At there we want to say that the mechanic is vestigial and really should be removed. It made sense back when we could get items to raise our weapon skill above cap, where it benefited us to have it, and to increase it when we could. It was the opposite of defense, something we could use to overcome it. You could get items to increase your defense and your weapon skill. 
   It is completely useless with the addition of expertise. It is only a detriment if you don't have it maxed, and there's nothing to be gained by hitting the cap because that's just where you have to be to perform. Getting a new weapon upgrade is lackluster when you need to go pound on low level mobs for 3 hours to raise the weapon skill before you can actually use that new gear upgrade.
   It's not realistic for you to pick up a weapon you've never used and be awesome with it. You should have been leveling your other weapon skills all the time. It sounds that this is incredibly inconvenient. Doing this at level cap means going back to low level zones/instances to hit things where I'm not even farming effectively. Doing this you need to keep several weapons of relatively equal level on hand. Imagine telling this to a warrior who needs to keep up his 1hand maces, axes, and swords.
   In the game, leaving this just hinders your gear choices and while it has never deterred you from taking an obvious upgrade, things that were only marginally better make you wince when you take them because you know you are going to need to go back to zones where your skill left off for hours to raise it up. Casters don't have to level up their magic schools and you should truly believe that melee shouldn't have to level up their weapon schools by the same token. Its original reason for existence was removed from the game with expertise, so it too should be removed.
   If anything, they need to revisit weapon skill and make it more directly integrated in how it works and affects your character and their abilities. So, this is to update weapon skill and find other areas of the game where we can increase attention to detail like that and make them viable gameplay mechanics.
   Wep skill is a really silly mechanic, even after you change things. We are just going to find some high-HP mob and wail at it for an hour, healing once in a while. We are not sure that it is totally outdated, more so for new players to the game. It also introduces a penalty for switching to a new weapon type. Something you should have to think about. Is it worth switching from the two handed mace to a two handed sword?
   Make the skill purchasable at the trainer for world of warcraft gold similar to the way the mounted skills are. This would give the middle ground that everyone would want. If you want to grind the skill or level it as you are power leveling the character, then do so. However, if you simply want to purchase it for an appropriate amount of wow gold, then that is your choice.
If they don't want to remove it, they should group the weapon skills more often than not. Like put swords/maces/staves/daggers etc together and just call it "Weapon Skill". This way you still have to get it up, but not multiple times for every new weapon that you get. There should be no penalty for switching to a different weapon; there are too many penalties in game as it is.
You should not have to spend hours on end leveling up a weapon skill, you can purchase your weapon skill up, but not the insane mount prices. Some people will want to hoard every copper they have and never spend any until the servers themselves literally crumble to dust and would rather spend the 4 hours. Some want to get back to the real game. It's their choice.
Without removing the mechanic that stops you from switching as soon as a new weapon drops unless you had the foresight to level the skill beforehand.
It's a pointless mechanic that is a UO carry over from MMO to MMO that people senselessly add. It would ruin the game and 'dismantle' it in the same way that mages not having to level up fire magic, ice magic, and arcane magic would dismantle the game, meaning not at all.