Talk:List of town tramway systems in Africa

Untitled
I decided to split this list into three parts because the file size has reached "156K and growing. Ldemery 07:42, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Transcriptions from Japanese
I changed "Akiu" to "Akyū (Akiu)" under Sendai because printed reference (Wakuda) unambiguously says あきゅう in kana (Japanese) and AKYŪ in rōmaji (Latin alphabet) form. I see that the Wikipedia article for the particular electric railway (秋保電気鉄道) does not agree (あきう, AKIU). This is not surprising, and brings up the pitfalls of transcribing Japanese into the Latin alphabet for "railway" (and tramway) purposes.

The Wikipedia style manual stipulates the "Modified Hepburn" transcription system - but does not address a couple of problems that come up for "railway" purposes.

One of these is the use of hyphens and lower-case letters in station names. Neither exists in Japanese script, so there are few rules on how to use these when transcribing. Actual station signs are not a good reference because these usually use "all caps, no hyphens." When necessary, I use hyphens and caps for readability; a good example might be a former "longest" railway station name in Japan: 長者ヶ浜潮騒はまなす公園前 in kanji, ちょうじゃがはましおさいはまなすこうえんまえ in kana, and CHŌJAGAHAMASHIOSAIHAMANASUKŌENMAE on the station sign itself. I would change the latter for the sake of readability to Chōgahama-Shiosai-Hamanasu-kōen-mae.

The second problem, a much greater issue in the pre-Internet era, was how to determine the "correct" pronunciation, and therefore "spelling," of Japanese geographic names, railway company titles - and persons such as the company founder. Pronunciations of Japanese dictionary words are standardized but geographic and personal names are not.

Pronunciations ("readings") of geographic names are also subject to change. Some of these changes are made for conformity with standard Japanese - but I can think of at least one change which (defiantly?) reflects the local dialect. The main street of Kyōto, 烏丸通り, is pronounced Karasumaru-dōri in standard Japanese but in the local dialect, "maru" in this case is simply "ma," thus Karasuma-dōri. All signs in Kyōto refer to the street (and the subway line below) as "Karasuma."

In Sendai, judging from evidence online, "Akyū" has been changed to "Akiu" with reference to the hot-spring district. Perhaps the entry should be changed to "Akiu (hist: Akyū)", and this form should be used for similar cases (probably very few, at least in this list).

The Japan material winds up my contributions to this section. I've tried to include "all" African and Asian town tramway systems for which I could find documentation. I hope that others will correct errors and fill in blanks.Ldemery 20:09, 13 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I forget exactly how I stumbled on this page, but it looks like an amazing effort. I wasn't aware of any instances of Akiu being romanized, or even kana-ized, as Akyū; so that's why I changed it.  After seeing your comments here, I googled あきゅう and あきう in various combinations with 温泉 (onsen) and the kanji 秋保.  There were a few blogs with Akyū but most were Akiu; and all official sites (travel) I could find were Akiu.  FWIW, the road signs here all say Akiu.
 * The historical aspect of the changed pronunciation is something I hadn't considered. What is the Wakuda source you mention?  I know some older folks here who may remember if the hiragana was ever written as あきゅう.  In the meantime, there is a wikiproject for trains in Japan that I think I should plug here, in case you are interested in joining.  Neier 23:56, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

The Wakuda reference is:

和久田康雄 Wakuda, Yasuo. 1993. 私鉄史ハンドブック Shitetsu shi (Private Railways of Japan, Their Networks and Fleets, 1882 to 1991). Tôkyô: Denkisha-kenkyûkai.

This is a valuable reference for anyone interested in Japanese transport history. Ldemery 10:19, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Saga tramway photographs?
A bit OT, but: Lack of published photographs, and information received from a leading Japanese transport historian suggest, but only suggest, that no photographs of electric tramcars operating in Saga are known. This would be remarkable because of the late date of electrification - 1930. Ldemery 10:19, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Tripoli
The current link leads to the capital of Libya.--Achp ru 16:53, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Reversal of flagicon deletion
I have reversed the flagicon removal undertaken - rather presumptiously - by "Andrwsc"

As he noted in a personal e-mail to me - but was too cowardly to note here - "Andrwsc" acted prior to adoption of WP:FLAG into Wikipedia policy.

In other words, "Andrwsc" acted according to a "draft" policy, which has not yet been enacted.

That, in my view, is a high-handed and arrogant act by a "Wikipedia" administrator.

The "current" iteration of flagicons on this list, which I undertook in order to improve "user friendliness," is not "perfect" - but: to quote directly from "WP:FLAG"

"[Flagicons] can aid navigation in long lists or tables of countries, such as for reporting political, economic, sporting or other statistical data, and many readers can more quickly scan a table with many countries with flag icons because of visual differences between flags."

"Andrwsc" did not dispute this - generally or for this list.

I note in addition the passage from "WP:FLAG": "when added excessively, [flagicons] clutter the page and become redundant."

"Andrwsc" does not make this charge for this list. He merely argues - rather weakly - that:

1.) The [flagicons] were attached to section headers, and most sections were big enough that you couldn't see more than 1 or 2 icons on a screen at a time.

--Well, boo hoo hoo. As noted above, the "current" iteration of flagicons on this list is not "perfect". I think they "should" go in the "Contents" boxes rather than the section. But I do not know how to do this - or if it is (yet) possible. "Andrwsc" did not bother to suggest this, so I will assume it is not (yet) possible.

2.) Many of the "flags" were actually coat of arms, and a large number of them were somewhat obscure, so there really isn't any benefit for users to be able to scan the list using them as visual clues for the table of interest.

--Well, (boo hoo hoo)^(boo hoo hoo).

"I'd also note that about 180 new templates needed to be created solely to support these five articles, which is very much contrary to the purpose of templates - normally, each template would have many transclusions on many pages."

I find a certain circularity to this "logic." It would appear that I'm to conclude that each newly-created template will, as if by magic, automatically sprout "many transclusions on many pages."

Or that this has occurred with each template created up to now.

Or something like that.

I note that the "WP:FLAG" essay fails to specify who some of these "many readers" are: those whose first language is other than English. The addition of flagicons was not an attempt at "decoration," but of improving "user-friendliness" - in particular, for those whose first language is not English, and are likely to recognize national (and perhaps sub-national) flags more quickly. In some cases, I was forced to make additional templates - and to use coats of arms rather than actual flags (which are flown / used in some places as flags).

Let me reiterate:

The "current" iteration of flagicons on this list, which I undertook in order to improve "user friendliness," is not "perfect."

Let me also paraphrase a respected colleague: "Perfectionism is the enemy of the good." Ldemery 03:08, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Separation of Japan
I have created a separate list for Japan to improve user friendliness and to make this list more manageable. Ldemery 02:12, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

External links modified
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Nigeria: Metro (heavy rail) rather than tram (light rail)
A closer inspection of the two future rail systems under construction in Nigeria reveals that they are metro (heavy rail) rather than tram (light rail) systems. I propose to remove them from the list. --Thathánka Íyotake (talk) 13:37, 3 May 2019 (UTC)


 * So would anyone protest if I delete the Nigerian data? --Thathánka Íyotake (talk) 13:45, 23 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Done. --Thathánka Íyotake (talk) 23:11, 24 May 2019 (UTC)