Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jules Joffrin (Paris Métro)

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

The result was keep. Kungfu Adam ^(talk) 20:27, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jules Joffrin (Paris Métro)

Jules Joffrin (Paris Métro) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Unsourced article of a subway station named after a person who doesn't have a wikipedia article. Doesn't meet Verifiability and falls in line with what wikipedia is not sections 1.7, 1.8. Alan.ca 22:03, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

• Delete. Some things may be inherently notable. Subway stations are not one of them. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 22:04, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
• Delete per above. Charlie 22:30, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
• Delete per above. Jules François Alexandre Joffrin has an article, by the way; he appears notable. --Charlene 22:48, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Subway stations are notable. Wikipedia has many good articles on individual subway stations in New York, Paris and elsewhere. The existence of the station is adequately demonstrated by the map, which also confirms that the town hall and a local church are nearby. You don't need to footnote something that can be found on a map. There is even an article on this station in the Norwegian Wikipedia at no:Jules Joffrin (Paris Metro). As for Jules François Alexandre Joffrin, he not only has an article in the English-language Wikipedia, he has an article in the 1911 Britannica as well. And even if he didn't, he would be notable for a number of reasons, including having served as a member of France's national parliament. --Eastmain 00:20, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Can you cite a policy that states the notability requirements for a subway station? Alan.ca 02:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

The appropriate passage in WP:AFDP just says it's under discussion, and the discussion seems unlikely to result in "all subway stations are inherently notable". So establishing notability is probably going to be needed. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 02:18, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Keep per Eastmain. Well done to the nominator for actually citing their specific concerns, but I think that WP:NOT 1.7 and 1.8 are more targetted at list articles, and there is considerable precedent for station articles in major cities like Paris, London and New York. --Canley 01:10, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per above. – Chacor 01:40, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Chacor, an AfD is not a vote, but a debate, please see Wp:afd#How to discuss an AfD.2FWikietiquette Alan.ca 02:17, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• And I see two "delete per above" votes. Your point? – Chacor 02:18, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

As a former administrator and recent candidate for Adminship, I would hope that you would seek to adhere to policy and guidelines of wikipedia. Alan.ca 02:23, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Um... Nobody actually pays attention to that part, nor does anyone care outside of the particular AfD... -Amarkov ^blah_edits 02:37, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

If you have something you want to tell Chacor, please don't do it in this AfD debate. - SpLoT _(*C*+u+g) 02:47, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Fair remark as I agree with the importance of keeping a debate to the point. Keep in mind I was answering his response to my statement about AfD etiquette. I posted the remark not only for Chacor's benefit but for the reading pleasure of anyone else voting in the debate. Alan.ca 06:52, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Keep or Merge into an article on the Paris Metro. I don't have a problem with this having an article on its own, Paris is notable as a city, thus many things in the city will be notable, including its metro system. Any article on its metro system should describe the stations, so the only question is, is it better to have that in one page, or several? I sort of prefer the latter, but I can live with either. Mister.Manticore 02:36, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

That's a good suggestion MM, I concur, merging the page into the subway system article would work well. Alternatively maybe one article could be created that contained all of the stops? Alan.ca 02:52, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

This article is a stub, but a discussion of the engineering, architecture and history of this station, particularly if someone can provide one or more photographs, could get fairly large. The advantage of having articles on each station is to allow better indexing and categorization, so that a link from another article would point directly to the station's article, not to a lengthy combined article on the entire subway line (this one is on Line 12) which many used would find difficult to navigate. This is why when an article gets longer than about 30 k, editors should try to split it up into several useful sub-articles. Given the precedent that exists for other subway stations, in Paris and elsewhere, I would invite the nominator to withdraw his nomination. --Eastmain 04:13, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• You may find it useful to learn that you can wikilink directly to a section of an article with [[article#section]] Alan.ca 06:49, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment While it may be true that subway stations can, generally speaking, be considered notable, this article contains, in addition to no sources or references other than a map which does not contain the facts cited in the article, no assertion whatsoever of this particular subway station's notability. Being named after a notable person is NOT enough to assert notability. Somewhat trivially, but relevantly, I could name my house after Martin Luther King. Houses, especially historical ones, can be notable, as can places named after notable people, but my house, even if it was so named, would nonetheless fail to be notable in any way. Even if my house was in New York City, for example, or another notable city, even that additional fact would fail to make the house itself notable. So it is, I think, with subway stations. If the information in this article is to be merged with an article about the various stations in the Paris subway system, I would have no problem with its inclusion in WP. However, no sourced statements have shown any assertion of enough notability to stand as an article alone, and I continue to argue for Deletion. Charlie 06:56, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Is there even a notability guideline for this kind of thing? Alan.ca 07:19, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment A proposed guideline can be found here. However, and perhaps more significantly, the article cites no sources whatsoever to assert its notability. Note that this also means that the article, as it stands, fails WP:V, because it should, under the policy, "contain only material that has been published by reliable sources." Note also that "The obligation to provide a reliable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not on those seeking to remove it." Charlie 11:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I think part of the problem is that most of the information on this subway station is likely to be in French, not that there are no sources whatsoever. So as far as it goes, I don't consider the lack of sources to be an unsurmountable problem, so I'm not too immediately concerned about WP:V in this case. Mister.Manticore 15:17, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment If a lack of sources is not a problem, then please provide some. Charlie 23:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me, but I did not say that there were no problems getting sources, since I did clearly say that the problem would be that those sources are French, but I believe it's obviously not an unsurmountable problem. All it will take is finding someone who reads both French and English. Since I'm not one of them, I don't feel I'll try to do it myself. But that doesn't change the fact that there are likely to be sources. It is a subway station, they are hardly undocumented. I don't know why that's so hard to realize, and that instead of calling for deletion, you would be better off calling for sourcing. Then, for example, someone who owns [1] might be inclined to look it up, and report its contents for us. Since I don't own the book though, and the relevant section is protected, I can't cite it myself. Mister.Manticore 01:46, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

• Comment If anyone is interested, there is a draft guidline for places of local interest WP:LOCAL#Creating_articles_about_places_of_local_interest with a section that discussed article creation criteria. Please remember, this is a proposed guideline. Alan.ca 07:23, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Stations notable per WP:AFDP. Discussion of inherent station inslusion is at User:Mangoe/Wikipedia is not a timetable, but untill policy is set we'll go by precendent that all stations are included. --Oakshade 17:55, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Teeny little problem... WP:AFDP doesn't say that. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 17:58, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
    • WP:AFDP says "Subway and railway stations are allowed, but notability is currently under discussion." --Oakshade 18:01, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
      • And since notability is currently under discussion in WP:AFDP, it is not helpful to use it to assert that stations are "notable" .Charlie 23:17, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
        • I think they are inherently notable and so far WP:AFDP has agreed. Everyone might not agree and they are free and encouraged to be part of the discussion as Mangoe's page on this issue. --Oakshade 23:50, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
          • Ugh. An ongoing discussion on notability is not a reason to keep every article under the scope of the discussion. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 23:54, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep or Merge to an article such as "Paris Métro Stations" - but should definitely not be merged to Paris Métro, which would ruin the article, and see the individuality of each station being lost. Merging to a new article with other stations either by Line or by Arrondissement would be my preference, after keeping — superbfc [ talk | cont ] — 23:48, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

UPDATE: If stations are to be merged, then I suggest they should be aggregated to something like Paris Métro stations in 18e Arrondissement &c., except those stations which merit a full article entry. However, this is still, for me, a second best to keeping the articles as separate entities which is a much more intuitive format — superbfc [ talk | cont ] — 02:10, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

• Keep as per Eastmain -- Samir धर्म 23:55, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment We can argue about notability until we are blue in the face, and probably get nowhere. However, none of those above arguing for "keep" seem to take seriously the first, and probably stronger, claim of the nominator: that the article is completely unsourced, and so fails WP:V! Take, for example, this, from the article: "The station opened in 1912." Suppose someone came along, and edited this to read "The station opened in 1913." Not being knowlegable about the topic myself, I cannot honestly decide which is correct. And without any sources cited, on what grounds could one argue that it must be changed back to 1912? Additionally, it has been suggested that the problem is that the sources are in french, not that they do not exist. This is a fine point: but the article still needs to cite existant sources, and no one has provided any, in french or otherwise. I do not claim that it is impossible to find sources for the article, and so it must be deleted. I claim that it is against policy that the article remain on WP without sources, and so far, none are forthcoming. If this changes, so will my delete opinion. Charlie 00:22, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Actually, it easily passes Wikipedia:Verifiability. (I was puzzled that the nominator chose that is the crux of their argument to delete). The first sentence of WP:V states "Verifiable" in this context means that any reader should be able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source." The source currently cited is a map provided by the actual Chemin de Fer Métropolitain de Paris [2] (for the Paris Metro challenged, that's the government body that operates the Metro - I consider that a very reliable source on their own stations). There are many other sources that verify the station is part of the Paris Metro. Here's just one [3]. Googleimages has lots of photos of the place [4] --Oakshade 00:40, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
    • You misundestand me. I do not argue that it is not verifiable that the station exists, but merely that the information in the article (such as that it opened in 1912) is not verified in the article. Charlie 00:48, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
      • That's not really a reason to delete the article, but rather should spur an attempt to find sources with the caveat that unsourced material may be deleted from the text. Oakshade's argument on the relevance of verifiability is spot on. The salient criterion should be whether this metro station is notable. -- Samir धर्म 00:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Ugh. Look. If there aren't any reliable sources, there is no reason to believe they exist. And it is your responsibility to prove that they do, it is not ours to prove that they don't. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 00:55, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
          • Ugh? You're muddling the concepts of deletion here. The station is inherently verifiable from the fact that it is on the RATP map. Sure, delete any unsourced material from the article you want, but the bottom line is that the station is verifiable. This is essentially a notability discussion -- Samir धर्म 08:19, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
        • If you are determined to have this discussion center around the notability of the station, then so be it. The only arguments that have been presented for this stations notability are: 1) it is named after a notable person, 2) other subway stations have been determined notable, and 3) It is in a notable city. As I have argued above, none of these arguments successfully establishes the notability of the subject, and WP guidelines call for independent sources to verify notability. Charlie 01:01, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Here's yet another ref satisfying WP:V, this one showing it was built in 1912. [5]. Source is the MuséedesTransportsUrbains (Museum of Uban Transport). This has just been added to the article. --Oakshade 01:43, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Okay, I'm satisfied. We can go back to notability now. -Amarkov ^blah_edits 01:45, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per Eastmain. I don't have much to say here, but NYC Subway, London Underground, Singapore MRT, Hong Kong's MTR and KCR have all articles on individual stations. Why can't Paris Metro be the same. Terence Ong 06:33, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment It's not a question of whether Paris Metro can have individual station articles: It's a question of why this particular station must have its own article. Does Every station in NYC, for example, have a unique article? Charlie 07:17, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, yes, they do. See List of New York City Subway stations. I leave the question of the quality of any of the articles to another discussion. Mister.Manticore 16:42, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Well... wow. I stand corrected. Well, if it helps anything, I don't think most of the NYC stations are notable either... Charlie 19:16, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

On their own? Probably not. As an aspect of a larger system? Different story.Mister.Manticore 01:25, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more. I don't think they should each have their own article. Charlie 07:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I think you misunderstood me. While a given station may not be much, I do think that Wikipedia, in order to be complete, should have information on them, since we are clearly going to have information on the New York City subway system. While I might have chosen to present the information in a list for each subway line, it seems that some people have already done a fairly extensive job of presenting them with their own individual articles. Since I don't think these articles shouldn't have their own article, I do not disagree with this choice. It seems well-done and informative, and you'd actually have to work to convince me otherwise, not just assert it. If anything, I'd like these articles expanded, including things like VR pictures of each station. That would be very interesting. So really, I don't think you agree with me at all. Mister.Manticore 15:10, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• comment "to be complete, must have information on..." Certainly--absolutely right. But that does not translate as "needs an article on each". I'm not voting here as I disagree with the principle on which such articles were ever accepted. & on which this one need be judged. DGG 05:16, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

• Merge to Paris Métro Line 12 -- Selmo ^(talk) 04:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. It's sourced, the article seems as notable as an article on a musical album, and deleting it would ruin the completion in that section. Using the succession box, I just "rode" from terminus to terminus on Line 12 (more enjoyable than you'd think, but perhaps I'm terribly bored). Messing up that completion, especially considering that this is a good article in the hierarchy of the Paris Metro articles, is just silly. DamionOWA 08:11, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per DamionOWA and others. Singling out smaller stations for redirecting to main lines will only result in confusion as larger stations would have their own articles, and smaller stations would redirect back to the line article. Continually arguing over where to draw the line, or if a line should be drawn, is a waste of time for many reasons. Neier 23:57, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
• Keep - has sources, seems notable. Dont see why it should not be here. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 12:29, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

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 article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.