The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was: delete. T. Canens (talk) 07:01, 9 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Portal:UK trams[edit]

Portal:UK trams (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Abandoned non-portal on a marginal topic. It has one selected article, one selected picture, one selected news item, and five "fascinating facts" of unimpressive quality, of which my favourite is #4 "There have been at least 10 ways of powering trams over the years, with some still to be discovered...".

The "in the news" section has one item: "Blackpool Illuminations Switch-On 31st August 2007. Blackpool Trams. The world famous Blackpool Illuminations will be switched on tonight."

This portal was created in August 2007‎ by Tbo 157 (talk · contribs), and built mostly by Bluegoblin7 (talk · contribs). Both editors last edited in 2015. The subpages were are created in 2007, with only minor edits since. Per requested move discussion in May 2018, the portal was moved from Portal:UK Trams to the current uncapitalised form.

This isn't a portal at all. It's a slim single-issue magazine from 2007. Unsurprisingly, it is also unviewed: an average of 1.36 pageviews/day in Jan–Feb 2019, which is likely all background noise.

I don't think this meets the WP:POG criterion says that portals should be about "broad subject areas, which are likely to attract large numbers of interested readers and portal maintainers". Trams are a very marginal part of contemporary transport in the UK, with only 7 currently-functioning systems; the extensive tram network built in the 19th and early 20th century was mostly dismantled in the 1950s, and often before then. There is no head article, just brief mentions in Trams in Europe#United_Kingdom and Transport in the United Kingdom#Trams_and_light_rail and the navbox ((UK light rail)).

Any editor thinking of expanding coverage in this area would do best to start by writing a good head article. Per WP:PORTAL, "Portals serve as enhanced 'Main Pages' for specific broad subjects" ... so start with the actual main page. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:45, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Clarifying for the record, independent of any response from Waggers to my below query, that I am happy for recreation of a portal at this title. Espresso Addict (talk) 10:57, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Per comments added below, ping me to re-review the portal/article when you are ready, Waggers. We are in fact working on a deadline here imposed by the MfD process. On which point, I don't think that it is particularly precipitate to bring a portal abandoned in such a poor state in 2007 to this forum. Espresso Addict (talk) 12:49, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Espresso Addict Happy to do so, but I'm not about to put time and effort into updating something only for it to be deleted moments later. If I'm given a fair chance to work on it, I'll do so. As is mentioned below, generating some of the required content is a non-trivial task and it's not reasonable to expect something amazing by the time this MfD closes. This is Wikipedia; I refuse to be put under that kind of time pressure for a sizeable task that I'm volunteering to do in my own time. WaggersTALK 13:42, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers: That's pretty much what I said at the MfD for Portal:Oscar Wilde. Would draftifying or moving to the Wikiproject be a workable solution? I don't know how much of the wikicode doesn't work in other spaces. Espresso Addict (talk) 13:48, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Espresso Addict: Neither do I. I recall there was a proposal to allow portals in drafts space, or create a new draft portal space, and if my memory is right both of those were rejected. But we could slap ((in use)) or something similar on these portals while we sort them out. Maybe ((Portal maintenance status)) could be modified to display something for low quality / broken portals that need a revamp. WaggersTALK 14:55, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers: It used to be possible to simply remove a portal to de facto draft portal space by appropriate categorisation plus removing it from the list of all portals. But I don't know how this works with the new maintenance template. Espresso Addict (talk) 15:02, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Espresso Addict: I think our answer, or part of it, is here: Template:Portal_maintenance_status#Categories. So using the appropriate qualifier there, as well as removing it from the list (which presumably we'd still have to do manually), should do the trick. WaggersTALK 15:12, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers: What are you offering to do here? And on what timescale? The existing portal doesn't seem to offer much of a start on a blank portals template. Espresso Addict (talk) 09:30, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers: ((Portal maintenance status|date=June 2018|broken=yes|note=Has no root article)) (retrieved right now) says otherwise. Pldx1 (talk) 09:58, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Pldx1, that's not exactly an explicit request for assistance, and given the wikiproject only really got started last year and has since been sidetracked by this distracting deletion spree and associated drama, I don't think that proves anything at all. Espresso Addict - much the same treatment as I gave to Portal:Eurovision Song Contest yesterday, but also as has been pointed out there's no lead article for this topic; it's a sufficiently notable topic for an article in its own right so I suspect maintaining the portal will also lead me to creating some more related content in the encyclopaedia itself too. As for timescales, there is no deadline but a quick overhaul to add more relevant (existing) content and utilise the transcription based templates won't take very long. WaggersTALK 11:44, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers:, I object very strongly to being called trigger-happy for MFDing a page which has been abandoned for 12 years, and where both the creating editors retired from Wikipedia 4 years ago. Please try a little bit of the core policy WP:CIVILITY, and strike that comment.
As noted in the nomination, WP:PORTAL says "Portals serve as enhanced 'Main Pages' for specific broad subjects", but there is no head article to enhance. Please go and write that head article before considering a portal. (Writing a good, well-sourced head article on a topic like this article is a non-trivial task. It will be some time before anyone is read to move on to icing the cake with a portal)
As to the wikiproject only really got started last year and has since been sidetracked by this distracting deletion spree, lord spare us. Honestly, that's as counterfactual as it gets. The portals WikiProject spent most of last year on a mad spree of spamming out about four thousand junk automated portals, and mangling previous existing portals into a useless automated state.
The community has spent the last two months cleaning up that crapflood with almost zero assistance from the chief portalspammer, and with almost no assistance from members of the portals project until the last few weeks, when a few editors have begun to help. However, all the hard work of identify analysing the flood has been editor who were previously uninvolved with the project. (I have personally spent hundreds of hours on this, comparing lists, writing software, building tracking categories, and meticulously analysing and documenting the history and flaws of hundreds of portals).
The resulting MFD nominations have overwhelmingly been closed as "delete", including the two mass deletions of automated portals: one, and two, where there was overwhelming consensus of a very high turnout to delete a total of 2,555 such portals. So please don't abuse this MFD to vent about your dislike for a broad consensus.
As to Waggers's invocation of Portal:Eurovision Song Contest as a model for "improvement", see my two comments[1] last night at WP:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Eurovision Song Contest on his tweaks to that portal. In summary, it's some minor changes which still leave the portal risibly unhelpful, and an exceptionally poor overview of an annual event which has been running for 63 years. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:35, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Both these portals, like everything on Wikipedia, are a work in progress. Deleting something because it isn't "finished" is not what MfD is for. As for trigger-happy, you've nominated hundreds of portals for deletion in a very short space of time. As such, I think my comment is valid. This mass deletion spree is just as harmful, if not more so, than TheTranshumanist's ill-advised creation spree. Slowing down to take the time to work out what should and shouldn't constitute a portal would be a far better use of all of our time than this "test everything at MfD" madness. WaggersTALK 13:35, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Waggers: I have made MFD nominations only after a lot of research, and over 99% of the Portals I have nominated have been deleted by consensus. Your claims that I am trigger-happy, on a deletion spree, and just as harmful, if not more so, than TheTranshumanist's ill-advised creation spree are wholly unfounded, malicious smears and personal attacks ... as is your disgraceful claim that I am engaged in "test everything at MfD" madness. There is a lot of research behind this nomination, and it is not a test. I have used a lot of selectivity involved in assessing many many other portals which I don't bring MFD because I have concluded that they are not fundamentally flawed.
Please discuss the substance of the portal and the related policy issues, and drop your WP:BATTLEGROUND approach. If you are unable to participate in a consensus-forming discussions without accusing other editors of madness, then you would be well-advised to desist from participating before you get yourself a block.
You have now had several warning about your abuse of MFD to make personal attacks and to reject established consensus. If there is any repetition, I will take this further, without warning. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:49, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Two things. First: calm down, for goodness' sake. There are no personal attacks here.
Second: please could you explain what your research comprises, and what criteria you use for determining what to nominate, what to leave alone, and what to work on? Better still, can we please have that discussion and get consensus for a uniform approach BEFORE nominating any more portals for deletion? Trying to do both at once is not conducive for a good working relationship with other editors and wrongly pre-empts the outcome of any such discussion. The Wikipedia way is to discuss contentious decisions before taking action. And spreading that discussion over hundreds of MfDs is not the way to do it. WaggersTALK 15:18, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Waggers, the attacks are as quoted. I have warned you on your talk page, and will not warn again. Just cut it out, NOW.
The research is summarised in the nomination, which as in several other discussions, you show no sign of having actually read.
If you actually wanted to understand the pattern of my nominations rather than doubling down on your disgraceful habit of making smears and personal attacks based on your unevidenced assumptions of bad faith, you could do so by reading my nominations. In the last day or two, you have make "keep" !votes claiming something to the effect of "no valid reason" at several nominations I made of portals based solely on navboxes, in which I not only explained in detail the issues involved, but also linked to the two WP:CENT-advertised mass nominations in which there was an overwhelming consensus of a large number of editors to delete automated portals based solely on navboxes.
So I will not waste my time writing a long history of my research for the benefit of an editor who repeatedly makes !votes without even reading the nomination and who repeatedly engages in angry, malicious accusations against identifiable editors. I write exceptionally length and detailed nominations, and I scrupulously correct any errors which I or other editors find. Yo have arrived late to the long process of portals cleanup, and show no signs of having done any homework. This would be a good time for you to start.
Take your own advice: slow down, read and discuss ... and fed gawds sake, drop your WP:BATTLEGROUND approach. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:46, 1 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.


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