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: no consensus. There isn't a clear consensus to delete this portal, but there seems to be agreement among some voters that the longstanding (pre-NA1K-update) version of the portal was in very poor shape for many years, potentially serving inaccurate information to readers. Additionally, there is disagreement about whether the updates that were recently made to the portal's structure are beneficial or not, but MFD is not necessarily the place to hash out an argument about the structure of the portal. ‑Scottywong| [babble] || 03:58, 19 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
If a moving vehicle collides with another object, this is referred to as a "traffic collision," not a "traffic accident"
Boeing ended production of the C-17 Globemaster III in 2015. India is not listed as an operator although it possesses the second-largest fleet. Mark Schierbecker (talk) 08:19, 7 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and Revert to this updated version of the portal. Actually, the portal was updated and expanded in early October 2019. Unfortunately, this was reverted by another user in a series of rapid, drive-by edits that they performed to dozens of portals, all in one day (diff). It is difficult to update portals when the work is erased four days later. In the process of the updates that occurred, entries listed at Portal:Transport/Selected article were added directly to the portal using transclusions (diff), which keeps the content up-to-date, verbatim with what's on the article pages. This should theoretically correct the various errors listed above in the nomination, unless that main article pages have not been corrected.
Additional new FA-class and GA-class articles were also added that were not present before, in accordance with WP:POG, where it states, "For the Selected article, Selected biography or other Selected content items, find a good number of articles, as many as you can, that could be showcased on the portal" that are "of high quality, either a featured article, a good article or one which deals with its subject substantially or comprehensively". See the page's Revision history for more information. Articles were chosen using article lists generated by the Wikipedia Release Version Tools here and here, from results generated via talk page article assessments in project banners. The articles were first viewed and checked prior to being added; they were not just copied and pasted from the lists. Their overall suitability for the portal was also considered in this process. Additionally, other select articles rated as B-class were added, to round-out the portal to provide a more comprehensive overview of the overall topic. This occurred in accordance with the Article selection section of WP:POG, where it states that articles chosen that are not FA- or GA-class should deal with its subject "substantially or comprehensively". Furthermore, the portal receives decent page views and serves a functional purpose as a navigational option on Wikipedia for those that choose to use it. Below is a list of articles that were present prior to the reversion that occurred four days later.
Keep updated version. Northamerica1000 has made similar changes to many portals, which were bulk-reverted with Twinkle and are now starting the tedious third phase of the BRD process. See Portal talk:Australia, where all but one editor have reached a consensus to reinstate a similar revamp. The changes which were reverted address the criticisms above about unmaintained pages with errors, by replacing outdated forks with transcluded excerpts which remain current. Certes (talk) 12:13, 7 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep a version of this portal. No opinion on current/suggested revisions. It's a broad scale and at least has editors interested, and has an equivalent project. Kingsif (talk) 13:10, 7 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Portal:Transport, as noted by User:Mark Schierbecker, has only three selected articles in its current state. However, this is a puzzling case, because it appears that there is an effort to improve and expand the portal by User:Northamerica1000 which has been reverted by User:BrownHairedGirl. BHG complains of a sneaky addition of articles, but if the portal was seriously deficient in articles, the addition of articles, even if the wrong articles, seems like an improvement. I would like an explanation from User:BrownHairedGirl of what she wants done with this portal. It doesn't seem reasonable to argue against improving a portal while also arguing that a portal should be deleted because it has been in need of improvement for years.
This portal had 41 daily pageviews in the first half of 2019, as contrasted with 1569 for the head article Transport (but readers mostly read about specific types of transport anyway).
I don't understand why BHG is opposing what appears to be an improvement of the portal. It would have been even better if the improvements had been discussed, but undiscussed improvements to a portal are still improvements.
I certainly don't think that the old version of the portal should be the basis for a deletion discussion.
I think that it might be in order to close this deletion discussion procedurally and wait until the discussion of improvements to the portal is resolved.
NA1K has restructured dozens of portals into a format which displays no visible, linked list of the articles on rotation … and has sneakily added dozens of new articles to these portals with no visible list anywhere of the articles which have been added, without even a namecheck in the edit summary, let alone a link. None of the changes which I reverted here (or any of the rest of NA1K's sneaky takeovers) linked to any discussion anywhere. I no see consensus anywhere that it is appropriate for one editor to wander around portal space, sneakily adding dozens of sneaky articles to many dozens of portals with no evident attempt at discussion or even at leaving informative edit summaries, let alone explaining the criteria for their choices. Portal-space is not one editor's private list-making playground.
NA1K has posted here the list of topics which they had added. The fact that this has been done only now serves to reinforce my point that there is no visible list on NA1K's version of the portal, because the manner in which NA1K chose to restructure the portal omits any list of the topics. Other models are available which avoids content forks but do display a list, e.g. Portal:Wind power. NA1K chose the sneaky format — and AFAICS did so with no prior discussion anywhere, and without even any subsequent explanation anywhere of why they chose the hidden list format.
I reverted NA1K's edits in part because there is no visible list, and hence no scrutiny without disproportionate effort. The history of the article and its talk page shows that NA1K made no effort to explain their actions until the reverts were being discussed at ANI: NA1K's last "update" was on 8 Oct; I reverted on 12 Oct, ANI discussion opened the same day; NA1K posted[1] on 13 Oct a few notes which did not include any list of the articles). Note that only now that this portal is being discussed at MFD that NA1K posted a linked list[2] of the articles (using the sneakily uninformative edit summary +New comment).
Now that I have actually examined the list posted above I find that it is much worse than I had feared. 64 articles are listed above by NA1K. Of those, 19 are generic topics, without particular ties to one country. A majority of of the remainder (i.e 24 out of 45) specifically relate directly to the United States. That is a massive imbalance which indicates at best a flagrant disregard for NPOV and the avoidance of systemic bias. I hope that NA1K will urgently explain in detail why they considered it appropriate to create this grotesque imbalance (which was not visible anywhere on the face of the portal).
Portals have rotted because most of the WikiProjects which ever had interest in their portal have long since lost interest in it, so there is no longer any pool of editors scrutinising and maintaining the portal. There should be a centralised discussion about where this leaves portals, and how any remaining portals are to be maintained ... but rather than discuss the consequences of WikiProject disengagement, NA1K's preferred "remedy" has been to appoint themself with neither discussion nor disclosure to do a sneaky, stealthy, single-handed takeover of these portals, on a huge and diverse range of topics in which NA1K has no demonstrable experience or expertise. In this case there is a WP:WikiProject Transport, but NA1K made no attempt to consult or even notify the project about NA1K's takeover of the portal. Even now, NA1K has made no attempt to explain why they made this perverse selection.
I tried to assume that NA1K acted in good faith, but the evidence here points overwhelmingly to an attempt to create a WP:FAITACCOMPLI. However, also I have to note that if NA1K had a conscious goal to impose their own worldview on the portal with minimal risk of detection, then the course of action which they took in this case would have been ideal: ensure that there is no visible list, make no notification on the talk page, make no notification of the WikiPeoject, and a use series of edit summaries neither list nor link to any one of the articles added.
I have I have already written at length elsewhere about the issues raised by NA1K's unilateral, sneaky restructurings of many dozens of portals. NA1K and Certes are well aware of those explanations, but have chosen to post here as if those explanations did not exist. Their omission of any mention of that is sadly typical of the systematic misrepresentations and deceptive half-truths which they repeatedly post in discussions related to portals.
NA1K justifies their actions as being in accordance with WP:POG. Yet NA1K was one of the vocal advocates for the delisting of those guidelines, which are now tagged as a failed proposal. In other discussions, NA1K has repeatedly noted this deprecation of POG, so there is no room at all to AGF that NA1K was unaware of this. There can therefore be doubt whatsoever that either a) NA1K is so spectacularly incompetent that they see no contradiction in relying on a guideline which they themself led the deprecation of; or b) NA1K's choice to rely on POG without noting its status is a mendacious attempt to deceive and mislead the discussion into believing that NA1k had acted in accordance with a community consensus.
I have repeatedly asked elsewhere for NA1K to work with me to draft RFCs on how to structure and populate portals. They have repeatedly refused to do so. In particular, I note Certes's comment above that we are now starting the tedious third phase of the BRD process. Consensus-building is a core policy of Wikipedia, and if Certes regards that process as tedious then they should reconsider their participation in a project based on consensus decision-making. If they do accept consensus as a core policy, then we should start those RFCs.
In summary, what we have here is a portal which:
A/ was long-abandoned in a terrible state
B/ a leading member of the portals project set out to completely rebuild with no prior notification of the portals project, the topic-specific WikiProject, or any other location that I have found. This was unilateral, solo takeover.
C/ was rebuilt sneakily, with no disclosure until challenged of what was done and why
D/ rebuilt in a stealthy form which impedes scrutiny of the articles within its scope (the lack of a plainly visible linked list makes it much much harder to examine the list)
E/ was hijacked to become massively imbalanced towards one country. I cannot know whether this hijack was by due to intentional bias or to incompetence, but the resulting lack of balance is outrageous.
and
F/ a hijacker who even a month later is wholly unrepentant about any part of their actions
G/ a hijacker who remains in stubborn denial of all the evidenced criticisms of their hijack
H/ a hijacker who vocally objects to holding RFCs to resolve the systemic issued raised by their hijacking, complete with a cheerleader
I/ 4 editors who posted here after the unbalanced list of articles was belatedly published, none of whom spotted the massive unbalance which NA1K had created.
Houston, we have a problem. And it's a systemic problem: under-scrutinised portals, with little or no WikiProject involvement, which have been rotting for years ... and are now being stealthily subject to exceptionally poor quality "improvements" while being hijacked to create severe regional bias.
There is a broad decision of principle to be made here. Do we:
i/ endorse this landgrab by NA1K's one-person Portal-Rescue-Squadron, and accept this practise of sneakily adding dozens of POV-selected articles to a list which NA1K has hidden from the face of the portal?, or
ii/ delete the portals whose WikiProjects have abandoned them?, or
iii/ devise some broad criteria for selecting articles, and some methodology for ensuring that changes to these lists are properly scrutinised?
Keep updated copy, especially considering the updated version should be sufficiently improved for the nominator. The wall of text above this comment is not appreciated, nor accusations of 'sneaking around'. What we do here on Wikipedia is edit and improve pages. Whether it's single edits to individual articles or overhauls of one, it doesn't matter, nor is consensus needed for such a mundane improvement. ɱ(talk) 16:09, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Ɱ: it seems that you are entirely unconcerned about the fact NA1K's sneakily-implemented version creates a massive bias towards towards the United States (24 out of 45 articles with ties to a particular country specifically relate directly to the United States). I don't want to put words in your mouth, so please can you clarify whether you find that acceptable? --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 18:09, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't identify that trend before. I think that so long as there's sufficient quality content, you are correct that selected articles should be more broad than just the United States. I'm not sure if there's a rule to back up this point, but regardless, they had constructive edits. If you'd like to swap many of them out with more global examples, please do so. Content removal is less helpful. ɱ(talk) 18:15, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Ɱ: I explained it above, before you posted your !vote.
Note that I reverted NA1K's edit before I was aware of this, because NA1K sneaky additions and conversion of the portal to a black box had made scrutiny unnecessarily difficult. Now that the portal has been scrutinised, it is clear that what NA1K actually did was as I feared: they created a massive biased selection, not just in geographical distribution, but also chronologically (almost nothing on the pre-industrial history of transport) and between modes of transport (there's almost nothing on non-mechanical transport, sea transport, or aviation). And all of this was hidden from scrutiny because of NA1K's choices: using a "black box" model of portal, not linking or even naming additions in edit summaries, and not making any visible list until MFD.
I didn't read every point in your wall of text, but faults in Wikipedia's global quality aren't an issue here. As Northamerica said, most GAs and FAs are related to the US/UK/Western world. Perhaps consider translating articles from other-language Wikipedias, or writing new articles on global subjects. ɱ(talk) 21:46, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
You are also still welcome to edit NA1K's list to include more pre-Industrial Revolution topics and other modes of transit. ɱ(talk) 21:48, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Ɱ: if you choose to not even speed-read a numbered list of points, that is your choice. But a lot of issues have been raised by NA1K's repeated FUD tactics, so don't complain that they are addressed, and don't complain that your choice not to read it led you to miss a crucial point. In any case, it seems that you didn't even scrutinise NA1K's list of articles before you pronounced it an improvement: even at a cursory glance, it shouts "USA USA".
Your first point is a straw man. Faults in Wikipedia's global quality do not mean that a portal will inevitably be biased, unless the pool of available content is too small ... in which case the portal should be deleted.
WP:NPOV is not just policy, it is one of the Five pillars Wikipedia; but there is not even a guideline, let alone a policy requiring the existence of a portal on any topic. As a result, if you can't or won't make an NPOV portal, policy requires that you don't make a POV portal.
For the reasons below, the decision to create a list which focuses more on NA1K's own country of residence was a choice made by NA1K.
You write most GAs and FAs are related to the US/UK/Western world, but NA1K made a choice which is over 50% US. There are many ways in what could have been avoided. These include, but are not limited to:
Making a shorter list, by omitting some of the articles on over-represented topics. Most portals have an article list much shorter than 64 articles, but NA1K chose to prioritise their personal preference for a high number over the core policy on NPOV.
Using articles which are not assessed as GA or FA. NA1K's post of 13 October[3] says only that New content was added, including Featured-class and Good-class articles. It does not say that the list was restricted to GA/FA class. (I am personally unconvinced that lower quality articles are appropriate, but since NA1K chose not to exclude B and C class, they had a much wider pool available).
Using transport-related articles which have been assessed by other projects. The topic of transport includes air transport and sea transport, but the list created by NA1K massively under-represents those topics. For example, taking only FA and GA class, there is Category:FA-Class aviation articles+subcats (138 articles), Category:GA-Class aviation articles+subcats (438 articles), Category:FA-Class Ships articles (264 pages) and Category:GA-Class Ships articles (1,517 articles), Category:FA-Class London Transport articles (33 articles), Category:GA-Class London Transport articles (104 articles). Sure, many of the ships and aviation articles are military, but there are literally hundreds of non-military topics there. And even that lot is only the tip of the iceberg: Category:WikiProject Transport shows a total of 23 transport Wikiprojects, all with their own assessment categories. So any suggestion that NA1K had only a small pool of articles to work with is just another of the falsehoods routinely repeated by NA1K and other portal fans.
Note that in this discussion, as in all similar discussions, NA1K has repeatedly failed to respond to requests to disclose clearly how exactly they selected the article for their list. So I cannot sustain any assumption that this hideously unbalanced list is the work of a competent editor trying to uphold policy. It's the result of either blatant incompetence or wilful POV-pushing, or some combination of both. And it has been hidden by NA1K's sneaky editing practices.
And a result of inadequate scrutiny by other editors of NA1K's poor quality contributions, several editors have rushed to this page to endorse NA1K's flagrant breach of one of Wikipedia's Five pillars. Mark Schierbecker even restored the POV version while discussion is underway. This is almighty mess: an admin has sneakily and avoidably built a massively POV portal, has responded to queries with evasion, deception and denial ... and may get away with their campaign of deceit unless other editors start to recognise that NPOV is core policy.⋅--BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 23:19, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Extended discussion
Comment I agree that the reverts are bewildering. Accordingly, I've reverted to NA1000's edit. Mark Schierbecker (talk) 16:18, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I have undone that, and restored the status quo ante while the discussion is underway. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 18:04, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
User:BrownHairedGirl - I note that User:Mark Schierbecker who is the nominator, and a critic of portals, finds the reversion of the edits by User:Northamerica1000 bewildering. Do you think that the portal was good before the changes? If so, do you want it kept in its previous state? If you don't think that a version of the portal should be kept, why is it worth edit-warring over which version to use? Robert McClenon (talk) 05:10, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Robert McClenon I restored the status quo ante, so that discussion should continue on the portal as nominated. The MFD discussion becomes confusing and disjointed if the current and reverted versions swap places.
Note that my objections to NA1K's edits are not based on the previous state of the portal. They were based initially based on the portals' sneaky conversion to a black box format which is v difficult to scrutinise.
My subsequent examination of the belatedly-revealed linked list (published a month after my initial revert) showed that it is a hideously POV creation. Its creator offers no remotely credible explanation for this breach on NPOV. Regardless of how dire the previous version was, NPOV is policy.
Despite all that, I did not reach a firm view for deletion until a few hours ago, which was well after my last revert. And even now, while the portal is being discussed at MFD, the POV version should not stand. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 05:31, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment – The WP:HOUNDING, badgering and personal attacks from BHG needs to stop.
The additions to the portal were not "sneaky" as BHG incorrectly assumes, as though if I was trying to deviantly hide them or some nonsense such as this. It is inappropriate for BHG to make personal attacks against my character such as this. They are wrong, and it is wrong.
I left a clear message on the Portal talk:Transport page on 13 October 2019 (UTC) (diff) summarizing the changes that occurred. At that talk page notice, note where I posted:
– " The articles added can be readily viewed in this version of the portal, and then selecting the Edit link (here). Then scroll down."
This is not "sneaky". It is transparent. BHG chose not to discuss matters on the portal talk page after reverting the improvements. This was their choice, not mine.
As I stated above, articles were added in accordance with WP:POG, where it states, "For the Selected article, Selected biography or other Selected content items, find a good number of articles, as many as you can, that could be showcased on the portal" that are "of high quality, either a featured article, a good article or one which deals with its subject substantially or comprehensively".
NA1k, POG was never a guideline at all. Moreover, that fact was established since over two weeks before your "changes" to the portal. And while maybe BHG calling your changes "sneaky" probably wasn't the best choice of words, her point that you never even bothered to seek community consensus for those changes still stands nonetheless. Might as well start an RfC for that reason. ToThAc (talk) 21:28, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
These aren't factors for deletion, and community consensus is not necessary for simply improving articles or portals. It would only be now that some people have disputed the changes. ɱ(talk) 21:46, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
NA1K's changes were notsimply improving the portal. NA1K sneakily restructured it in a way which impedes scrutiny, and sneakily created a biased list which amounts to a flagrant breach of WP:NPOV ... and NA1K did similar changes to dozens of portals without ever disclosing their plan or notifying the relevant WikiProjects. This was an attempt to create a WP:FAITACCOMPLI, as evidenced by NA1K's subsequent verbose expressions of outrage about the reversions and their persistent refusal of all requests to open RFCs to seek consensus. This has none of the characteristics of competent, good faith editing, or even of WP:RECKLESS editing. It's classic WP:FAITACCOMPLI. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 00:49, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to NA1K NA1K's reprehensible conduct of sneaky takeovers, biased selections, list hiding, and false accusations of houndings and personal attacks all need to stop. NA1K is using classic FUD tactics to deflect editors from scrutinising the very poor quality of their work and the sneaky way in which it has been done.
I have not made attacks against NA1K's character. I have criticised their conduct, and questioned their competence in the tasks which they have set out to perform. I will continue to do so far as long as those problems persist.
I note that NA1K continues to repeat a bunch of demonstrable falsehoods:
NA1K says "This is not "sneaky"". Yes it is, in multiple ways. NA1K converted the portal to a format which does not display a list, and added dozens of articles in multiple edits without listing any of them in edit summaries. After NA1K's edits, there was no visible indication anywhere of what new content had been added.
As noted above, the note which NA1K left on the talk page was after my revert on 8th October. NA1K chose not to notify me in any way of the existence of this message, but has the brazen hypocrisy to criticise me for chose not to discuss matters on the portal talk page. NA1K has chosen to criticise me for not participating in a discussion which they chose not to notify me of, even though you NA1K opened the discussion in response to their revert. That is a form of entrapment, and such vile conduct has no place on Wikipedia.
NA1K's message on the talk page did not include either a linked list of the articles chosen (to facilitate scrutiny), nor any explanation of how they were chosen apart from the absurdly vague statement content was added, including Featured-class and Good-class articles. It added precisely nothing to the ability of other editors to evaluate the changes which NA1K had made. (NA1K's posting of a link list once this discussion opened is a tactic and belated acknowledgement of the deficiency).
NA1K makes no attempt to explain, let alone justify, why they chose to create a list of topics which is massively-biased towards the country in which they claim to live (User:Northamerica1000 says "this user lives in the United States of America"). I had hoped for an explanation which might allow for AGFing that the extreme bias which they introduced was a by-product of using some other criterion without adequately assessing its consequences ... but NA1K's choice not to offer any such explanation tilts the evidence towards a conclusion that it was conscious POV-pushing.
NA1K again cites WP:POG in their support. However, POG is not a guideline; it is a failed proposal. It was delisted per an RFC this year, in which NA1K themself made a long post supporting its delisting. Yet now, for the second time in this discussion, NA1K has cited POG as if it still had community support, and omits to mention that it is a failed proposal, even tho that had been pointed out to NA1K above. This degree of deception is extraordinarily bad conduct. In 13 years as an admin, I have never before seen any editor, let alone an admin, cite in their support a page which was deprecated on their own insistence that it never received actual formal discussion to be enacted as a real English Wikipedia guideline page. I could never have imagined a situation where an actual admin would repeat that deception in a discussion where the error had already been noted in the post to which they were replying. We are now well past the point this sort of deception could be excused as a good faith oversight by a competent editor. This sort of extreme misrepresentation of facts seems to me to be explicable only as either: a) NA1K exercising extreme mendacity, or b) NA1K having very low comprehension skills. It is not for me to judge what combination of the two applies in this case, but I can see no basis on which consensus-formation can work in the company of a verbose editor so detached from reality. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 21:50, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That's odd: POG was good enough for 900 MfDs which used it as a deletion rationale this year. But we get your message loud and clear: editors who disagree with you are liars and idiots. Exemption from our usual responses to personal attacks is not a licence to repeat them in every possible forum. Certes (talk) 22:31, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to Cetes's smear. There is nothing at all odd about it, @Certes.
When POG was tagged as a guideline, I cited it as a guideline, even tho there were parts of it with which I disagreed. And unlike NA1K, I didn't cherrypick it by selectively omitting the parts of a sentence which were inconvenient to my case. (That was a deception tactic which NA1K deployed repeatedly). And when it was delisted as a guideline, I stopped citing it as a guideline. What on earth is your problem with that? Are you just trying to smear me for following established guidelines? Or do you object that I have more integrity than to follow NA1K's deceitful practice of selective quotation?
By contrast, NA1K proactively sought to delist POG as a guideline, and succeeded. But having done so, they continue to cite it in support of their actions, and do so even in reply to a post which noted that it is now just a failed proposal. That's a whole different kettle of fish.
I stand by my observation that this repeated use by NA1K of a failed proposal which NA1K opposed is either spectacularly dishonest and deceitful conduct, or the product of deep incompetence. And for the avoidance of doubt, I regard your endorsement of this conduct in the same way: as either deeply deceitful or deeply incompetent.
And no, I do not believe or claim that all editors who disagree with [me] are liars and idiots. Most disagreements are reasonable, or are good faith errors. However, on the rare occasions where I see repeated conduct which ignores corrections and which unambiguously amounts to ether deceit or incompetence, then I will note that.
The only place on en.wp where I have ever seen this conduct sustained is by portal fans, where it is usually endorsed by other fans, as you have chosen to do here. Shame on you for your endorsement of the shabby conduct, and shame on you for your vile attempt to smear me in the process.
But hey, it's all more FUD to distract from the fact that NA1K tried to sneakily convert Portal:Transport into a massively POV portal. I note with interest your complete silence on that policy breach, and your explicit endorsement of the POV version even after NA1K had posted the POV list which they had created. Instead, you join in NA1K's FUD campaign, by complaining that you don't like the way the game has been rumbled. This is all just a continuation of the battleground stance which you adopted back at the start of the year, when you denounced the deletion of TTH's portalspam as war on portals. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 23:59, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, without prejudice to re-creation in some circumstances. No good version; no willing and competent maintainers; abandoned by WikiProject.
Whatever the potential merits of a portal on this topic, we have no version worth keeping. Neither the abandoned version as nominated or the "black box" sneaky version by NA1K are worthy of retention. The abandoned version has only 3 selected articles, all content-forked and full of errors. As outlined in my other comments on this page, NA1K's "black box" version is a massive breach of WP:NPOV.
There is repeated evidence on this page and related pages that NA1K's edits in respect to this portal have been done with some severe combination of bad faith and/or incompetence. NA1K has:
restructured the portal in a way which leaves no visible linked list of the portal's current contents, which impedes scrutiny by readers and editors. (A month after their last edit, they created a linked list for this MFD; but it is a static list which will not self-update to reflect future changes to the portal, so the problem has not been solved.)
Made a large list without clearly stated inclusion criteria, which is a breach of WP:NOTINDISCRIMINATE ("To provide encyclopedic value, data should be put in context with explanations referenced to independent sources").
Made a large list which is massively biased towards their own stated country of residence (the USA), towards land-based transport, and towards recent topics.
Twice cited as their basis a guideline which was delisted with NA1K's verbose support, and is now tagged as a failed proposal. (Note that: a) it was de-listed on 26 Sept, i.e. 12 days before NA1K began their edits to this portal on 8 Oct, and 42 days before NA1K cited it here; b) NA1k themslf edited WP:POG on 27 September 2019 to note[4] that "there is clear consensus that the "Portal guidelines" are not, in fact, official guidelines."). YCMTSU.
Whatever the precise reasons for NA1K's bizarre and disruptive conduct, the history of NA1K's conduct in regard to this portal alone (never mind their similar antics elsewhere) means that there is no way that they can be regarded as having anywhere near the competence and good faith required to maintain what the information page WP:PORTAL describes as enhanced "Main Pages" for specific broad subjects. Given NA1K's long involvement with portals, there is no reason to believe that these are problems early on a learning curve, and hence likely to improve. On the contrary, they come after many years of NA1K's involvement with the portals.
Nor is there any other set of editors willing and able to sustain the portal while seeking consensus for their actions. There is no sign of any recent maintenance, and no maintainers have come forward at MFD. Also, Portal talk:Transport has had no discussion (i.e. one human replying to another) since 2013. Posts made there in 2016 and 2017 got no response.
I note that Transport is a Level-2 vital article, i.e. one of the top 100 most important topics. There has never been any consensus that the imperfect VA lists are a good basis for choosing portals topics, but I agree with those who say that they should be a factor in that choice, and I hope we can agree that transport is a broad and important topic. So if we have portals, transport would in theory be a good one to have.
However, in practice, we have no good version to use, no credible maintainers to build it, and and no active, engaged WikiProject to sustain and scrutinse it. So I propose that it should be deleted, without prejudice to recreation if and when a) there is a consensus at the WikiProject to maintain it, and b) there are community-endorsed guidelines on how portals should be structured and populated. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 04:42, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Procedural Close due to confusion and edit-warring over what version of the portal should exist, so that we don't know what we are considering the deletion of, without prejudice to a renomination. Once it is decided what the portal should be if it exists, then we can discuss whether to keep or delete it. Robert McClenon (talk) 05:10, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is actually clear enough, @Robert McClenon. There is:
So there are three choices to make: keep the rot, keep the sneaky POV, or delete. Plenty of XFDs consider multiple options, and I don't see why this one can't do so. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 05:38, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Robert McClenon: Agreed, there is no need for a procedural close at this point in time. ToThAc (talk) 05:46, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete because User:BrownHairedGirl and User:ToThAc have made the case that the "new" version of the portal is not a significant improvement over the existing version.
I had already concluded based on previous examination that the existing version should not be kept. Neither should the "new" version.
It appears that User:Northamerica1000 has some mystical belief in or about portals, because they have not been able to explain in several months why they find it so important to engage in frantic modifications and changes to portals in order to prevent their deletion. I prefer the two-thousand-year-old once-a-week mystical tradition. Robert McClenon (talk) 07:03, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per the thorough and highly detailed investigation of the portal by @BrownHairedGirl. This Bonsai portal has been abandoned for over a decade, save a spat of highly dubious and destructive edits by NA1K last month. One off maintenance, let alone the secretive and highly POV edits NA1K made, mean nothing. Portals need ongoing maintenance from a dedicated team of topic knowledgeable editors and WikiProject support to be beneficial for readers, none of which has happed with this portal. That no competent editor in 14 years has cared to flesh out this portal beyond an abysmal three articles speaks volumes about this portal's lack of worth. Its been rationally abandoned by readers and maintainers alike, while the head article Transport, and its set of rich and versatile navboxes do a fine job helping readers explore this topic. I oppose re-creation unless there is a team of dedicated, topic knowledgeable editors with a maintenance plan behind the effort, and WikiProject involvement. Newshunter12 (talk) 07:40, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Extended discussion
Comment – I've already posted much about this above, but I'm inclined to comment about Newshunter12's !vote directly above a bit.
The edits were not "dubious". Articles were chosen in accordance with WP:POG recommendations. See my commentary above for more information. Systemic bias on Wikipedia in which western topics sometimes receive more editing and article creation is just that, systemic, all across Wikipedia. POG states to use high-quality articles, so high-quality articles were used, such as FA-class and GA-class articles generated by the Wikipedia Release Version Tools here and here. Articles were also viewed to assess their suitability relative to POG; they were not just copied and pasted from the lists.
There was absolutely no POV involved, and I take umbrage at its insinuation that has been occurring. I simply updated the page in accordance with POG's recommendations. Some of the commentary herein reads as though if I chose which articles to add based upon my geographic location, intentionally focusing on U.S. topics. This is incorrect. Articles were chosen as per the bullet point directly above in this comment, period. It's not my fault that English Wikipedia editors sometimes favor western topics and that more recognized content about them is created compared to other geographic areas in the world. It's not my intention for systemic bias to exist on Wikipedia vis-à-vis western topics, but it does.
Perhaps a discussion should occur on the POG talk page to address this matter, whereby the POG page could be updated to reflect these types of systemic bias concerns. That would be a functional step. While POG is not a guideline page anymore, people will still rely upon it for advisement.
Prior to my edits, the portal shuffled through three whole articles, that's it. "About 20 articles" is recommended at the POG page. When I finished my work on it, 64 articles were present. This is not "destructive" as stated above, it is constructive.
Edit summaries were left describing the additions I performed. This is not "secretive" or "sneaky", it is transparent. The fact that the ((Transclude random excerpt)) template does not generate a list of articles does not therefore make the edits "secretive", as though if I was trying to "hide" them. Furthermore, all one has to do is select the Edit link to view the articles. See the diffs and edit summaries below for examples of this transparency.
Diff – "Maintenance: Overhauled portal with modernized wiki markup using transclusion from articles to display content, which provides readers with current, up-to-date information. Used selections moved here from Portal:Transport/Selected article. Also added: London Underground."
Diff – "Maintenance: Portal updated/further expanded with new selections - Added more FA-class articles"
Diff – "Maintenance: Portal updated/further expanded with new selections - Added GA-class articles. Also added some other selections to round-out the portal"
Perhaps discussion should occur at the POG talk page about including a list of articles within portals, for those that utilize the Transclude random excerpt and other similar templates. It would be a shame for other editors who use these templates to later be assumptively and unfairly accused of being "secretive" or "sneaky" as has occurred herein. It is quite inappropriate, and the badmouthing really needs to stop.
Wow. NA1K is really doubling down on their strategy of deception and misrepresentation:
NA1K is wholly unrepentant about continuing to relay for guidance on a former guideline WP:POG which was delisted with their support; and now seeks discussions to "update" a page whose status is solely a "failed proposal". This is one of the worst case I have seen of trying to gaming the system. NA1K could have sought changes to POG if they thought it just needed updating, and in fact the talk page of POG shows that several editors tried to do that. Those changes were all rejected, so NA1K changed tack to support POG's delisting in whole ... and having achieved that, NA1K is now cherrypicking the parts of POG that they like, and using them as if they were still a guideline. Note that on 27 Sept 2019, at MFD:Portal:Monaco, NA1K actually posted a specific "note to closer"[5] which says in full The WP:POG page has been downgraded to an information page (diff). Per WP:POG2019RFC, it was determined that "there is clear consensus that the "Portal guidelines" are not, in fact, official guidelines.". So there can be no room for any doubt that NA1K actively deprecates POG when it suits their purposes, but relies on it when another part suits their other purposes. This amounts to playing games with the consensus-building system, and calculatedly manipulating other editors. Such blatantly deceitful, dishonest and manipulative conduct is wholly incompatible with NA1K's status as an admin.
NA1K fails to acknowledge that the result of their actions was to create a massively POV list, and merely notes that that systemic imbalance exists. NA1K justifies any imbalance in the list that they created in two ways: a) that it was following POG; b) that it reflects imbalance in the set of FA/GA articles. Both those points are not just false, but actively deceitful: a) POG is no longer a guideline, because NA1K asked that it be no longer a guideline, so they are under no obligation to follow it; b) even it was followed, the resulting imbalance was solely a product of choices made by NA1K. As I noted above in reply to User:Ɱ, WP:NPOV is a core policy, one of the Five pillars of Wikipedia. Even if POG was a guideline, rather than just a failed proposal, then per WP:LOCALCON it cannot override a core policy. As noted above, even if NA1K did follow the flawed approach which they claim to have taken, there are many ways in which the imbalance could have been avoided if NA1K had sought to uphold NPOV. These other ways include, but are not limited to:
Making a shorter list, by omitting some of the articles on over-represented topics. Most portals have an article list much shorter than 64 articles, but NA1K chose to prioritise their personal preference for a high number over the core policy WP:NPOV.
Using articles which are not assessed as GA or FA. NA1K's post of 13 October[6] says only that New content was added, including Featured-class and Good-class articles. It does not say that the list was restricted to GA/FA class. (I am personally unconvinced that lower quality articles are appropriate, but since NA1K chose not exclude B and C class, they had a much wider pool available). The NA1K post to which I am replying again confirms that NA1K did not restrict themselves to recognised content of the Transport WikiProject: high-quality articles were used, such as FA-class and GA-class articles.
Using transport-related articles which have been assessed by other projects. The topic of transport includes air transport and sea transport, but the list created by NA1K massively under-represents those topics. For example, taking only FA and GA class, there is Category:FA-Class aviation articles+subcats (138 articles), Category:GA-Class aviation articles+subcats (438 articles), Category:FA-Class Ships articles (264 pages) and Category:GA-Class Ships articles (1,517 articles), Category:FA-Class London Transport articles (33 articles), Category:GA-Class London Transport articles (104 articles). Sure, many of the ships and aviation articles are military, but there are literally hundreds of non-military topics there. And even that lot is only the tip of the iceberg: Category:WikiProject Transport shows a total of 23 transport Wikiprojects, all with their own assessment categories. So any claim that NA1K had only a small pool of articles to work with is just another of the falsehoods routinely repeated by portal fans.
NA1K writes Perhaps discussion should occur at the POG talk page about including a list of articles within portals, for those that utilize the Transclude random excerpt and other similar templates. I agree that such discussion should occur, but
it should be a properly-advertised RFC, not a discussion on the talk page of a failed proposal. And note that elsewhere, NA1K has chosen to repeatedly ignore my pinged request to collaborate on making that RFC.
such discussion should have taken place before NA1K tried to create a WP:FAITACCOMPLI by sneakily removing the visible list from dozens of portals. It should now take place before any restoration of the "black box" format which
NA1K denies that they acted sneakily, and writes Edit summaries were left describing the additions I performed. (Note yet again NA1K's weird use of a passive voice to distance NA1K from responsibility for their own edits). However, as NA1K is well aware, (because it has been pointed out to them many times)
Nowhere in any of those edit summaries did NA1K note that they were removing from the portal any visible, linked list of the articles
None of the edits listed the articles added.
Having converted the portal to a format with no visible list of the articles, NA1K added such a list only a month later
NA1K writes badmouthing really needs to stop}. My reply is simple: my criticisms of NA1K will stop when their bad conduct stops. So long as NA1K continues to behave badly, then I will continue to note that fact. I will not be deterred from noting problems such as: NA1K editing sneakily on a huge scale; NA1K restructuring portals in a way which impedes scrutiny; NA1K creating a massively POV portals; NA1K using as guidance a page which they have successfully sought to delist as a guideline; NA1K calling for discussion on a point where they have repeatedly declined my requests to collaborate on an RFC; NA1K using entrapment techniques such as criticising me for not responding to a post they made in response to my revert but which they chose not to notify me of.
If and when NA1K cleans up their act and starts acting with integrity and honesty and transparency, I will stop criticising their conduct. Meanwhile, I repeat my observation that NA1K's conduct in relation to this portal is not that of a good faith, competent editor. Your call, NA1K. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 22:02, 9 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment – In union with the commentary of Ɱ above, if the portal is retained, some functional Alternatives to deletion include:
Discuss matters presented in this discussion about current articles used in the portal on its talk page, and edit the portal accordingly per what may transpire in said discussion(s). Naturally, concerns presented above in this discussion should be included there.
Expand the portal with more entries to balance it out, increasing its diversity of topical coverage to present more various styles and types of transportation, across a more diverse range of countries, states and regions.
Discuss issues regarding the portal's scope on its talk page.
The portal receives an decent amount of views, is wanted and used by WP:READERS, and the topic's overall scope is broad. Per the Transport articles by quality statistics page, there are presently 275 B-class articles available. While WP:POG is now a failed proposal, it is still utilized as a schema for advisement about portals and in MfD discussions, as per WP:COMMONSENSE, and WP:POG allows for non-recognized articles (those that are not FA/GA-class) to be used in portals. To determine potential usability in the portal, these B-class articles can be perused, nominated and discussed on the portal's talk page. As article assessment is sometimes outdated or inaccurate, additional articles can also be considered, such as the 776 C-class articles that exist. Some of these articles have outdated assessments, whereby they are rated lower than their actual improved state, because reassessment has not occurred.
NA1K is either an idiot or a liar or both. This is supposed to be a consensus-forming discussion. But consensus-formation is not possible when an admin such as NA1K abuses their position by repeatedly engaging in foolish, mendacious word games as an attempt to decieve and disrupt.
NA1K continues to base their arguments and proposals on POG, which was delisted as a guideline at NA1K's request and hence does not have consensus support.
The precise words used by NA1K are worth scrutinising: While WP:POG is now a failed proposal, it is still utilized as a schema for advisement.
Look at that phrase schema for advisement. Apart of the absurdist grandiloquence of NA1K's attempt to sound like a cheap parody of a Dickensian lawyer, that phrase schema for advisement amounts to an almost exact synonym of the word "guideline".
So if we translate NA1K's grandiose verbiage back into plain English, what NA1K is saying can be simplified without any change in meaning as "While POG is not a guideline, it is a guideline". That oxymoron is just a fancy form of lying.
I really don't know what the point is of this sort of this sort of NA1K posting this sort of absurdist nonsense.
Does NA1K think that other editors are so deeply stupid that they will be deceived by this amateur dramatics?
Or is NA1K so deeply stupid that they actually think there is something clever about creating pompous phrases because pompous phrases fit an idiot's idea of how a clever person uses words?
Or is NA1K engaging again in some kind of bait-trolling, hoping that when NA1K's repeated mendacity and crude deceptions are challenged, NA1K words will be such that they can selectively quote to them to fabricate more claims of "personal attack", "hounding", etc?
Or is this just all more FUD, a continuation of NA1K's previous attrition strategies at MFD, where NA1K posted enough mendacious nonsnese and idiotic claims and other forms of FUD to make the discussion such a huge task to close that it languishes until some admin just shakes their head and wearily closes it as "no consensus"?
Whatever's going in NA1K's very strange thought processes, some facts are clear:
NA1K sneakily and stealthily converted this portal into a "black box" format, where scrutiny is impeded by the lack of a linked list of its contents
NA1K stealthily created a massively POV list of topics, and didn't post the list until a month later
NA1K justifies their methodology by citing POG, even tho it is not a guideline
NA1K denies the fact that even if POG was a guideline, nothing in POG recommends creating a POV list, and that it is entirely possible to follow POG's path without doing so
NA1K is an admin, so should know that WP:NPOV is a core policy, which cannot be set aside by one editor or by a guideline (let alone a non-guideline). Instead, NA1K has repeatedly sought to justify and defend their flagrant disregard for NPOV, effectively wailing "POG made me do it".
The WikiProject is not interested. No other editor wants to maintain the portal. The case made above by NA1K for retention is effectively a plea that they should be given the portal as a playground to continue their display of mendacity and/or incompetence ... and that anyone fool enough to want to try having a reasoned discussion with NA1K's folly and mendacity can come join them. That's no basis for keeping a portal. Portals need people who know the topic, have the skills to uphold policies, and are capable of rationally discussing disagreements, none of which apply to NA1K. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 06:33, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment – The above personal attack above should be redacted; the user is entirely mistaken, and is grossly nitpicking about the semantics of a three-word phrase now, which is open to various interpretations. Their bizarre theories are also mistaken. In the interest of hopefully moving forward with a functional discussion, rather than subjective opinion about semantics and the user's desire to paint me as a "liar" and "idiot" in bold, I have struck part of my comment above. North America1000 06:47, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I won't redact. The meaning of three-word phrase was very clear, and no it is not open to various interpretations. It was an exercise in deceit through wordplay, and NA1K was right to strike it.
The fact remains that NA1K abused a failed proposal as their justification for creating a massively POV portal which they hid from scrutiny, and whose policy-defiance they still don't acknowledge.
If NA1K wants to me revise my view that they are either an idiot or a liar or both, then they need to make a sustained change in their conduct. Their continued failure to acknowledge that the list they created is massively and avoidably POV indicates a serious and unresolved failure by NA1K of competence and/or integrity. It also poses a major barrier to what NA1K calls moving forward with a functional discussion. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 07:06, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep NA's version is which, while not necessarily perfect, is superior to the other version. Transport is inherently a broad enough topic that is well suited to having a portal. Thryduulf (talk) 13:38, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thryduulf's phrase while not necessarily perfect is a strategic euphemism to disguise the fact that Thryduulf is advocating restoring a massively POV version which has been restructured by NA1K to be difficult to scrutinise.
Thryduulf is an admin, and should know a lot better than to apply euphemisms to such massive POV-pushing. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 15:05, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@BHG: Nope, completely wrong. The version I recommend is simply better than the version you prefer, nothing more, nothing less. My words were not euphemistic and I would appreciate your apology. Thryduulf (talk) 16:17, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Thryduulf: Do you seriously want me to apologise for noting that you used a euphemism to express your support for restoring a massive breach of the core policy WP:NPOV? For real?
Absolutely no chance. I stand my comment.
It's a very sad indicator of the state of portal-space that an actual admin describes a huge breach of NPOV as an improvement over a small set of rotted scraps. It's a further example of how portals have developed as a backwater, without regard to a range of Wikipedia policies. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 23:22, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Not for the first time in discussions with you I will not apologise for something I have not done, no matter how many insults you care to throw in my direction. Thryduulf (talk) 23:29, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thryduulf, this is not complicated. you have advocated the restoration of the version created by NA1K. That version is massively POV. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 16:39, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - I have no idea why updates to portals are being reverted, this is a broad enough topic. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 23:45, 10 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Note that Knowledgekid87 has restored[7] the POV version of the portal with the edit summary This isn't how things work, if consensus is against you then its staus quo unless things change.
KK87 misunderstands or misrepresents the situation. My previous revert had restored the status quo as it was at the time of nomination, as it had been for the preceding month. It is KK87 who has unilaterally altered the status quo. The consensus of this discussion will be weighed by an uninvolved closer, and until it is closed, the final status remains unresolved. So I urge KK87 to self-revert, to restore the status quo which they say they is their goal. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 05:56, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, neglected and poorly-structured. Unlike in an article, this sort of neglect in a portal seems like it can't be fixed by a quick rewrite - even if someone is willing to update it now that its disrepair has been pointed out, and even if we ignore the somewhat-complex dispute over the quality of the rewrite, the underlying problem is that the fact that it fell into such a state shows that it is unused and unlikely to be maintained in the long term. Portals, unlike articles, require use and constant mainteance to justify their existence; without that, they're just cruft that needlessly complicates navigation for new users who fall into them. --Aquillion (talk) 12:07, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Actually portals require little maintenance, all you need to do is add transclusions on the articles and the content will update in real time. There are also plenty of FA and GA articles to chose from to make a balanced NPOV for the selections. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 13:48, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per WP:ATD, which is Wikipedia policy. This topic is certainly broad enough to support a portal. Very disappointing to read, again, so many occurrences of the words "liar", "idiot" and similar in the above discussion. UnitedStatesian (talk) 17:07, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete – per Aquillon. Unmaintained portal. A one-off improvement doesn't suddenly turn it into a maintained portal. Also, we can probably do well to slaughter fewer electrons in these discussions. Won't someone think of the server kittens! – Levivich 17:52, 11 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and easily - this is a very large topic, should have a lot of content to feature, and has been updated in a way that will allow it to stay fresh into the future. I also want to add that I am very dismayed by the crystal-clear personal attack that has been hatted above. SportingFlyerT·C 00:49, 12 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Inherently a broard subject area, not TNT worthy. There are plenty of good transportation articles, transclude them and it doesn't need constant maintenance. ~~ OxonAlex- talk 16:31, 12 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Weak delete; no prejudice against keeping for now: Doesn't matter if BHG made personal attacks or not, the fact remains that this portal simply can't function without broad community input on what kinds of selected content would be okay to add (and no, not NA1k's version, as BHG still has a point about systemic bias). Even if this discussion is closed as "keep" in the end, if the problems persist despite NA1k's additions, then clearly that will lead to another deletion discussion. ToThAc (talk) 23:28, 12 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
If too many selected articles are on similar topics, replacing some of them with alternatives selected from WP:FA#Transport would be a simple edit and be might make a better alternative to deletion. Similar points apply to pictures, etc. Certes (talk) 11:21, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: While I'm concerned about the tone of this discussion and the interplay between commentators, I'm ultimately convinced by the analyses above that neither the old version nor the new version are keepable. I'm certainly not opposed to future recreation, but it must be done in a neutral and more-encompassing manner. — Huntster (t@c) 07:57, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment – In response to the neutral point of view concerns above, I have removed most, but not entirely all of the U.S.-based entries from the portal (diff). Removing all of the U.S. based portals would conversely present a non-neutral point of view of intentionally avoiding all U.S. based topics. Per this, I have also removed some U.K-related articles, because after removing the U.S.-based articles to balance it out, the portal would have been slightly slanted toward U.K. related topics.
The portal would certainly now benefit from more additions to further round it out in relation to presenting additional transport-related articles from various areas of the world. I hesitate to add any new articles to it, because at this point, article selections should be discussed on its talk page. Of course, now one could state that there are too many or not enough of one type or another type of topic present in the portal, such as it now having too many engine-related transport articles, as in articles involving transport regarding vehicles that use engines, not enough animal-powered transport articles, too many port-related and nautical-related articles, too many historical-related articles, too many articles that involve modern aspects of transport, not enough aviation-related articles, etc., and also vice-versa per these notions. Furthermore, it could be argued that some transport-related topics are presently not covered in the portal. So, if the portal is retained, I encourage talk page discussion to occur.
As I have stated above in this discussion, there was no intention of creating a non-neutral portal. As I stated above, articles were added relative to WP:POG, where it states, "For the Selected article, Selected biography or other Selected content items, find a good number of articles, as many as you can, that could be showcased on the portal" that are "of high quality, either a featured article, a good article or one which deals with its subject substantially or comprehensively". While WP:POG is no longer a guideline page, many portals are still based upon it, and it is common sense to use high-quality articles in portals. However, I certainly understand that article selections in portals should not favor one geographic area over another, and that elements of systemic bias that may exist in various areas of English Wikipedia should not be reflected in portals.
The following is a list of articles that are used in the portal as transclusions after the above edit occurred on 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Transcluded article list as of 13 November 2019 (UTC) (Permanent link)
If the portal is retained, the present version of it, in which U.S.-based article entries have been pruned, should be used. Any further ideas, suggestions, objections, etc. can be discussed on the portal's talk page. – North America1000 15:27, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
NA1K, I am glad that you certainly understand that article selections in portals should not favor one geographic area over another. Given that understanding,
why did you create such a geographically biased selection in the first place?
Why has it taken you five days after the POV issue was noted to even acknowledge that POV matters?
How many of the other dozens of portals whose article lists you unilaterally rebuilt contain similar POV issues?
Why have you restricted your recent edits to this portal only addressing the geographical bias which I noted, and and not addressed the many other forms of bias which I noted and which you also belatedly acknowledge?
For goodness sake, why on earth are you still relying on POG even tho it has been repeatedly noted that you yourself successfully asked for it to be delisted as guideline?
I see no reason at all to believe that your work here was or is that of a competent editor acting in good faith. You blustered for days, and objected to the complaint ... and now you try to do a partial volte face without accepting any responsibility for what you did, using your trademark passive voice (articles were added, there was no intention) etc) to describe the path by which you created a huge breach of NPOV. I note that you used the active voice in the lead para when describing the actions which you hoped would gain approval, but switched to the distancing passive voice when describing the actions which you appear to be trying to disown.
If, contrary to all impressions, you believe that you have been acting in competence and good faith, and are not actually trying to disown your conduct, then it is up to you to explain how all this happened and why anyone should believe that you won't do it all over again. Given that this matter is likely headed to ArbCom, it would be very much your advantage to come from behind that passive voice. --BrownHairedGirl(talk) • (contribs) 10:11, 14 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The topic is broad enough to provide ample content for a portal. Contrary to the nomination argument, it does have recent, pre-nomination maintenance activity. Any legitimate issues around the specific selection of content can be resolved with ordinary editing, not deletion. --RL0919 (talk) 19:45, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep certainly a sufficiently broad topic. Deletion is not a solution for any NPOV issues. This shouldn't even be up for debate. Lepricavark (talk) 20:38, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, broad topic, recent improvements. Not perfect (I don't like that the lead image isn't shown completely, and I would like to see all possible transclusions somewhere, as that makes it easier to spot problems), but any imperfections can be improved by editing instead of deletion. —Kusma (t·c) 21:15, 13 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete because it's not supported by the large amount of work and discussion needed to find objective selection criteria on a topic which is often dear to wikipedians (train photos are our equivalent of kittens on social media) and involves parochial sentimentalism. Don't get me started on how the various subjects were selected (the reports above will suffice), but I see a news section with "US announces restrictions on flying to Cuba" and I have no doubt that this portal serves no justifiable purpose in informing our users about its purported topic. Nemo 12:35, 17 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Topic is broad enough, with a very wide array of articles to choose from, to justify a portal. Even without the failed guideline POG this is a common sense argument. All described problems can be fixed with relatively simple low-effort editing. Arguments that are against the concept of portals in general should be ignored by the closer. This MfD is about this individual portal, not about portals in general. The content dispute described above is irrelevant for this MfD. --Hecato (talk) 17:39, 18 November 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.