Talk:Showground Central railway line

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Showground Central railway line/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Is this really a line? A service maybe. This wikipedia entry should relate to the former Showgrounds branch of the Adelaide suburban rail system, with a note that a contemporary service to Showgrounds still exists, but without the branch.

Last edited at 01:52, 1 January 2012 (UTC). Substituted at 06:04, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

"railway line"? really?

Was (or is) this a "railway line"? The only track dedicated to the service would have been a crossover to allow the train to cross onto the city-bound track to return to Adelaide station, and perhaps an extra signal or two. Or did this "line" have exclusive access to what was normally the Belair railway line, with Belair trains running on the Noarlunga Centre/Seaford pair of tracks as far as Goodwood Junction? If so, the article does not state that. --Scott Davis ^Talk 06:16, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Merge discussion

Following recent and historical discussion cited on this talk page, I am proposing that this article be merged into Showground Central railway station.

Firstly, from a local's perspective, this was not a "railway line" in and of itself, rather a distinct station that was serviced by an express shuttle train running along the existing Belair/Noarlunga alignment. In addition, official sources never referred to this as a "railway line" either, only ever mentioning the station and the express shuttle.[1] [2] [3] [4] Meanwhile, on Google Australia, "Showground Central station" has 193,000 hits, while "Showground Central line" has 57,100 hits. Though it is notable to mention that "Showground Central railway station" has 77,700 hits compared to "Showground Central railway line" with 155,000 hits.

I also agree with past comments that there is little-to-no need to have two articles that more-or-less cover the same topic. Regards. – Nick Mitchell 98 ^talk 02:42, 7 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello - I have just now reverted a few of your (assuming good faith) edits regarding this line and station. Firstly, it is not ok to edit or modify another person's proposal (i.e. my suggestion at Showground Central railway station) in this way - in just the same way as I should not hijack your proposal to suit my viewpoint. If there is disagreement with a proposal, then it should be stated in the talk page (as I note you have above). Secondly, with a proposal in place, edits should not be made to other pages and links (eg. Template:Closed Railway lines of Adelaide or List of closed railway stations in South Australia) with bias to either case in the absence of an agreement on the main page to do so. Thank you. JabberJaw_JAPAN talk 13:20, 7 October 2017 (UTC)

@Jabberjawjapan: Hello. In regard to modifying the merge hatnote, that edit was done as there was no active discussion apparent on either talk page and in order to correct the links to the correct discussion thread that I had started, I updated the marge hatnote accordingly. I was unaware that it was so frowned upon to make such a change especially since the only evidence of a proposal was that merge hatnote and nothing else, not even a few lines on either talk page. If I may, in order to make the merge hatnotes more neutral, I would like to propose using Template:Merge, this gives no favoritism to either proposal in the merge hatnotes, providing a more neutral segue into this discussion thread. – Nick Mitchell 98 ^talk 00:32, 8 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello again. I guess the main issue with changes to another's proposal is the intent, which is often difficult to gauge in non-verbal and non-FTF communication such as this. In particular, edits that change the suggestions/opinions of others could be taken as aggressive, intimidating, or hostile (or simply disruptive), when in fact the actual intent may be bold or simply facilitative. Further, it changes the perceived nature of the proposal - from I propose A, and you propose the opposite B, to only you proposing A<>B. So, to avoid misunderstandings, therefore, I would suggest that such changing be avoided. Further, on local low-volume pages such as these, discussions often take time (i.e. weeks/months) to reach consensus, so no responses after a week may not be such a surprising fact. Anyway, TBH I have no problem with a merge proposal (to be settled either way via discussion here) - I am aware of the parallel proposals at Talk:Hendon railway line - and I have expressed elsewhere my opinion that single station lines do not necessarily warrant 2 articles. To that end, feel free to add merge tags as you suggest. Thanks again. JabberJaw_JAPAN talk 01:27, 8 October 2017 (UTC)

Support merging of railway line article into railway station article. Isn't a stand alone railway, merely a siding running parallel to an existing line so not significant enough for a separate article. Bullgold14 (talk) 05:16, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Comment just to further confuse seems there are 2 simultaneous merge suggestions, @Nick Mitchell 98:'s to merge the line article into the station article and @Jabberjawjapan:'s to merge the station into the line article. I have amended the hatnotes per the merge template instructions. Bullgold14 (talk) 03:27, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for that- but anyway, please note that I feel there was no particular reason/justification IMO to alter the date of the initial and older proposal (mine), which was quite clearly in September. I have reset it to the original (in line with my comments above). Thanks. JabberJaw_JAPAN talk 13:46, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

I have made further amendments to the merge hatnotes based on my proposal above. Placing two conflicting merge hatnotes is an off choice to make, hency why I have replaced them with the neutral Template:Merge. – Nick Mitchell 98 ^talk 01:18, 12 October 2017 (UTC)

• Support merge to station article. Just to be clear, I don't believe that the "railway line" ever existed. It was a service provided on existing lines. --Scott Davis ^Talk 23:37, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
• Weak oppose - TBH, even though I instigated the move discussion through a merge proposal (station >>> line), I am less concerned about which way the move goes, and more strongly of the opinion that 2 separate articles are unnecessary. To that end, I am fairly neutral on which way the Showground Central pages are unified (although I would prefer that the greater (line) subsume the lesser (station) - remembering that the concept of a line is global (all parts and elements of the line) and station is specific (to a particular part of the line where stock/passengers transfer). Thanks. JabberJaw_JAPAN talk 01:12, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

What evidence is there that a Showground Central railway line ever existed? The station is mentioned in the references, along with a service in later years, but it was "...the Royal Show Shuttle service offering a direct Adelaide to Showground Central Station service every 15 minutes." (TransAdelaide Annual Report 2005-06) and the photo captions in reference 1 suggest that in 2003 the station was used as an additional stop on services to Noarlunga Centre.

I think I agree with your point that the greater should subsume the lesser, if there is a greater to subsume it. The route map is wrong as there were never Showground Central services that stopped at Mile End station, and at the time when there was a Showground Central service, Keswick station was open (but also not used by this service). It would be reasonable to insert mention of the station and possibly the service into the Noarlunga Centre and Belair line articles. --Scott Davis ^Talk 05:56, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello - well I guess that's the crux of this merger discussion - which way to merge and upon which facts. If the line article is tenuous, then it fails Wikipedia's criteria for notability or accuracy and would not be the place to merge to. Then again if it is substantiated, then logically the articles should move that way. So for me, this discussion is less clear-cut than that at occurring at Hendon, hence my "weak" stance. JabberJaw_JAPAN talk 07:14, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

@Jabberjawjapan, Bullgold14, and ScottDavis: Based on the discussion above, the consensus appears majority in favour. If nobody has any reservations or additional contributions I will merge this article into the station article. – Nick Mitchell 98 ^talk 07:31, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Please do. --Scott Davis ^Talk 10:27, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

The move has now been made per consensus, sorry for the delay. – Nick Mitchell 98 ^talk 10:10, 29 January 2018 (UTC)