scale. I would have discussed the suitability of the articles without adding the tags on. There are many people down at WP:AFD that are very deletion-happy, and vote without taking things into proper consideration, sadly as it may seem. Administrators are not the only people who participate there you see. As it is, the best policy would be for all you lot that are involved in this to get together, discuss, and fix the problems together. It will get done quicker and more efficiently. Contact me or someone if you get stuck. Turn unacceptable lists into acceptable lists, together. You know what is and what isn't allowed from my previous message. Regards,  Lra drama 10:56, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Basically, you were never going to get agreement for wholesale changes based on what was a very small discussion at one article, even if it did involve a couple of admins or looked to have solid grounds in policy. I generally agree route info is not notable (with maybe an argument for core routes and major destinations, see Lothian Buses for an excellent example, although even that could be cut down to terminal points), but I haven't bothered removing any precisely because of the lack of prior consensus to do so. Your arguments about advertising don't realy hold for basic route information of this type in my opinion, where is the advantage when there are clearly better and more reliable sources elsewhere?. Fares, contact details and seasonal changes, definitely should be out as temporal cruft, and I do this when I see it. Your mistake in my mind was also to try and apply a general principle across all articles. You are perhaps not aware that even some individual routes, such as Stagecoach Manchester 192, are quite notable, ,.

Also, many stub articles may be about notable companies from a variety of online but most likely, offline sources, and are just not finished (bus articles don't get an awful amount of exposure with which to develop), however, db'ing is quite a legitimate process so I don't think that was all that bad. I would caution on relying on admins to actually do the background cheking before deletion, remember, they are the brooms, we are the editors, anyone is able to find and add sources, and for such minor articles, five days is not long for someone to notice the tag. When approaching as an edior without knowledge of the subject, I would have used the other {notability tags} first, and then db if they produced no improvement in a reasonable time. But, what was very bad in my view was transferring your attentions to fleet details, which are highly verifiable through many sources, without any prior discussion, merely cross transferring the principle about route info.

'''Anyway, the basic problem is that there are no specific bus company article guidleines that I am aware of, so acting bold is not necessarily a bad thing but is also going to be widely open to interpretation from the general top level policies. However, a wider discussion should have been attempted to avoid this rather predictable outcome. WikiProject buses is pretty much dead I believe, but in that light you should at least have opened a discussion either at the Notability (organizations and companies) or the higher project WikiProject Transport. I personaly think you were misadvised by the admins at Talk:First Leeds by people who should know better. When editting has got as far as having templates such as Template:Glasgow Buses and Template:West Midlands Buses navbox then being bold clearly wasn't going to be an unnopposed move. MickMacNee (talk) 14:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC) '''
 * Excellent. It is nice to see a couple more people have got involved in the discussions. I hope that this matter than therefore can be resolved quickly and fairly, without anymore flared tempers. On the subject of Black Velvet, I did this because I will be able to expand when the new services start in September, which will be here in no time! Arriva436talk 16:48, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

What next?
Regarding the bus company articles discussion, does anyone have any ideas as to where this can be discussed properly? I'm sure Richard doesn't want his talk page wasted! As everyone seems to have finished initial ideas, are we ready to decided what to do next? <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk 19:15, 14 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Apologies for there being no earlier reply. I have been away from my home for several days!
 * Well I certainly seem to have dipped my toe into what seemed a small pond and created ripples in an ocean. :(    Arriva436  I have no problem with the talk being held here, but as noted above one of the project pages may be better as it will give a fresh start to the discussion. The points above that I highlighted seem to condense the main problem within the articles and guidelines under WP:NOT.  I fully accept what people are saying for a constructive conversation to help improve the articles and keep notable route information, whilst divesting the articles of timetable, fares and information on each and every bus stop on a route and future predictions on changes to them. I have noted the Bluestar (bus company) page, mentioned by  Arriva436  and find that to be a quite readable and well laid out article with the route information concise and in prose format.  I do see a problem with articles that contain route and fares information like First York. I also personally find route articles like National Express West Midlands routes 340 and 341, A2Z Travel route 341E and Central Connect Diamond route 342 and List of bus routes in the West Midlands countyto be more suitable to Wikitravel than Wikipedia. Obviously a lot of hard work has gone into producing the list of routes, but does it fall within the requirements of Lists (stand-alone lists). So if someone with the required knowledge can start things goings then please do so, perhaps starting by having a consensus / guideline / policy on what should and should not be included in an article and then perhaps making up a sectioned list of those articles that need editing to comply with the consensus achieved for page formating, those that may be suitable for moving to Wikitravel and those that may not suitable for either to allow a further consensus on them before any deletions take place. (NB: Please keep messages limited to constructive comments on improving the bus articles, I may be inclined to remove those that are not, as per WP:TALK). Richard Harvey (talk) 09:23, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi! It's good to see you are back. I hope you don't mind if I start my discussion tommorow, I have a lot to say and don't want to jumble it up. I'll talk tommorow. Thanks. <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk

The discussion
Right, hello, I'm here! I am going to give my opinions on the current problems. I have bolded the start of each point I am making and the word that shows what it is about.

Firstly, I think that perhaps what has happened was a bit extreme. Citing policies and using a previous discussion at Talk:First Leeds - which is irrelevant to most other articles and which most other editors won't have seen, was not enough to take on the edits which happened. While I wont say that Richard was trying to game the system, I hope Richard will accept me saying it may have been a good idea to check on a couple of articles first. No problem though, as it can be fixed like what I am doing right now.

Secondly, route lists. I do feel these are appropriate in some circumstances on Wikipedia. After all, the routes of a bus company are basically what it does, without them, a bus operator would be pretty useless!! A list showing and linking to the places the operator runs I think is helpful as it shows the sort of services the operator runs, where to, how big a places etc.

How these routes should be presented is another matter, while the current state of the Bluestar (bus company) article is in prose and easily readable, it is the best way of putting it across? Could numbers mixed with words, commas and semi-colons be potentially confusing? Did the small list of routes affect the article too badly? Of course, for operators with lots of routes, listing them in prose would be way too complicated and look and read ridiculously! List format is surely the only way?

There is the point of policies. I partly agree with what Richard has said. Firstly though, I'd like to say that I don't think that any of the information violates WP:ADVERT. As <span style="font-family:Comic Sans MS,sans-serif"> Lra drama has said, why would an operator want to put any information on Wikipedia. A list of routes, as I have said above, illustrates where the operators runs. It would be of no use to anyone trying to plan a trip or route, bus companies have websites for that. These websites also have loads of other info, including fares.

The other policy that has been cited is WP:NOT (Wikipedia is not a directory). This is in two parts. As I have already said twice and will say again, I think that routes help shows the operations of a bus company, rather than needlessly listing information that can be seen elsewhere. However (and this is where things change), some of the other information is violating the policy.

Which moves onto the forth point of fares. As I have said before, I some of the other details are definitely going to far. Complex and masses of details on fares and tickets are definitely not needed on Wikipedia, is can be found on bus company publicity. This I think should be deleted. I do think there are some exception though, perhaps York park and ride to give details of specially unusual fares, but normal bus companies no. Examples of First Manchester and other FirstGroup companies showed well how much unneeded information there was.

Other information is similar to this. Addresses, which can be seen on some London Buses subcontractors' articles are like a directory, and I have been removing some of. Stops and routes are also the same.

Then there is the issue of route articles. Some of these are incredibly well written, like the London ones. However the Glasgow and West Midlands ones are not very good if I'm honest. The example Richard has given of National Express West Midlands routes 340 and 341, A2Z Travel route 341E and Central Connect Diamond route 342 made me laugh. What a stupid article name. The history section is riddled with mistakes, and then the editor has singed it. It's not a talk page!! I found this older version of National Express West Midlands route 997. Not quite sure what it's about. Any of the articles that are particularly bad then I don't really see a reason to keep them. Articles on route lists I think are acceptable, but some of them now have "Forthcoming changes" sections, a bit OTT.

For now anyway, they are my opinion. As I have shown with the reasons above, I can summarise with route lists yes, but fares, addresses, stops and routes unless particularly notable, no. If anyone hasn't fallen asleep yet, then thanks!! <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk 14:47, 19 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Now then, I have returned to this discussion to reiterate some of my earlier thoughts, seen as this discussion seems to becoming stale, and only person so far contributing to this particular thread. This time, instead of a huge essay, I will provide a simple and easy-to-understand summary. As I said, a lack of discussion before these actions took place was a root cause of this dispute. A list of routes is not advertising, unless it butters up the other features / plus-points of the route in question, as a bus company would surely do on their websites, or promational leaflets. A simple list of routes, with the route number and a list of destinations is not advertising, and fully lives up to the expectations of the purpose of an encyclopedia, which is to simply give information. Look at the routes on Lancashire United, which are clearly not advertising. While the accusation of some articles looking like directories is more complicated; phone numbers or any contact details of any company or person should definately be removed. Anything else that makes it look like an attempt at conducting business, which just brings us back to advertising, needs looking at. As Arriva436 said, fares, addresses, stops, are a bit promotional...but a mere list of routes isn't. Hope that helps. If you are still struggling, contact me again. <span style="font-family:Comic Sans MS,sans-serif"> Lra drama 10:38, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Right, my beeswax - London buses have a article for each of them, so why should West Midlands, or any other region not have them???


 * Also, the names can be worked on here and then the origional names can be used, like the company names on the UK Transport Wiki, e.g. West Midlands Premier bus 997 or West Midlands bus route 222 here and on UK Transport Wiki, we can have names like National Express West Midlands routes 340 and 341, A2Z Travel route 341E and Central Connect Diamond route 342 and the more detailed stuff, like maps, because i am an admin on there and i am just a plain editor here so i know the stuff.


 * Also, last thing, any article about bus routes would be covered by 2 wikiprojects, that areas wikiproject and wikiproject buses. I should know most stuff about West Midlands Transport as i am a collector of timetables.


 * Me Myself and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 11:24, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Would it not be easier to maintain the articles if the individual and more detailed routes were just kept on the UK Transport Wiki, with only a simple summary of them on wikipedia. The transport Wiki has considerably more leeway for what can be included in the article pages. Having a table format link to those article pages from the various bus companies on Wikipedia would save a considerable amount of duplicated editing work. A simple four column one could list:- Route No - Start - End - UK Transport Wikilink. EG:-
 * {| class="wikitable"

! Route No ! Start ! End ! UK Transport Wiki
 * 341
 * Walsall St Pauls bus station
 * Willenhall
 * Route Details:
 * 341E
 * Walsall St Pauls bus station
 * New Invention
 * Route Details:
 * }
 * My thoughts being that with numerous editors then the two article pages could never be duplicated exactly. A change to either of them would require an editor to update both articles simultaneously. I can see that that would be easier for a dedicated (Bus enthusiast) editor like Dudleybus. However if one is made by a new anon editor it would need to be picked up quickly for the other page to reflect it. That would also then allow a certain amount of consistency of format for the wikipedia articles? Richard Harvey (talk) 14:24, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
 * }
 * My thoughts being that with numerous editors then the two article pages could never be duplicated exactly. A change to either of them would require an editor to update both articles simultaneously. I can see that that would be easier for a dedicated (Bus enthusiast) editor like Dudleybus. However if one is made by a new anon editor it would need to be picked up quickly for the other page to reflect it. That would also then allow a certain amount of consistency of format for the wikipedia articles? Richard Harvey (talk) 14:24, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * well, could there be an extra collomn for frequency and via?? Me Myself  and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 14:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * (IIRC, I argued this in the Afd of List of London bus routes) London bus route articles to my mind are more justifiable over any other place in the UK because the London system of setting routes is properly controlled and enforced under an official franchising scheme by Transport for London, and the route as an entity stands apart from whoever has the current contract to run buses on it. Therefore, details in these articles, and changes, are easily verifiable from a reliable source. In the current political climate, this is not the case for other areas, where the bus companies themselves are predominantly the only entity responsible for setting, changing or cancelling routes, legally with minimal notice required, and are therefore to my mind not deserving of any innherent notability through verifiable sources. However, in my comments higher up, there are cases such as Manchester 192 where it can be demonstrated that particular routes outside London may be exceedingly notable and worthy of an article. Other routes tha may be the first to introduce new technology or ideas (such as the first ever FTR (bus) route, the first ever quality partnership, or routes specifically different to the local operations), could in my opinion also be argued to have notability in the subject of bus transport, but this may not be notable enough generally for an article. MickMacNee (talk) 16:11, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree with MickMacNee on the fact, as he rightly says, London Buses routes are a lot more stable. There's no point repeating with what has just been said, I agree with it all.


 * I also think that Richard Harvey's plan for route articles in other areas. As he says, having the same information in two places is a bit difficult; some of the information on the UK Transport Wiki is copied and pasted. Rather than having information that might not be appropriate here, I think it would be better to link to the Transport Wiki, which could then be adapted to provide even more specialised information. Also, the content here on Wikipedia would be limited to a route list, which as I have said before I think is acceptable here. Is this a good compromise? <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk 19:09, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Ok, all fine with me, we just keep Wikipedia with LDN and notable bus services, e.g. i have found newspaper online articles about west midlands routes 205 and X96, West Midlands route 529 is notable as it was the first bus route to be run using buses powered by CNG. West Midlands routes 934, 993 and 997 are notable as it is the first 3 west midlands bus routes to be in a volentary partnership. i have press releases for these 3 routes. Me Myself and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 08:07, 24 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Just to say that I have gone through the remainding London Buses subcontractors' articles and removed all the the company adress details, per NOT which has also been disccused here. I hope everyone agrees with this. I'd also like to say I'm on holiday from tommorow until the 11th. <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk 17:33, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Page move to Transport Project
As discussion in a low traffic venue triggered the first issue, prior to starting to comment, I'm moving this discussion from this sub-page of User talk:Richard Harvey to a sub-page of Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Transport, with spam notices to Wikipedia talk:Notability (organizations and companies), Wikipedia talk:WikiProject buses (dead?) and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject London Transport. I presume nobody will have any objection. MickMacNee (talk) 15:49, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Move done MickMacNee (talk) 15:50, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Spamming done MickMacNee (talk) 15:55, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Having dragged a lot of new readers in to opine on your question, you now need to provide a synopsis of the question (preferably with a few well-chosen examples) so the rest of us can get caught up on whatever it is that you want input on. The discussion threads above were, as someone noted, "long", "messy", "heated" and "getting out of hand".  Perhaps that would be an appropriate use of the project page.  Rossami (talk) 16:23, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Minutia updating of fleet details
From some editor activities at Arriva Southend Ltd, I have noticed a further aspect of the recording of trivia beyond things like minor route changes, that is the specific recording of fixtures and fittings details about individual buses. I definitely think this is far too trivial, and will trim the article. I think general details such as branding for routes and major fleet movements/refurbishments are worthy of note, but not down to individual dated details for buses. I have directed the editors here for information. MickMacNee (talk) 14:39, 24 July 2008 (UTC)


 * As one of the two editors being mentioned, i'll get my views in. First of all, i see quite a few double standards in the remodelled article. E.g. You say not to include specific recordings of individual buses, so why did you leave the names of the four buses on the page? Why were fleet numbers removed from the Arriva Southend page when the First Essex page and Stephensons of Essex page still have them? Minor route changes are not meant to be included so why on the Wilts & Dorset page are all former services still mentioned? You say branding notes are allowed yet i see you removed the specific buses branded when on the First Essex page, specific branding on buses are included. You removed the notes section which could actually help people wanting to use buses in Southend, how will they know whether the 4A goes to Landwick or East Beach or that the 6A only runs during the day or Tuesdays or that the number 7 is extended to Wakering?


 * And finally you have asked for clarification on wheather buses for commercial routes were moved from Grays to Southend, it was clear before you edited the article.


 * I feel that me and Chris are being taregtted just because we are trying to provide accurate information on Arriva Southend Ltd, we are both local and so i feel that we have a better idea of what is going on in the area. Xp132476 (talk) 21:56, 24 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Apologies if you felt targeted, this was not my intention. I acted on the article because it is one in my watchlist and I saw how it was being updated, and I was aware of the pertinent discussion here. The majority of your points deal with comparing this article to others. First off, I am not aware of the contents of theose pages, as I don't have them watchlisted. If I have the time I will review them in due course. But if you read this page, there are more than one editors in agreement that the minutia is not needed and is against policy (I'm coming to specifics). A good read is this essay Other stuff exists, which explains the merits and pitfalls of using the comparison of other articles in defence of others. In time, or maybe never, we might have all bus articles to the same standard. But the standard to be met is independant of the current state of any articles (barring good or featured articles, which have been assessed for quality).


 * Specifics. Wikipedia is not a travelguide. It is not our purpose here to record information for the purpose of assisting somebody in their travels. Being local to articles, while usefull, is not realy important. Anyone is allowed to add to, remove or refactor articles as they see fit to meet policy. On the bus naming thing, it was a personal editorial decision, which other may yet disagree with (you will see even this Brighton article has been the source of dispute before). Buses which have an unusual feature like a name, compared to the number of each bus with a certain paint job, is where the line is for me between encyclopoedic information about a bus fleet, and minutia details more appropriate elsewhere, and I think everyone else would agree on that point so far. If needed, the fleet numbers could be removed from those buses as well. Bus naming is also more likely to be reported in third party sources and thus be considered noteworthy. On the clarification, I'll raise that on the article talk page, that isn't an issue for here. MickMacNee (talk) 23:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I've read the whole of this page, and whilst I wasn't initially entirely happy with the deletions due to the work that's gone into them (on all articles), I can see the point behind most of the changes such as removing information like fares, company addresses, stops etc. that can easily be found on the bus companies' websites or moving a version of the article with them to Wikitravel. I wasn't aware of the policies such as Wikipedia is not a travelguide, but I think it's important that all articles are brought up to the same appropriate standard, and that perhaps since much of this trouble arose due to not having guidelines, we should use this discussion as a basis to draw some up? As long as the information such as fleetlists and other 'minutiae' which may only be of interest to a limited audience are avaliable collected in a single place somewhere, if not Wikipedia perhaps somewhere like the UK Transport Wiki for people who want them, and they can be linked to from the Wikipedia article. It's all available in the history if anyone wants to see it, so at least there's a record. What do people think of moving the prior versions of articles with the detailed information which may not be appropriate to Wikipedia to other sites like those? Huangcjz (talk) 08:04, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Dudleybus is copying articles to wikitransport I think. Discussion here could/should eventually be drawn up as a guideline, but we are way off the numbers of people required to comment for that to pass scrutiny I think, I've nerver read up on that procedure. At the least, any proposal would need comment from the main notability policy talk page probably, and a few admins. I don't have the will/time to draw up a guideline, but I'm happy to use this as a discussion clearing house for common issues, and comment if someone else draws one up. MickMacNee (talk) 18:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Articles are being moved in the next week (between 6pm and 10pm most weeknights before i go on holiday - Me Myself  and Iwith the UK Transport Wiki 19:46, 27 July 2008 (UTC)


 * MickMacNee, you said that we should discuss the clarification of a statement on the Arriva Southend page on its own talk page, so I've posted my comment on that there. Huangcjz (talk) 15:06, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Overuse of fair use images
Opening up another issue I just noticed, is the use of copyright images in the illustration of specific route branding, such as at Arriva Southend Ltd and Ensignbus (versions as of looking . While I don't absolutely hate it stylistically, and it is arguably usefull for identification, on past experience I know for a fact this is going to fall foul of the minimal fair use movement. So, this is an FYI without actually doing anything about it. I am not currently aware of any other fair use image use of this sort, so if anyone knows I suggest fessing up here for full disclosure. These images have a tag on that means that eventually a fair use bod will eventually examine them. Trust me, I know. MickMacNee (talk) 14:39, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The   tag for logo's does state the images should be low resolution and include a rationale for each individual article the image is used on. At 1006 x 315 pixels images such as Image:Arriva Southend Route 5 Basildon direct logo.png used on the Arriva Southend Ltd article are not low resolution. A suitable size guide would be to uploaded logo's at or less than that used on a company website. EG: the Basildon Direct website, though in this case the logo seems to have been obtained from:- this pdf file, which was zoomed up to give a larger quality image. As MickMacNee advises that image and others similar to it may be deleted, to protect Wikipedia from a potential copyright claim. Richard Harvey (talk) 09:03, 25 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Couldn't smaller versions just be uploaded to replace the current ones? Should I do that now, or wait for them to be examined first? Huangcjz (talk) 10:08, 25 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes! Smaller sized images (180x56 pixels) uploaded with the same title, using the link at the bottom of the image pages marked 'Upload a newer version of this file' would be the best way. Richard Harvey (talk) 12:19, 25 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Done. The new ones are all about 200px wide and 70px tall. Huangcjz (talk) 14:27, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

In my experience, they will be gone after as 'decoration', whatever the resolution. It would take a tremendous effort to argue they are essential images to convey meaning. But then again, I guess that is the point of branding. Maybe it is defendable just on that point, I don't honestly know, but I know what the anti fair use crowd are like. MickMacNee (talk) 18:08, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

A conclusion?
A month has now gone since the last contribution to this discussion. A lot has been talked about, a number of topics interestingly discussed, even some that weren't even in the original discussion!! Many users have contributed - all giving their important views.

Are we now ready for some kind of conclusion on the matter? It has been around two months since the first edits on the matter happened. Can we get around to editing some of the articles? I would like perhaps to reintroduce some of the route details back to the articles. As I have said (lots and lots!) above, all I want to keep is small-scale minimal route details, I have no intention of filling articles with tons of unneeded rubbish.

Any other ideas? <b style="color:#FF0000;">Arriva436</b><sup style="color:#800080;">talk 17:51, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Quality drive
To apply the issues raised in this page uniformaly across UK operator articles, and to make other improvements, a new quality drive is now in progress. See WP:UKBQDRIVE for details. MickMacNee (talk) 18:36, 6 September 2008 (UTC)