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.
A non notable bus route that is split over two articles (H19 is the reverse of H18). Wikipedia is not a directory, it is not a guide and it certainly isn't a mirror for the London Transport website. London Transport is notable, but that does not mean that every product/service they offer is. I can find no coverage of this service that is not trivial and certainly none that would meet the requirements of WP:NOTE. Nuttah (talk) 08:21, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep It seems hard to argue in favour of something so mundane but the deletion of something so obviously innocent makes me quite uncomfortable so here goes:
There are quite a few hobbyists who are deeply interested in transport minutiae. For example, I had a cousin who was obsessed by trams and a colleague who was a aircraft spotter. This demonstrates that there is a readership for this material, per WP:5. See bus spotter.
There is lots of material out there written for this hobby audience and so good sources are there to be found. For example, as a simple first cut, Google Books has 662 hits for London buses. Has the proposer checked any of these sources?
There may some national/class biases at work here. North Americans perhaps rate the automobile most highly and so US highways seem to be considered notable automatically. Buses are quite a respected institution in London and seem comparable as significant threads in the transport network. Note that London has an especially notable history, a larger population than most countries and that its red buses are one of its notable features.
The article is trying to be more than a directory entry by including the history of this route. In this, it compares well with the thousands of articles on asteroids which seem likely to be kept. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This search produces 21 results, which comprise of primary sources and copies of the Wikipedia article. There isn't any coverage by independent sources. Addhoc (talk) 12:57, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well if you consult some of the searches I've already directed you to, you'll see that a different search string gives a lot more hits than that - and that they include questions before the London Assembly, Arriva bus company webpages, Transport for London pages, and commuter group pages. That's primary sources from three/four different points of view. No, none of them are secondary - but give the people who actually care about bus routes a chance to work on this, and allow the rest of us to turn our attentions to more fruitful topics. --Paularblaster (talk) 20:10, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. I will never understand why Wikipedia contains "articles" about bus routes. High schools I understand. Asteroids, yes. A bus route? No. (jarbarf) (talk) 05:33, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The first of the five pillars specifies that wikipedia content is that of "general encyclopedias, specialized encyclopedias, and almanacs." Yes transport history is specialized (and of no particular interest to many of us, including me); but no, it isn't unnotable or unencyclopedic. And WP:NOT#DIRECTORY does not apply: none of the bus route articles (and I see them continually, not because I'm interested in bus routes but because over-eager deletionists keep bringing them to AfD) is anything like a "directory" listing or a timetable. In response to the lat remark above, beyond simple snobbery I can't think of any reason that individual bus routes should be any less suitable for inclusion than individual asteroids (another specialized minority interest). --Paularblaster (talk) 01:52, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The main difference between buses and asteroids is that I can find coverage of asteroids in independent reliable sources. If someone can provide that coverage for this bus route, and references to back up the information in the article, I'll willingly withdraw the nomination. Nuttah (talk) 08:52, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I can see how sources produced by asteroids might not be admissible, but I'd have thought that the information provided by the bus companies and Transport for London can be considered reliable, and the London Assembly, bus enthusiasts and commuter groups can be counted as independent - at least to the same extent that astronomers can when it comes to their (paid) pet interest. --Paularblaster (talk) 20:18, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Not because I feel that individual bus routes are any more important than asteroids, but for the simple practical reason that if there is not a single repository for information on a bus route, its timetable, operator and even the bus type, then the individual location articles where this (or that ...) bus calls will be inundated with repetitive detail. At the moment I can delete that and point the obsessive to the relevant bus article. I, for one, value the service the people who maintain these bus articles, provide. Kbthompson (talk) 16:47, 28 December 2007 (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 article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.