Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of defunct United States railroads


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   no consensus. Consensus leans towards deletion, but various solutions have been suggested that would rectify the problems raised here without wholesale deletion of the article - possibly involving cutting it down and merging info elsewhere. There is sufficient argument in favour of this path that I do not think a consensus to delete has yet been established. I would recommend a renomination of this article in the intermediate future if the unmaintainability and navigability problems remain unsolved. ~ mazca  talk 13:52, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

List of defunct United States railroads

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

In short, this single list is too unmaintanable, and has been replaced by lists by state.

It has about 2000 railroads listed. I just finished redoing the pages listed on Template:US railroad lists for all 50 states and D.C., listing all defunct railroads I could find; the total number is over 10,000 railroads. In addition, about half of the companies on list of defunct United States railroads didn't actually build or operate anything; they were just chartered and left to die, and should not be listed. (I checked each one that was on that list but not on one of the state lists, and got under 20 that needed to be added to the state lists.)

This has also been discussed a bit at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Trains/Archive: 2008, 4.

In other words, the state lists are much easier to maintain and have better information. NE2 16:28, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  -- – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 17:38, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of United States of America-related deletion discussions.  -- – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 17:38, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Transportation-related deletion discussions.  -- – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 17:38, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * It's also been posted to WT:TWP. --NE2 17:40, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment. You say there are state lists. Rather than deleting this article, wouldn't it be more practical to make it a dab or index for those articles (or alternatively to create such a dab or index at another title then redirect this page there)? AndyJones (talk) 17:54, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * (edit conflict) Keep as an index to state lists. The information is worthy of inclusion, but as you say the state lists are better and have superseded this list. The title is useful and has lots of incoming links, so it should be reconstructed as an index to the state lists. There is no need to remove the edit history and so deletion is not a necessary (or even valuable) precursor to doing this and consensus could easily have been sought on the talk page. Thryduulf (talk) 18:05, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * There are actually only 20 15 incoming links that aren't through transclusion of US railroad lists. Out of those:
 * 6 are "easter egg" links such as United States railroad
 * 9 are in the "see also" section or a template such as see
 * 5 are just plain horrible links such as Leavenworth, Lawrence and Galveston Railroad just fixed these
 * The only ones I could justify keeping if I were editing the article are a few of the "see also" links, in which case it might make more sense to insert US railroad lists. If the concern is about links from offsite, a redirect to that template might make sense after all links are removed. --NE2 18:21, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment -- a list of this size is too vast to be useful: split into lists by State; categorise those lists (thus providing a link between them), and only then delete this article. Peterkingiron (talk) 18:13, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Already done, if you read the nomination. --NE2 18:21, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep as a state-level directory — the National Register of Historic Places wikiproject has split many lists into pieces, but always retains the statewide list article as a directory; see National Register of Historic Places listings in Wyoming for an example. Why wouldn't such a practice be useful with railroads?  Nyttend (talk) 19:04, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * For example: I expect that there's a way that you determine whether a railroad belongs on any of these lists. If there is, this page could include a list of railroads per state (like a number of sites per county on the Wyoming list), list of railroads that crossed state lines, and perhaps more.  Nyttend (talk) 19:05, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * There is a way to determine (if it built anything, even unfinished grading, or was consolidated into one that build anything), but there's no way to be sure that we have them all, especially when it comes to minor street railways and the like. In fact, I'd guess that all states but Delaware and southern New England have at least one steam common carrier missing. --NE2 19:09, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Even if you can't have a complete list, the page would still be useful as a directory. However, you could always say "this may be an incomplete list" in the list-by-states section, and add newly-discovered railroads when you discover them.  Nyttend (talk) 19:13, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The state lists do say that they're incomplete. What would you put on list of defunct United States railroads that's not in Category:Defunct railroad companies of the United States? --NE2 19:19, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * As I said, an approximate list? I'm assuming that you've not missed many railroads, and it would likely be useful to show that this state had a larger number than that state, etc.  Nyttend (talk) 19:34, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I've missed enough that a number would be meaningless, especially if you include electric railways. --NE2 20:05, 1 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete per nomination, and per my own comments in the previous linked discussion. Mackensen (talk) 20:37, 1 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete per nom. A state-by-state breakdown is far less unwieldly, and easier to navigate. Keeping the current article as a link list is uneeded, as there are few enough links to it that they can be easily replaced. oknazevad (talk) 21:34, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom and everyone else. JBsupreme (talk) 21:43, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Commennt myself and Nyttend !voted to keep prior to your comment and Mjroots has done so subsequently. Thryduulf (talk) 12:53, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 *  Suggestion  : I'm not sure what the point of this is, not commenting one way or other, but I have often wanted a list of "defunct public companies" or companies that had public stock ( and presumably some really seductive stories ) and then went under. Obviously you think about the dot com bubble, but these recurr in biotech quite often and of course many companies did well for a while but nothing lasts forever. The purpose of this is to have failures to analyze and get more prespective on companies and invesmtents. Bubbles and hype have been a huge problem lately. While I personally think much of this is intentional as responsibility for money has been delegated to people with various incentive conflicts ( I have constantly defended the FDA on similar issues but they are often accused of financial conflicts too), negative controls may make investors more prudent in the future. I'm not trying to moralize but just suggesting that there are a many researchers who could benefit and the same sources ( primary and secondary ) that would have been annoying hype prior to the company's failures make a good entry after the case is closed on the company. Just something to consider. Nerdseeksblonde (talk) 22:21, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't think you understand. The information is there in the state lists like list of Utah railroads. List of defunct United States railroads is simply a greatly incomplete version that would be huge were it complete. --NE2 22:24, 1 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Peripheral Issue: fwiw. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nerdseeksblonde (talk • contribs) 10:15, 2 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep: Suggestion: Make this list into a master list (like List of windmills. Then create lists by first letter for each of the letters of the alphabet (these can be split if necessary) - see Empire A ships where the various lists are split that way. Mjroots (talk) 10:25, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Those would be just as unmaintainable as this list. --NE2 11:56, 2 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment: NE2 certainly makes a valid case for deletion, and I applaud his work on fixing many of the state-specific defunct railroad chapters. However I like Nyttend's suggestion. They should all lead to the defunct RR chapters for each state and territory. DanTD (talk) 17:59, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.