Talk:Brussels Metro

message: Hi LHOON, I don't understand why you re-applied this spam-edit, forming part of massive cross-wiki spam. Anyway that website is listed on the spam blacklist by now. GijsvdL 10:56, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blacklisted link 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I'm quite surprised that some pages related to Brussels metro stations are sometimes written in Dutch-then-French name, while the majority is rather in French-then-Dutch form. For instance, Kunst-Wet/Arts-Loi, the most frequented station of the network, has a Dutch/French name, while most of bilingual naming for the Brussels metro stations are on the contrary in a French/Dutch form.
This highlights the lack of logic in the naming of the Brussels metro stations.
There are three kinds of situation, here on Wikipedia:
*Stations whose names cannot be translated, and/or are written the same in both French and Dutch: Beekkant, De Brouckère, Schuman, Merode, Montgomery, Joséphine-Charlotte, Gribaumont, Tomberg, Roodebeek, Vandervelde, Alma, Eddy Merckx, Bizet, Aumale, Jacques Brel, Thieffry, Pétillon, Hankar, Delta, Beaulieu, Demey, Herrmann-Debroux, Houba-Brugmann, Stuyvenbergh, Bockstael, Pannenhuis, Belgica, Simonis and Elisabeth, Delacroix, Clemenceau, Rogier, Ribaucourt, Anneessens, Lemonnier, Horta, Albert, Diamant premetro, Georges Henri and Boileau.Of course, there's no problem with the naming of those stations.
*Stations whose names can be translated in English: King Baudouin, Brussels-West station, Brussels-North railway station, Brussels Central Station and Brussels-South railway station.As you can notice, it mainly concernes metro stations connected to railway. But shouldn't we created specific pages for the metro stations, rather than combine both metro and railway in the same pages? (For instance, in Paris, there's a page for Gare du Nord (railway station) and another for its metro station.) In all cases, the language issue arises, as in other non-English cities, the name of the station is never translated (eg. Gare du Nord and Gare du Nord (Paris Métro) in Paris, Praha hlavní nádraží and Hlavní nádraží (Prague Metro) in Prague...).
*And stations whose names are different in Dutch and French. Here is the mess:
**Most of times, names are written in French/Dutch form: CERIA/COOVI, La Roue/Het Rad, Veeweyde/Veeweide, Saint-Guidon/Sint-Guido, Étangs Noirs/Zwarte Vijvers, Comte de Flandre/Graaf van Vlaanderen, Sainte-Catherine/Sint-Katelijne, Heysel/Heizel, Osseghem/Ossegem, Hôtel des Monnaies/Munthof, Louise/Louiza, Trône/Troon, Botanique/Kruidtuin and Parvis de Saint-Gilles/Sint-Gillis Voorplein.
**Sometimes, names are written in Dutch/French form: Kunst-Wet/Arts-Loi, Maalbeek/Maelbeek, Stokkel/Stockel.Those three stations were previously named in French/Dutch form, then a contributor moved the pages to French only names, and evantualy another contributor moved them to Dutch/French. All this happened in March 2016, right after the Brussels bombing: a bomb exploded in the Maelbeek/Maalbeek station, in a metro vehicule riding from Stockel/Stokkel to Arts-Loi/Kunst-Wet (the most frequented station of the network), giving a sudden "fame" those three stations. Therefore, another - ridiculous and typically Belgian - linguistic battle, to show to the world (or at least to the numerous people consulting the English version of Wikipedia) that Brussels is more French- or Dutch-speaking... Ludicrous.
**And finally, some names are unilingual, without translation in the other language:
***Erasmus and Kraainem are named in Dutch only, despite their official names also included a French translation (respectively: Érasme and Crainhem). For Erasmus, it was considered that Erasmus is also the English version of the name of the famous philosopher. For Kraainem, the naming is obviously affected by the linguistic issue related to the neighboring municipality of Kraainem (a flemish municipality with French-speaking majority): a long term issue concerns the name of the municipality itself, and its translation in French Crainhem.
***Parc, Porte de Hal, Porte de Namur, Yser and Bourse are named in French only. All those names were in French/Dutch form, but a contributor changed them in 2013.
Therefore, to clarify the situation and avoid potential conflicts, I suggest that we adopt a naming convention.
I suggest different options:
*Unilingual names:
**Option 1: all names in French only. Because French is the language of the majority in Brussels. French names of local places in Brussels (such as municipalities, streets, buildings...) are widely used in French, rather than in Dutch, by English-speaking people visiting or living in the city. Besides, the English Wikipedia obviously don't like bilingual names for its pages : eg., all the 19 municipalities of Brussels Region are named in French only (except for Brussels itself, of course, but also Sint-Agatha-Berchem (Berchem-Sainte-Agathe)... without any reason). Of course, in the main article, the official translation in Dutch should appear too.
**Option 2: all names in Dutch only. Because... if one proposed "French only", why not the opposite?
**Now the question is: should English-translated names be kept? As I wrote, it's not in the habits of the English Wikipedia to translate the names of the foreign railway stations, for instance...
*Bilingual names:
**Option 3: all names in French/Dutch form. Because a large majority of names actually uses this form now. And before somes moves by contributors in 2013 and/or 2016, it was the form for all the bilingual names. This options is the one used by the German Wikipedia too. And for the question "Why French before Dutch?": here again, because French is the language of the majority in Brussels.
**Option 4: all names in Dutch/French form. Again: if "French/Dutch" is proposed, why not the opposite?
**Option 5: alternate French/Dutch and Dutch/French names, using for instance the STIB/MIVB internal naming convention. Indeed, the regulars of the Brussels metro know it: on the maps, signs in the stations and in the voice announcements, French and Dutch languages alternate. Each station has an "official" first language. Even those whose names cannot be translated: their names could be pronouned differently, or with a different accent. For instance: Arts-Loi/Kunst-Wet has French as first language, which means the signs are written Arts-Loi/Kunst-Wet (also on the maps), and the voice announcements while the train enters the station is (Arts-Loi. Kunst-Wet. Correspondance lignes 2 et 6. Aansluiting lijnen 2 and 6. Metro connection lines 2 and 6). Other example: Maelbeek/Maalbeek is pronounced approx. the same in both language, but as Dutch is its first language, the announcements are made by the Dutch-speaking voice, and the station is mentionned as "Maalbeek/Maelbeek" on all official supports.
**Option 6: alternate French/Dutch and Dutch/French names trough our own convention. This means a long a laborious process of voting for each 69 stations of the network. But at least, democracy on Wikipedia would have the final word...
Tell me what you think. And if someone know how or where creating a more appropriate debate or voting, please let me know.  MisterQ (talk) 10:16, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: My understanding is that there is no general en.wiki convention for the naming of articles about railway stations in non-Anglophone countries. To the extent that there is such a convention, it varies from country to country. Belgium is of course a special case, as it is, officially, a trilingual non-Anglophone country (the other official language being German). As far as Brussels is concerned, Option 5 seems the most sensible option to me. Bahnfrend (talk) 10:15, 10 July 2020 (UTC)
replies: text:  Option 5 also seems the most sensible one to me, as it follows what STIB/MIVB (or MIVB/STIB) itself does, even in its English-language station announcements and its English-language warnings about disturbances. — Tonymec (talk) 06:00, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Naming convention for the metro stations 

message: Upgrading a line from premetro to metro service includes, among others, raising the whole platform to metro height and replacing the overhead line by a third rail power supply[citation needed].
I don't see what requires additional sources: indeed, a platform with both heights (part of it at tramway height and the rest ready for future upgrading to metro height) is clearly visible in the photograph illustrating "Premetro" section, where a catenary line is also clearly visible, while third rails are visible on the photograph of Demey station illustrating the "Lines and stations" section itself.
Maybe that [citation needed] mention reminds us the Wikipeda dogma that "primary sources are never enough, secondary sources are always necessary". IMHO, secondary sources are necessary to buttress statements of opinion, but nothing is better than a primary source when a statement of fact is made about, among others, "what is where in the city" (like here), or when something is said which is an obvious immediate conclusion from such a statement of fact. — Tonymec (talk) 06:00, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Citation needed" at the end of the lead part of "Lines and stations" section: really?