Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Trains/Archive: 2004

I'm seeing an increasing number of Wikipedians interested in trains and railways, and I think it would be a good idea to start a WikiProject on the subject to coordinate our efforts, establish standards, and help each other keep track of what's going on. We'll discuss more later, but I'd like to see if we can get something started here.

I anticipate that both trains and the railway infrastructure will be on topic. Stations appear to already have their own WikiProject. Model trains are probably also appropriate. &mdash;Morven 23:23, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * I had made a provisional link to "WikiProject Railways" in Stations but never did anything with it; this title might imply information on the actual train cars and locomotives. Still, it's a good idea, either way. :) I was wondering how to do railways, perhaps a cue can be taken from how well the London Tube has been presented. Beyond municipal rail systems, though, I'm not too well versed.


 * I'd be interested to see what ideas you have. :) --Golbez 23:35, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Some thoughts
Some thoughts User:duncharris

Firstly, need to have a top-down structure. I honestly think List of locomotives is pretty pointless, and could potentially run into several thousand! Perhaps list of famous locomotives is better (but then who decides what is famous?)

The first level would be perhaps be by country. So USA, Australia New Zealand, (presumably this is going to gravitate towards English-speaking countries). Note however, that lines in Ireland, both in Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland should be considered together since because of their common use of broad-gauge, (not any political things, its all historical). As a result, the Great Britain should be considered instead of the United Kingdom.

Secondly, to categorise everthing out there, would it be a good idea to put some boilerplate text at the top, possible so that we can see what links here? And owuld it be possible to cross-reference with stubs?


 * The point of List of locomotives was simply to keep track of what articles actually existed. Maybe it should be moved to a subpage of this one.


 * It's best to work both top-down and bottom-up, I think, because we can't expect the contributors to Wikipedia to be willing to wait to write detail articles on topics until the top-level ones are written. But yes, some kind of top-down structure is good.


 * In terms of railway systems, yes, country articles linking to individual railway company articles that in turn link to detail articles. We're also going to have a parallel 'railway technology/terminology' set of articles that go alongside these to explain things.


 * Naming conventions: Railway companies should have their commonly used name as the main name unless this is ambiguous, in which case disambiguation by country is probably enough.  Abbreviations (LMS, GWR, ATSF) should not be the title but should be redirects.


 * Locomotives and stock: I think locomotive and similar articles should be named 'Company descriptor'.  Company is the railway using it if a one-railway locomotive, or the building company if a common design.  It should, in this instance, be the short version of the railway's name or manufacturer, initials if necessary.  Thus PRR, LMS, Alco.  The descriptor should be a name OR designation depending on what was commonly used, following the Wikipedia policy on common names.  So: LMS Turbomotive, PRR K4s.  I think wheel arrangement should generally not go in the article name (comments?).  Of course, redirects from any other common name.  Do you think GWR King class or GWR King?  I think the former, since 'King class' is the name of the type.


 * I want to include the company in there for uniformity and more helpful article titles. For one thing, numeric type designations sometimes clash between companies. &mdash;Morven 21:15, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Naming conventions of railways and rly companies should be use commas in name, and "and" instead of ampersand. Redirect pages with ampersands and misisng commas.


 * I think that structure proposed, e.g. LMS Princess Royal Class is a good idea. Official names or good offical descriptive names should be used.  Where there are names, there should be links to whatever they were named after.


 * The problem is of extending that to individual locomotives which had various numbers (so e.g. LMS Hughes Mogul number 13156 was first renumbered 2856 under the LMS 1934 renumbering scheme and later 42856 under BR.). I would suggest using the name of the company that built it, followed by its original number and note renumberings in the body of the main article.  The alternative would be to use its last number, but then some classes didn't survive to BR.duncharris 20:38, 4th Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * P.S. and what about the boilerplate text? And how about a railway dictionary of some sort?


 * Agreed, commas should be included, 'and' should be spelled out.


 * When individual locomotives are concerned, we should generally be referring in article text to its numbering at a specific time. If we're going to make an article about a very specific locomotive (rare, probably only famous locomotives at first) we should, following Wiki convention, use whatever number it's best known as.  Generally the number it first bore. &mdash;Morven 20:25, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)

A Rose by any another name...
Just a question as to the scope of this project, is this just for trains or is it including railways as well? --Golbez 20:12, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * I think it means all things to do with railways. As I understand it "trains" is just a neat word.  Rail transport may be more appropriate but longer winded. duncharris 21:36, 4th Apr 2004 (British daylight savings time)

Might it be appropriate to rename this WikiProject Rail to overcome this potential confusion? duncharris 2004-April-5 T 19:32 in UTC


 * I used 'Trains' to avoid the 'railroad' / 'railway' divide. The problem with 'rail' is that Americans don't generally use that term either. &mdash;Morven 19:54, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Fair enough.Duncharris 21:43, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)

British and American differences
What exactly should be done about the American/British railway/railroad terminology confusion on articles which are about railways in general and not just in individual countries.

Many railway related articles seem to be strange mix of both American and British railway terminology.

I dont think many people would find standardising on one countries terminology acceptable.

Anyone any ideas G-Man 18:32, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * It is silly having two pages for each term. Again, suggest having railway dictionary with terms.  There are several options.  As a first rule, when discussing American railroads, one should use American terms, when discussing British railways or indeed railways in the British Empire one should use British terms.  Options?:


 * Try to use neutral terms, perhaps more descriptive. e.g. unpowered rail vehicle for rolling stock and railroad car. I can see problems with this on the technical side of things.
 * Failing this, use both in the title. e.g. railroad car/rolling stock
 * Use mainly American terms, with British terms second because they're are more Americans than British.
 * Use mainly British terms, 'cos we invented them ;)
 * Use first alphabetically, which would produce a colourful mix!
 * Is there a precedence for this?
 * duncharris 2004-April-5 T 19:10 in UTC


 * Well, obviously articles about British trains should use British terminology, and American should use American terminology. The problem is when it's an article about railways or railway technology that should be shared.
 * I find it quite strange that the the category "Railway companies of the United States" wasn't properly titled "Railroad companies of the United States" from the get go. This should be corrected in my opinoin.


 * Note that the split is not absolute on that word. There are and have been lots of American rail companies named " Railway" - the Santa Fe being one of the better known.  "Railroad" is rare in England, though. &mdash;Morven 14:50, Aug 12, 2004 (UTC)


 * It would clearly be unacceptable to have duplicate articles about every piece of terminology that isn't shared. I definitely suggest in any such article, when a term is used that is different in the other nation's terms, the other one should be stated on first use, even if it makes the article a bit cluttered.  E.g. the first use of 'bogie' should be followed by '(US: truck)', and the first use of 'stack' should be followed by (UK: chimney). &mdash;Morven 19:50, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think neutral terms should be used wherever possible like "rail line" instead of railroad/railway for example. I think I proplosed a while ago that a page should be created about British/American rail terminology G-Man 20:15, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Let's start one, then. It's essential.  The problem is that railroad technology was created at just the wrong time: parallel development in both countries before good communications would have encouraged shared engineering discourse.  Let's use neutral terms WHEN POSSIBLE, but not when it makes for more awkwardness. &mdash;Morven 20:19, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Suggest name Rail Terminology. Redirects from Railway Terminology and Railroad Terminology. Duncharris 21:14, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Made stub with suggested structure. Accept? Duncharris 21:43, 5 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Renamed to Rail terminology following Wikipedia standard (don't capitalise non-initial words unless it's a proper noun) &mdash;Morven 15:52, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Right then. Several secondary pages.

Firstly, rail transportation by country page, should link through to descriptions of all the systems. eventually...

rail terminology already mentioned.

Model railways because its an odd topic.

Possibly another, perhaps rail operations or rail transport operations? Duncharris 17:31, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Rail transport modeling potential subcategories
Not sure if this is the right place to put this, but I can envision two, possibly three good subcategories for modeling: scales/gauges (could be two, since gauge is sometimes out of scale) and manufacturers/brands (also could be two, potentially). Also, I was wondering how we might pull Toy train into this. While it certainly has a lot in common with model railroading, it's not exactly the same hobby. Or does this need to be pulled in?

Thoughts or comments? --Dave Farquhar 19:02, 31 May 2004 (UTC)


 * How about a section for prominent model railroaders (e.g. John Allen, John Armstrong, Tony Koester, etc.) or their railroads (e.g. Gorre & Daphetid, Canandaigua Southern, Allegheny Midland, etc.)? I was thinking of adding a page for NTrak since I do so much of it (just displayed my modules at another show this last weekend in Monroe, WI), so maybe a section for modular railroading?  slambo 17:47, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

About Structure
Before someone dives into splitting eveything by countries, it might be more logical to split by manufacturer: a very large number of countries' trains were built in other countries and exported there ... (and sometimes they return decades later ;-) Another option would be split by motive power (steam/diesel/gas-turbine/diesel-electric/electric-hi/electric-lo/etc). Much of it can be paralled with multiple indices of course --VampWillow 22:11, 4 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Union Station
I merged union station into Union Station simply to eliminate confusion, and made a link from train station. Now somebody's modified train station with some terminology I'm not familiar with (interchange station). I sort of regret I did anything, so would somebody familiar with the precise terminology take a look and make sure its correct? Thanks. Mackerm 07:12, 11 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Where the photo of GWR castle class go?
Anyone know? Dunc_Harris|&#9786; 10:44, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Some thoughts and questions...
Hi everyone! I've been adding North American railroad information that I know or have access to, starting a few pages for various railroads and trains. The most significant page (in terms of disk space) that I've created so far is the List of named passenger trains. There are quite a few more to add as I go through my timetable collection to gather data as well as Googling around for it. I've also created a category called Named passenger trains as a subcategory of Rail transport. Some quick searching around (and creating a couple articles like 20th Century Limited and Super Chief) and we've got articles populating the new category. However, should we possibly add a further subcategory for named trains per continent?

The second item is more of a question. Under the Railway companies of the United States category, should we split out the company names for defunct companies into a Fallen flags subcategory? There aren't a whole lot of pages specific to one railroad yet, but the List of United States railroads includes a rather extensive list of fallen flags (but I noticed it was missing Green Bay & Western so I added it there and created a page for it too). It would be easier to recategorize the pages for fallen flags now than it would be after we add pages for many more of them.

Finally, what is the threshhold for the number of edits/additions to be considered a project participant? Since I've been adding so much information on American railroading, it probably won't be too long until I hit that threshhold, if I haven't surpassed it already. slambo 02:58, 26 Sep 2004 (UTC)


 * You're a project participant when you decide to be. There's no threshold or criteria.


 * The named trains should probably be broken out eventually, when the existing category gets unmanageable ... no need now if you don't want to. &mdash;Morven 04:26, Sep 26, 2004 (UTC)

Project todolist?
Okay, here's another thought. Now that I've had some more practice adding new articles (the latest that I added tonight was Stourbridge Lion), how about a section on the project page or a subpage like maybe WikiProject_Trains/Todo where we list articles that need improvement or that we want to see written? I'm thinking of something along the lines of the requested articles list, but the articles would be specific to this project. Rather than randomly adding articles, such a list could help us identify what really needs to be documented as well as provide a strategy to fill out information on the topic. Thoughts? slambo 02:08, 22 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * It's been a few days, and hearing no dissents, I'm making the proposed todolist official. slambo 16:11, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Railroad summary template
I've created a summary template that we can use on pages that discus specific railroads. The template itself is at Template:Railroad, and it will accept parameters for:
 * railroad_name - the most common name by which the railroad is known
 * logo_filename - the filename of an uploaded image of the railroad's logo
 * railroad_abbr - the most common abbreviation by which the railroad is known
 * marks - the railroad's official reporting marks
 * locale - where the railroad operated
 * start_year and end_year - two parameters to define when the railroad was in operation; these will be automatically linkified
 * gauge - the track gauge(s) on which the railroad operated
 * hq_city - the city where the railroad kept its headquarters

There are probably a few more parameters that we can put here, but this gives a quick overview of the railroad. Two examples of it in use are Wisconsin Central and Green Bay and Western. This is the first version of such a box for specific railroads, so please suggest anything else that you would want to see in such a summary box. slambo 18:30, Oct 28, 2004 (UTC)


 * A few days later and no dissents, so I'm going to start adding this template to other railroad articles. slambo 11:39, Nov 2, 2004 (UTC)

Locomotive Cyclopedia
I have just acquired a copy of the 1922 Locomotive Cyclopedia of American Practice, an over 1100 page book about the state of the art of locomotives and their equipment in the United States at that time. It's sort of a half-catalog, half-descriptive work - sections are clearly written by various manufacturers about their products. Being 1922, it's public domain, so it's a huge source of images for various articles.

I've already put a few up (see PRR K4s, Booster engine) but I plan to do a huge number more. It should improve our coverage of locomotive equipment, in particular.

If anyone wants me to look for an image or text about any subject likely to be covered, please ask.

I'm hunting down copies of the car builders' cyclopedia, the railroad equipment one and the streetcar one too, so we'll see if I can get those. They're not cheap, alas. &mdash;Morven 00:48, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)


 * Cool. I've just added a short template and category similar to  for this resource.  Just add  to articles that use it. I wonder if there are any resources on Project Gutenberg or other such similar projects that we can use? slambo 15:05, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)


 * I moved the template to because the other seemed just a bit too ambigious to me. &mdash;Morven 17:42, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)

There is a similar book by Aherns from about 1925; I'd also recommend using a longer boilerplate msg. Are you sure it's in the public domain? How many authors does it have? Dunc|&#9786; 17:07, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * According to various sources, including Wikipedia articles, the US Copyright Office, and this, works first published in the United States before 1923 are now in the public domain, regardless of the author's lifespan. Works published elsewhere may still be copyrighted, depending on copyright law in the nation of first publication.  Since this is entirely an American work detailing American practice, it's certainly PD. &mdash;Morven 17:38, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)