Template talk:IATA

Is this template supposed to be used in headings? In Hamburg I think it gives an unwanted effect at least in the Contents-box... -- Eiland (talk) 16:46, 25 October 2012 (CEST)


 * No, only in prose. --Globe-trotter (talk) 16:59, 25 October 2012 (CEST)

Now redundant?
I understand that 6 or 7 years ago the intention was to include some RDF markup to note the nearby airport code. (See Project:RDF Expedition/Airport codes for details.) but that project is now obsolete isn't it?

That means that all the template really does now is possibly flout Wp-ds, eh?

Here's an example of where this was happening. -- A l i c e ✉ 09:26, 25 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I think you mean wv:wp, but I do agree with your general point. --118.93nzp (talk) 06:41, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Poorly signalled
Leaving aside the fact that this template breaches our current policy about links to Wikipedia, it also very poorly signals that it is an external link after this change again.

I'm going to change the link so that it goes to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IATA_code since some articles use it for airline as well as airport codes (eg: http://en.wikivoyage.org/w/index.php?title=Italy&oldid=2509785#Prominent_airlines_in_Italy)


 * I'd be okay with removing the link entirely. Powers (talk) 18:18, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I think we do need to signal to our readers that it is an external link - albeit one that finishes at a sister WMF project. The usual way to do that would be so that the end result looks like this: IATA: NSN
 * --118.93nzp (talk) 20:18, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree that signalling an external link (if we're going to have one) is our standard practice and I will make the necessary change to display the usual widget. --213.160.119.242 18:19, 4 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Is now pointing to a local Wikivoyage page. --Traveler100 (talk) 11:22, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Suggested new parameters
I suggest adding some optional parameters:


 * A  or   parameter that suppresses the automatic link to the page of the same name. This is because the natural and common way to write a listing that will link to an airport article is like this:
 * John F. Kennedy International Airport is New York's main airport...
 * which is linked twice to the same article. A  parameter could be used to suppress the link. Similarly, New York City starts with
 * New York City ( for all airports) is well connected by air...
 * where "" ought to link directly to the section you've just started reading! (It doesn't link there, which brings me to my next suggestion...)


 * A  (which conflicts with the previous suggestion, so maybe   or   instead) to change what article is linked to. This is because NYC is a redirect to New York City, as it should be, but in the context of this template, we ought to link to New York City.
 * A  or   parameter that suppresses the "IATA:" text. This is for times when this template is used repeatedly, such as this text from USA:
 * The international airports in Atlanta, New York City (Newark  & JFK), Los Angeles , Chicago (O'Hare) , San Francisco , Miami  and Houston  are the seven main points of entry to the United States by plane.
 * which is a messy jumble of text. Using a  parameter, all but the first of these could be suppressed to yield something much cleaner:
 * The international airports in Atlanta (IATA: ATL), New York City (NYC) (Newark (EWR) & JFK), Los Angeles (LAX), Chicago (O'Hare) (ORD), San Francisco (SFO), Miami (MIA) and Houston (IAH) are the seven main points of entry to the United States by plane.

I'm not an expert with Mediawiki template syntax, so it would take me a lot of trial and error to figure out how to implement these correct; I'd prefer to have someone more skilled implement them.

If you do, please don't take my suggestions verbatim, particularly for the names of the parameters. If there's a more natural or common way to express those kinds of parameters in Mediawiki templates, by all means follow convention. --Bigpeteb (talk) 23:39, 18 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Not quite sure what benefit this will achieve. If you what to link to an airport in another article there are two possibilities


 * 1) When the airport has its own article then simply name the airport and do not list the IATA code as this is given on the airport page.
 * e.g. the closet connection by plane is Frankfurt Airport


 * 1) When the airport does not have is own article, give the name and the IATA code and have a redirect of the code to the correct section in a city :article.
 * e.g. the closet airport is Düsseldorf
 * The NYC example is a little problematic as the abbreviation and redirect was created for the city not the collative code for airports in the area. --Traveler100 (talk) 08:02, 19 August 2017 (UTC)


 * For the current sentence on the USA page:-
 * The international airports in Atlanta, New York City (Newark  & JFK), Los Angeles , Chicago (O'Hare) , San Francisco , Miami  and Houston  are the seven main points of entry to the United States by plane.
 * Should maybe be:-
 * The international airports in Atlanta, New York City ( & ), Los Angeles , Chicago , San Francisco , Miami  and Houston  are the seven main points of entry to the United States by plane.
 * Which links the cities and the airport articles. --Traveler100 (talk) 08:31, 19 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Thinking about this a little more I can see a need for switching off the links. Main one is when the IATA template is used on the article of the airport or the city article for small and medium sized airports. This would stop circular linking. --Traveler100 (talk) 16:32, 21 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Your suggestion to rework that sentence from USA is a good one. (I'll play with it some; I hate to omit the link to NYC for all airports, but maybe that will always make it too complex.) But do you not think the repeated "IATA"s really clutter up the sentence? I greatly prefer the form without them. I think the parentheses and boldface make it sufficiently clear that those are airport codes, without needing to preface each and every one with "IATA:". --Bigpeteb (talk) 20:23, 24 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Why not simply use the the abbreviation as a link? No need to use the IATA template to link to the airport. --Traveler100 (talk) 05:40, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
 * How about changing the stle of this template so that the explanation text is smaller:
 * The international airports in Atlanta, New York City- ( & ), Los Angeles , Chicago , San Francisco , Miami and Houston  are the seven main points of entry to the United States by plane.
 * This would be the way all IATA code are displayed if change made. --Traveler100 (talk) 07:18, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
 * I have also change the link to show the actual article rather than the three letter acronym redirect. --Traveler100 (talk) 09:21, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
 * I appreciate the experimentation, but I have to admit I find the superscript distracting. It's less obtrusive than the prefixed version but we use superscript so rarely it just looks jarring to me. We also still haev the issue of not signaling an external link when "IATA" is linked. Powers (talk) 00:14, 6 September 2017 (UTC)
 * I know some still see Wikipedia as "external link" so was already thinking of redirecting to a Wikivoyage page. --Traveler100 (talk) 06:45, 7 September 2017 (UTC)
 * IATA has been languishing on Requested articles for three and a half years now. There are about 1800 airports of various sizes which get one or more mentions on en.voy but no one has taken the time to generate a list of just the ones we need and post them in article form. K7L (talk) 12:40, 7 September 2017 (UTC)
 * I have started IATA airport code but not convinced there is enough material for an article. Do we really want a list of airports article? --Traveler100 (talk) 18:39, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

Railway stations
Any IATA codes with a leading Q, X or Z were originally codes for railway stations with no associated airport. A code like should not be linking to #By_plane as a train station in the cellar of Madison Square Garden is a horrible place to try to land an aircraft. Any way to make these specific codes link to #By_train instead of #By_plane? —The preceding comment was added by 66.102.87.40 (talk • contribs)