Talk:List of funicular railways

what about the funicular inside of the st.louis arch?
inside of the jefferson exspansion memorial. or more commonly known to everybody as the saint louis arch. there is a funicular type of train inside and it carries people to the top of the arch and people can look out the windows up there and get great views of the city of st.louis and nerby land across the missisippi in the state of illinos. why has there been no mention of the funicular in the st. louis arch? 69.221.168.185 (talk) 13:44, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Europe
List alphabetically by country (state ot province), City and name as is done (at least partially) for United States

--Peter Horn 17:20, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Globalise
Surely Pennsylvania, US, doesn't have the majority of funicular railways in the world. Discuss DannyM 11:59, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Actually, Pennsylvania has a disproportionate number of these for several reasons: 1. It has the hills 2.It had the engineers, such as Caroline Endres and Samuel Diescher 3.  The steel cables, designed by John Roebling, which made them practical were made in Pittsburgh. 4. The Pittsburgh Coalfield is elevated above the Monongahela River, and several "inclines" or funiculars were built to deliver coal from these seams to the water level for transportation.  At one time, Pittsburgh alone had 17 of them! Pustelnik (talk) 23:25, 15 February 2009 (UTC)
 * The separate articles for the UK and Switzerland are probably distorting this global list. Thryduulf 01:40, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I've merged the UK entries. Will look at the much larger Swiss list once I've digested this change. -- Waterstones 11:20, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I've merged in the UK entries, and put the entries for Japan, the UK and the US in the format used by the rest of the list. I cannot see any justification now to say that this article lacks global perspective, so I've removed the tag. I still havn't merged the Swiss list, and I'm a bit hesitant about this because of the list size; perhaps best to leave this as is. Thoughts?. -- Waterstones 13:01, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Japan
The Japan sub-list was in a quite different format to most of the rest of this list. I've reformatted it into the common format. That still leaves the US list in a different format, but I have to start somewhere.

The change to the Japanese su-list has one down-side, as it loses the external links. My personal opinion is that these shouldn't have been there in the first place (WP isn't a link farm; if a subject deserves a link it deserves an article even more), but I don't want to lose the information for future editors researching individual articles on the funiculars in question. So I have transcribed the table here:

United States
See Japan above.

Reinstated template TOCright
Peter Horn removed the TOCright template from this article. I've reinstated it, as IMHO it seems it fits better with this geographically based list article than the default TOC behaviour, in that it gives the first-time reader a flavour of what the article is about on first sight. There may be good reasons for Peter's change, but as there was no useful edit comment I cannot know this. I'm therefore reintroducing the template; if you want to re-revert please do but pray tell why. -- Chris j wood 11:33, 21 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Fully support !! Some editors seem particularly twitchy about using TOCright, etc, presumably as it "does not comply with the MOS". Personally I much prefer their use since this invariably avoids acres of whitespace at the top of articles -- which particularly applies to lists such as this one. For my own part, I now think twice before adding them since I am more aware of windows-size change issues and the variable layouts that can ensue from different monitor resolutions. But I still apply them, especially where the lede is short but the TOC is long (again, as here). -- EdJogg 11:57, 21 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately use of TOCright obviously irritates some editors, as it essentially precludes the article showing images alongside most entries from Asia. I personally don't think this a huge problem, but I've got bored with removing images that interfered with the TOCright. Recently an editor switched to TOCleft, so as to add an image of the Carmelit funicular. Unfortunately TOCleft looks horrible, and certainly does come close to violating our MoS. So after five years (check the date on my post above) I'm afraid I've decided that if you cannot beat them, you might as well join them. I've reverted to a standard TOC, and am currently adding images for Asia. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 15:19, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Certaldo, Italy
Certaldo has a funicular from the old to new town and return. TRIKER1 (talk) 19:35, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Make that Certaldo. No mention of a funicular on that page. Peter Horn User talk 20:50, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I found these: Peter Horn User talk 21:00, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Been there done it! TRIKER1 (talk) 20:31, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

Garmisch-Partenkirchen
I have removed the entry for Garmisch-Partenkirchen from the list of German funiculars, because (a) it is uncited and (b) I can find no evidence of there being any funiculars in Garmisch-Partenkirchen.

Specifically:
 * The wp:de counterpart to this page does not list Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
 * The usually authoritative Speers & Wall Eisenbahnatlas Deutschland does not show any funiculars there.
 * Google search for 'Garmisch-Partenkirchen funicular' lists lots of hits, but all appear to be by people who cannot tell the difference between a funicular and a rack railway, or a funicular and a cable car.

If you added this, or know there is a funicular in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, then please re-add and annotate with a citation. -- Starbois (talk) 12:45, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

The names of systems
It is all very well to mention the cities in which the funiculars were located, but what about the actual names of a few of them in the list of funicular railways? Peter Horn User talk 14:57, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Steepest ?
Would it be easiest to tabulate this differently so it could be sorted by Name, country, inclination ?

106% Switzerland, Gelmerbahn funicular

122% 52 degrees Katoomba, Katoomba Scenic Railway http://www.smh.com.au/news/take-five/top-five-funicular-railways/2005/10/29/1130400400382.html

--Dave Rave (talk) 04:18, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

Chart.
When I have time, I will probably turn this list into a chart, similar to the one in List of metro systems. Any Objections? Staglit (talk) 14:55, 26 June 2014 (UTC)

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Removed well-intentioned but not helpful extra structure in Europe
User Gidonb added extra structure in the Asia and Europe sections. In the case of Europe this was to introduce sections for North, South, East and West Europe. The trouble with this is that it pushes the country names (which I would respectfully suggest are the things anybody looking something up in the list is most likely to know) out of the contents table, and replaces it with something much more arbitrary and more confusing. For example, when I tried looking up the United Kingdom, I couldn't find it because I assumed it would be in the 'Western Europe' section, whilst it was actually in 'Northern Europe'. And I only live in the damned place!.

In truth there are no well defined definitions of Northern, Southern, Eastern or Western Europe. If they exist at all, they do so as overlapping cultural concepts rather than as geographical entities, and as such are not useful as a sorting mechanism, which is essentially what this list is. And besides making the list less useful, they also increase the chances of sterile arguments (for example, is Slovenia in Southern Europe or Eastern Europe, when it is probably in both).

So I've removed the extra layer, whilst retaining any other changes Gideonb may have made. If you think I'm wrong, please discuss here. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 11:28, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Hi chris_j_wood, why not discuss before undoing? You could have solved your entire "intuition" problem by increasing the TOC level by 1! Also please refrain from giving marks to your colleagues in titles. For now we can discuss both matters below because this is not how things are normally done. Additionally, combining the discussions will make things easier as, obviously, there is a lot of overlap between the multiple discussions that you started. gidonb (talk) 12:02, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * On the positive side, you did preserve the other changes that I made. Let's salt this particular discussion and continue below. gidonb (talk) 12:37, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Ok, moved the discussion to -- chris_j_wood (talk) 13:26, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Extra structure in Asia
As indicated above, Gidonb also added extra structure in the Asia section. I'm tempted to do the same as I did above with this, but I feel I'm on less firm ground as to how well-defined and/or arbitrary the definitions are. I'd welcome comments on this before I do anything. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 11:32, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Chris j wood, would have been good if you had taken the same approach also in Europe. With a sole change of Iran, the subcontinents exactly follow the UN standard. Europe exactly follows the UN standard. Please discuss before you mess up the work of others. There may be another solution to your "intuition", like the one suggested above. gidonb (talk) 12:06, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Ok, moved the discussion to -- chris_j_wood (talk) 13:26, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Extra structure in this article
@Gidonb:Ok, to make things (I hope) clearer, I've started a new section as you suggested.

Firstly let me apologise if my section title came across as 'giving marks'. What I was trying to get across was that I didn't think I was reverting vandalism. I'm well aware that your earliest edits to this article date back to December 2007, around the time I first edited it, so I'm quite sure that you have its best interests at heart. If that isn't how it came across, then sorry.

I don't, on the other hand, feel the need to apologise for making the change without consulting. Any more than you should feel the need to apologise for making your change without consulting. We have both been editing WP long enough to know that nothing is ever lost, and reverting and/or reinstating changes is a fairly simple task. The way WP makes progress is by people being bold, and then working out the consequences in some sort of consensus.

Moving onto the actual issue, to be honest, until you mentioned them in your response, I had no idea that the UN had definitions for sub-divisions of Europe (I'm assuming that these are the ones you are referring to). I do note that they are for statistical purposes, which doesn't necessarily commend them as a content indexing strategy for a list article. And they certainly are not in common usage, which surely is something we ought to look for in such a strategy. And also I'd point out that the article does not exactly follow the UN standard. To do that we would have to unite North and South America as a single continent called 'The Americas' and then split that into sub-continents 'Latin America and the Caribbean' and 'Northern America'. And put Mexico in the former rather than the latter.

I think what I simply didn't get, and what you didn't explain in your edit comments, is why you feel the need was for an extra level of structure. There are, after all, only 190-odd countries in the world, and (if I count right) only 50 listed in this article. And for that number, two superior levels of contents indexing seems a huge overkill. Even with an increased TOC level, it makes life more difficult for the reader who wants to look up all the funiculars in a given country (which I perceive to be the most common use-case) for no good reason that I can see. It might help the discussion if you could indicate the use-case or cases that you believe adding an extra level of structure benefits. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 13:26, 8 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Hi chris_j_wood, thank you for moving the discussion and for the thought and effort that went into your contribution. Let's start with the reason to split up a long list of funiculars into continents, subcontinents, and countries, cause this should not be automatic. All else falls and stands on this. The need has to do with optimizing the spatial organization so readers can consider data in spatial environments. Ideally they will be able to process how many and which (in this case) funiculars are in a country within the framework of its region. Region here can be a continent or subcontinent. Too many items per continent means difficult to consider the region. Too few makes it also difficult to integrate. BTW true also for subnational divisions vs national divisions.


 * I can totally see why the UN geoscheme for the Western hemisphere causes you distress. I reject this typology for different reasons. First, the double-continent of the Americas and its Northern America/Latin America & Caribbean subdivisions are *NOT* continents but regions in the UN geoscheme. WP uses 7 continents that can further be divided into subcontinents and the UN geoscheme uses regions that lend themselves for that purpose. The inclusion of Mexico in Northern America or Central America is not important to the discussion at this article and, in either case of classification, the country is on the CONTINENT of North America.


 * As you imply there is some resentment to the idea of Mexico in Central America which has to the do with a generational progression of spatial perception from double continent to single continent thinking. In the US folks have developed this illogical perception of a North America within a North America and since most stick to the ideas they grew up with this will only gradually unravel. In Mexico, folks can be concerned that if they are part of Central America they are not part of North America as, like Europe, it has worked with the continent "America" (Americas in English). However, as I noted before, Northern America AND Central America are BOTH in North America.


 * As I see it, the main problem with the UN Americas typology, even before the desire to please everyone by including an intercontinental region, is the misnomer of this intercontinental region. At WP, aside from Mexico, this part doesn't matter as we always use the continents first. Mexico eventually will resolve itself as new Wikipedians come in. Theoretically there is a UN geoscheme problem also with Oceania, however, again not for WP classification purposes and definitely not in this article.


 * With my addressing of the problems (also before), I haven't discussed the strengths of the UN geoscheme and these are, atypically for the UN, many. Again, before any other discussion comes the need to optimize the number of countries per group. If we disagree on that, the rest is interesting but irrelevant. gidonb (talk) 15:02, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Inclined elevators
As described at the funicular article: "...Counterbalance of two vehicles is also a distinguishable feature of funiculars which separates them from inclined elevators", which is supported by the relevant references.

So far these are the inclined elevators included in this list:
 * Drahtseilbahn Hotel Montana
 * Odessa Funicular
 * also according to :


 * Montmartre Funicular
 * Spa, Funiculaire de Spa (fr)
 * Lärchwandschrägaufzug
 * Katoomba Scenic Railway

A few days ago I've removed Drahtseilbahn Hotel Montana from the list, commenting it as "Hotel Montana has not a funicular, but an inclined lift as there is no counterbalancing 2nd cabin there". Despite this re-added it back to the list with the comment.

Apparently this issue requires some discussion -- Vаdiм (talk) 13:32, 13 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Surely does. Counterbalance is indeed key to the definition of a funicular, but the article Funicular goes beyond normal usage, and AFAICS its own references, by requiring that counterbalance to be provided by twin vehicles both carrying a payload. Many (most?) single-cabin inclined lifts do use a counterbalance, often running on a track parallel to and below the track carrying the cabin, and are therefore also funiculars. I have requested that the funicular article either provides appropriate references for the 'with payload' requirement, or be rewritten in line with more normal usage.


 * Thus, for example, our article on the Montmartre Funicular explicitly says that each car has its own counterweight. In which case it is still a funicular (or possibly two funiculars) and should stay in this list. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 10:43, 14 June 2018 (UTC)


 * The Funicular and Funicular sections are based on reliable, published sources, which are academic works, published by "respected publishing houses" or "university-level textbooks". @u|chris_j_wood, it is quite logic: in Wikipedia you need to have such a source --Vаdiм (talk) 18:22, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Statement of coverage
There is an ongoing debate at Talk:Funicular about what is, and indeed whether there is, a distinction between a funicular and an inclined elevator. I've amended the lead of this article to hopefully remove it from that debate, by making explicit what was always the intention of the list. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 10:56, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Reverted these changes as per Talk:Funicular --Vаdiм (talk) 08:55, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Why Can I not Move Turkey to the Europe Category?
The three funicular railways listed are all in the European part of Turkey, not in the Asian part. When I went to edit the article, I saw an off-putting note saying:

"moving to Europe will lead to blocking of user and IP"

Why is this? Turkey is officially in both Europe and Asia, so why should this article not list the funicular railways correctly? --User:Gnomon42 14:31, 23 July 2018 (UTC)


 * They were added here by at the start of the year. Note that they've added these warnings for Georgia, Azerbaijan and Turkey. Hopefully Gidonb will explain their purpose to us.
 * Warnings like this may be well intentioned, but they carry zero weight. As such, they are unwelcome here and I will be removing them later on, if Gidonb doesn't care to do it themselves.
 * Gidonb is not an admin, and cannot block anyone. Nor do admins carry any additional weight in a content dispute, as such would be (sadly there are many admins who don't observe this). The geographical description of each of these three countries is not trivial and such things are always contentious. However the regular WP editing rules of sourcing such changes, so as to be WP:VERIFIABLE from WP:RELIABLESOURCES apply (so, if challenged, would be a claim that the sky was blue and that water was wet). This is just our normal practice, we don't wrap it in empty threats.
 * If (and only if) such issues were contentious in this article, or in some recognisable set of related articles, then there might be a discretionary sanction applied. See WP:ACDS or many other political hotspots. The nearest relevant ones I can see are WP:ARBEURO & WP:ARBAA2 (sorry, but I know these pages are almost unreadable). They would normally be linked from the talk pages of affected articles.
 * If you can source and justify your change, then go ahead and make it. You will be expected to be able to justify it, and please try to write clearly. If your point is that the country straddles a geographic boundary, but that the location of the funicular is very clearly to one side, then please make that clear and phrase it in a neutral and non-contentious way. If such a change is 'clearly wrong' because it's against some already-decided wiki-decision then it might even be reverted forthwith by someone familiar with an old argument (see WP:DERRY - these things don't have to be right, we sometimes agree just to stick with one form alone to save argument). However you'd be acting in clear WP:GOODFAITH there, and so no-one needs to end up blocked. Thanks for raising and discussing it first. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:26, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Andy. --User:Gnomon42 09:29, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Countries spanning continents
As we have now moved Turkey into Europe, how do you propose we should handle Russia?. We have two funiculars listed, one in Sochi and the other in Vladivostok. Apparently, despite being well to the east of Istambul, Sochi is normally considered as being in Europe. Vladivostok clearly isn't. Should we split Russia and list it both in Europe and Asia?.

Are there any other continent spanning countries we need to consider?. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 13:27, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Funicular means two cars that counterweight each other
I have paid attention only to the English list. The long-gone Broadstairs is not a funicular if it had only one car, and the Southend-on-Sea cliff lift is also not a funicular for the same reason. I removed both. If the list includes single cars with counterweights, we have hundreds of thousands of "lifts" or "elevators" to list here. The list already excludes the "cliff lifts" at Whitby and Shanklin, which are vertical elevators, that is, single cars with counterweights. I think we need to follow the definition that requires two cars that counterweight each other. JoeBrennan (talk) 01:30, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

I thought about this change afterwards and I have just undone it myself rather than be guilty of vandalism. The Southend lift is a particularly tough case. "Though having a single car, the lift is a true counter balanced funicular," says the text of the booklet "An Illustrated Guide to the Funicular Railways of Great Britain," Heritage Railway Association, 2014, and when I rode on the lift in June 2019 the volunteer running it told me it is a funicular. This may be simply loose talk contradicting the proper definition, but I'd be happier to have other opinions on removing these or keeping them but marked as inclined elevators as I have just done. Note, the same booklet calls the Birmingham Airport Air-Rail a funicular, which is quite impossible since it is level! JoeBrennan (talk) 15:11, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Lifts and elevators aren't publicly accessible from outside the building. Where they are (street lifts are around in a few towns, such as Lisbon, Ebbw Vale and Turku) then they're included here too. Additionally, 'lifts' (by the main definition, although the term varies nationally) are vertical and don't carry their weight on rails, as funiculars do (but then, South Wales also had a number of vertical industrial water balance lifts, sometimes included). Andy Dingley (talk) 16:06, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

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