Talk:Trainspotters in the United Kingdom

Requested move 13 January 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Moved - There is a rough consensus to move this subject on the understanding that trainspotting is a different thing to being a "railfan" in general. There probably needs to be another discussion to cover where Trainspotter redirects to. (non-admin closure) FOARP (talk) 21:18, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

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Trainspotter → Trainspotters in the United Kingdom – This title was suggested by me in a comment a while back when the article was in draft (Special:Permalink/1193456614). My comment was that the article focuses too much on the UK and that the word "trainspotter" is not exactly a UK-exclusive term, but also used globally. [1][2][3][4]. This meant that the article does not offer a WP:GLOBAL perspective (which the title may imply), and while another reviewer suggested can include more transpotter things worldwide, is already in my opinion covered under the Railfan article, hence the suggested name to make sure that readers know this article deals with the UK. S5A-0043^Talk 07:42, 13 January 2024 (UTC) — Relisting. BilledMammal (talk) 20:38, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose: this can be fixed by broadening the content, and it is already so tagged. - UtherSRG (talk) 14:08, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  Understandable position, and I would be okay with that idea if the Railfan article didn't exist, but it does. And "trainspotter" is actually bolded there in the lead of the article, and Trainspotter was actually a former redirect before this came out. I'm personally not exactly fond about two articles on the same topic and covering the same things. And even if the article is kept and the consensus is to globalize there needs to be a commitment to include that global perspective before a random person wants to search up the global trainspotter and gets confused on "wHy iS tHeRe oNlY thE UniTeD KiNgdOm", and I'm not sure whether there are any editors willing to do that yet. S5A-0043^Talk 00:16, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'm persuaded by the below arguments to change to support and redirect trainspotter to railfan. - UtherSRG (talk) 15:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

• A move to trainspotting as the primary topic, while moving what currently resides there to Trainspotting (disambiguation) may be in order. — Godsy ^(TALK_CONT) 18:12, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

  Perhaps, though it's no dunkshot. Some activities are in their gerund form, such as knitting, singing, and acting, while others redirect or are disambiguated to another form, such as gaming or modelling. - UtherSRG (talk) 20:02, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support: on reflection the article should’ve just been titled ‘trainspotters (or trainspotting) in the UK’ in the first place as it’s a more precise description of the article’s content and will avoid confusion in the future. Wikociewie (talk) 09:45, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. If the problem with the article is that it's too UK-specific then it can be fixed by expanding it. JIP | Talk 16:58, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. I'll note that this article has only existed for a day, and I'm not convinced of its usefulness; see Railfan. The nomination seems to suggest that "Trainspotter" is not actually a British subculture, but a term that can be applied to other railfans; if that is the case, then this is a WP:CFORK. 162 etc. (talk) 17:15, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  The term emerged in Britain to describe a specific subculture based around the collecting of locomotive numbers. The railfan article covers a general interest in railways by people across the world whilst this article is intended to provide information about the subculture of the trainspotter. I think part of the issue lies with an incorrect conflation of the terms railfan and trainspotter. Wikociewie (talk) 18:41, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  Some kind of hatnote to Railfan at the top of the article is probably in order. 162 etc. (talk) 20:34, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  Think you might've misunderstood me. I do agree that Trainspotting is a culture within Britain, but the term has been used by global RSes as well. My concern is that the title suggests a global perspective of "trainspotters", but the article is centered around the UK, which may be possibly misleading to readers who view the title at first glance. Thryduulf's explanation below sums up my understanding of this issue and what I'm proposing. Sometimes I make things more complicated than it should be & I'll admit it's a headache. S5A-0043^Talk 13:07, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support this article is about trainspotters and railfans in the United Kingdom. Railfan (to which this title used to and should redirect) is about trainspotters and railfans generally. Thryduulf (talk) 11:25, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• Comment for some useful relevant (but old) history, I suggest reading the short section at Talk:Railfan/Archive 1#limited geographic scope & merge where it was agreed to merge the then-articles Trainspotting, Ferroequinologist and Railroad buff into the Railfan article. Thryduulf (talk) 14:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. This applies to a particular type of railway enthusiast not a particular country and can easily be expanded to include information about other countries. Rename to Trainspotting though and move that to Trainspotting (disambiguation). -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:53, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  This is definitely not the primary topic for "Trainspotting". You may have heard of this 1996 film, or the novel it was based on. 162 etc. (talk) 17:18, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  Indeed, though trainspotting (hobby) would be a good destination. - UtherSRG (talk) 17:36, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  Trainspotting (subculture)? Wikociewie (talk) 17:45, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  A hobby can (and often) has a subculture, but not all subcultures are of a hobby, so hobby is the better destination as that can include the subculture of the hobby. - UtherSRG (talk) 17:57, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  I’d argue that trainspotting is a subculture of railway enthusiasm. It is referred to as a subculture in several of the citations used in the article too. Wikociewie (talk) 18:13, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  If any article should be at Trainspotting (hobby) it's Railfan. This article is specifically about the hobby in the United Kingdom, Railfan is about the hobby globally. Thryduulf (talk) 03:47, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

  Naturally I have heard of the novel and film named after this hobby. So what? The hobby is still the very clear primary topic. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:49, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose issue can be fixed by normal editing Mach61 (talk) 14:14, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

  Except it can't, because that would duplicate the existing Railfan article. Thryduulf (talk) 14:15, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support this relates to the UK trainspotting subculture, for which there is sufficient content for an independent article. It has a link to Railfan in the See Also section, this link should be included in the lead/definition section. Similarly, a link to this article is needed from Railfan. Polyamorph (talk) 17:03, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Relisting comment: Relist, to discuss overlap with the Railfan article. BilledMammal (talk) 20:38, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support this is an article describing the British subculture which is worthy of an article in itself because of the specific nature of the subculture especially post WW2.

Keithec (talk) 22:51, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support, and redirect trainspotter back to railfan, where it had redirected for years until the recent undiscussed change of topic.  — Amakuru (talk) 15:15, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I've initiated an RfD discussion about retargetting Trainspotter back to Railfan. See Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 February 14#Trainspotter. Thryduulf (talk) 22:10, 14 February 2024 (UTC)