Talk:New York and New England Railroad

Name of this article

 * The intro to this article is very confusing - it should either be re-worded to talk about the New York and New England Railroad first, in context of names previous and after - OR it should simply be renamed "New England Railroad". --Marcbela (talk) 00:11, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Map?
A route map (possible showing what was built or acquired when) would be much more useful than a list of stations. --Piledhigheranddeeper (talk) 21:55, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Maps are good, but I disagree about the station list. Furthermore other station lists could be applied to the branches. -User:DanTD (talk) 03:49, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

External links modified (February 2018)
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Norwich and Worcester
In section "Combined routes from Providence and Boston: 1863-1898," 3rd para., "Norwich and Worcester Railroad" is hyperlinked. Clicking on it just jumps you, annoyingly, to the top of the present article. Getteth it don't-eth I.

Jimlue (talk) 04:54, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Dividing up articles
I want to start a discussion on how to divide up the NYN&NE mainlines and corporate names. As we work towards getting the main NY&NE article to GA/FA status, it will be necessary to focus it on the corporate history and the larger scale operations, plus a higher-level description of the geography. The branchlines can all be given their own articles, with history and station listings there, and just a list of branchlines on the NY&NE article. The mainlines (Hopewell Junction–Brewster–Danbury–Waterbury–Hartford–Willimantic–Plainfield–Providence and Willimantic–Putnam–Southbridge–Blackstone–Franklin–Readville–Boston) are trickier. I think there's two main options:
 * Two main mainline articles:
 * Hartford, Providence and Fishkill Railroad, covering the full Hopewell Junction–Brewster–Danbury–Waterbury–Hartford–Willimantic–Plainfield–Providence mainline history and station listing.
 * Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad, covering the full Willimantic–Putnam–Southbridge–Blackstone–Franklin–Readville–Boston mainline history and station listing, except for the MBTA-era histories covered at Franklin Line and Fairmount Line
 * Upsides: presents coherent histories of the full mainlines. Allows some of the pre-1860s corporate history to be moved to those articles. Downsides: may end up with separate stubs for some items like Washington Secondary Rail Trail. (I dislike perma-stubs for rail articles.)
 * Sectional articles:
 * Hartford, Providence and Fishkill Railroad and Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad redirect to the NY&NE history, which covers their corporate history and large-scale operations
 * Fairmount Line, covering the Readville–Boston section (and the earliest history of the Islington–Readville section) from inception to present
 * Franklin Line, covering the Blackstone–Readville section from inception to present. Norfolk County Railroad redirects there.
 * The Willimantic–Blackstone section, under whatever name makes sense
 * The Hartford–Willimantic section, the remaining portion of which is called the Manchester Secondary
 * The Waterbury–Hartford section, most of which is now the Waterbury Branch (CSX)
 * The Hopewell Junction–Brewster–Danbury–Waterbury section, collectively called the Danbury Extension by Karr, and some of which became part of the Maybrook Line
 * The Willimantic–Plainfield section, now the P&W Willimantic Branch
 * The Plainfield–Providence section, aka Washington Secondary. Could be merged with a properly-pared-down Washington Secondary Rail Trail.
 * Upsides: allows detailed histories of each section, including station listings, without getting too big. The pre-MBTA and MBTA histories of the two commuter services aren't divided up.

My preference at the moment is for the sectional articles. I think that makes it easier to provide a start-to-finish history for each section. The BH&E and the HP&F were relatively short lived, so it makes more sense to discuss them in a combined context. It's not clear how much coherent history the two mainlines actually need; other than a few through services like the Nutmeg and White Train, they pretty quickly went back to being operated as smaller segments. (Nutmeg could probably be a catchall article for all the Boston–Hartford/Waterbury intercity services.) However, either method would be better than the current article, which has high-level corporate history and low-level detail mashed together. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 20:01, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
 * It looks like you missed the Hartford to Springfield section in your listing - I've covered that at Connecticut Central Railroad (1871). It works well there since the Connecticut Central Railroad was an actual independent railroad for a few years and the Connecticut portion of the line (minus the branch to Rockville) is still intact. The HP&F line from Waterbury to Berlin I have heard referred to as the "Connecticut Cluster" though I believe this also includes the Canal Line. I think there's enough to be said that we could have an article on the Washington Secondary (a.k.a. the Providence and Plainfield Railroad, which is probably what I'd title it personally).
 * There's a lot to digest here, and I have to admit I'm less familiar with the lines near Boston, but have we considered doing both? The Hartford, Providence and Fishkill operated from 1849 to 1878, that's 29 years and I am pretty sure we could easily have enough to justify a full article there. There's also the possibility of doing the mainline articles and then doing sectional articles where it makes sense. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 20:40, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
 * I also think the Norfolk County Railroad merits its own article. There were two periods of independent operations and based on my research for bringing Providence and Worcester Railroad to FA there was quite a bit that happened with the Norfolk Country's bankruptcy (including a failed hostile takeover attempt of the P&W). Trainsandotherthings (talk) 20:44, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I was counting the Connecticut Central as a branch line in that accounting. As with all the NY&NE lines except the mainlines, it's obvious what the scope of the article should be.
 * The problem with doing both is that you either end up with a lot of repeated history, or the history of a single track segment gets split up between multiple articles. I'm not sure there's going to be that much BH&E or HP&F history that is both too detailed for the NY&NE article and too broad for the section articles. If we do two mainlines, not all (and maybe few) segments really need separate articles. The Willimantic–Blackstone segment is a perfect example: there's probably enough for a 500-1000 word article, but the vast majority of that would be in a BH&E article anyway.
 * I'm not opposed to the Norfolk County having a separate article in either scenario, but we'll have to make decisions about how to divide things up. There are three topics (the Blackstone–Irvington–Dedham railroad line, the corporate entity that built that line and the Medway Branch, and Blackstone/Franklin–Boston passenger service), and we have to decide what goes where. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 21:28, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
 * It's a side matter, but I'm working on the Medway Branch right now. To my thinking, the line gets its own article because it had multiple owners, but the Medway Branch Railroad should be handled there and in Norfolk County Railroad (once it's converted from a redirect), as it doesn't have much history of its own. Mackensen (talk) 21:30, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
 * I have a mild preference for the two mainlines approach, with the caveat that I'm still wrapping my head around the corporate history and what was built when. See Main Line (Reading Company) for an example of a unified approach. Mackensen (talk) 20:43, 15 April 2023 (UTC)