Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Trains/Archive: 2008, 2

Question about Line guide in Noarlunga Centre railway line, Adelaide
Could you please tell me what the word leer means in the above Line guide? Is it a proper part of the Line guide or is it Vandalism? Kathleen.wright5 24:30, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't see that. In Spanish, "leer" translates as "to read", so I wonder if the problem would be related to language settings somewhere...  Slambo (Speak)  10:43, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not seeing anything wrong. Has it been fixed? TravellingCarithe Busy Bee 13:21, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * It is most definitely still affected. I've also noticed the same problem with the line guide for Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway. FYI, I am running an old Windows 2000 system; Firefox shows the word "leer" for every blank space in the line guide (ie every white square where there is no track or other feature), and Internet Explorer initially showed what appears to be the little red cross you get when an image can't be found, although the image eventually loaded. The line guide was, as far as I know, created by a German editor (hence the BHF symbol, bahnhof) and I believe "leer" is German for "empty". I'd be checking if someone's been making alterations to the template of late.
 * Zzrbiker (talk) 13:45, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Haven't seen this myself. In the original German implementation of the routemaps, empty sections were required to be filled with "leer" (for 'empty'). I think the map creation tool does this also. Most manually-created maps would not include it. Maybe the underlying templates rely on an underlying template that has been tweaked (possibly in Germany?).
 * Suggest you ask at Wikipedia talk:Route diagram template. EdJogg (talk) 14:27, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm still not seeing it. The German translation seems more likely than the Spanish translation and the possibility of someone working on the icon images seems plausible.  Do you still see it if you purge the cache (i.e. visit )?  If you click on where it says leer, does it take you to an image page?  Slambo (Speak)  14:28, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, it takes me to Image:BSicon leer.svg, but there is no image. The above article has been fixed but its still on some of the articles in Category:Railway lines in South Australia that use the Line Guide Template. Kathleen.wright5 15:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The point is that it's supposed to be a blank icon. Presumably the early versions of the template required it for spacing purposes. I didn't realise that it's presence would create a clickable link (although it's pretty obvious when you think about it!) But it certainly isn't a requirement. The vast majority of these routemaps do not use them.


 * Since they should be unnecessary, perhaps this has potential for an AWB run to remove them? (Thinly-veiled request for someone else to do the work!) A text search of 'leer railway' brings up 56 pages, although not all will need attention. I'll raise the point on the routemap template talk page, since they are the people to deal with the matter.
 * EdJogg (talk) 19:57, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * 'leer' icon is technically required for the correct positioning of other icons, especially in multi-column guides. There is no difference for using 'leer' parameter or an empty parameter, as all empty parameters are automatically interpreted as 'leer' and BSicon leer.svg is being called. And so removing 'leer' would not be important.
 * That's me who changed tooltips to show icon names when I made overlapping icons allowed, but I guess that's better than showing icon file names as in earlier implementation. It is possible to disable the tooltips of 'leer' icons, but I don't really know how to disable the link to Image:BSicon .svg. – Peter CX &amp;Talk 03:28, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Just to notify that now 'leer' is interpreted as empty, which is the reverse of the previous scheme, as anyway Image:BSicon leer.svg is redirected to Image:BSicon .svg. Also, tooltips for empty or leer icons are disabled now. – Peter CX &amp;Talk 04:09, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Very close inspection of the template code shows that 'leer' is the default element, used where no other icon is specified, and hence the routemaps can simply leave unused fields blank. Hence I now agree and accept that there is no need to remove 'leer' from the routemaps.
 * The bigger question is whether there is a need for tooltips at all. If they could be adjusted to show the name of the feature ('junction', 'major station', 'river bridge', etc), rather than the codename of the icon, that would be a great improvement (although it could pose language issues). Alternatively, disabling direct access to the template icon files would be even better (ie icons would not be clickable links, and the tooltip issue would not apply.
 * EdJogg (talk) 12:53, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * But using name of the feature in tooltips either requires a database template (causing high server burden) or manually inputted in diagrams (causing inconsistency). And also tooltips can help editors realise the icon codes, especially when the codes are not really obvious as in composite icons.
 * And also icon hyperlinks can be disabled by imagemap, but using hundreds of imagemaps in one page also causes server burden. I am not sure if there are simplier ways in doing it. – Peter CX &amp;Talk 13:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I tried to remove all Image:BSicon .svg and empty those cells. That is, no icon would be loaded in those cells, and so no problem of hyperlinks and tooltips. Some further notes can be found at WT:RDT. – Peter CX &amp;Talk 16:15, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Reverted... I cannot solve the display problem for collapsible tables... Can some experts solve that? – Peter CX &amp;Talk 17:13, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

WP:Rail Banner
I was just wondering if our project should have its own banner. See WT:Rail. Simply south (talk) 19:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

More infobox problems
Right now, all Harlem Line (Metro-North) and New Jersey Transit station articles are losing their colors. Why is this happening, and can somebody fixt them? DanTD (talk) 18:22, 22 March 2008 (UTC) (Outdent) The problem is Middleborough/Lakeville. It's so long, without breaking, that it forces abnormal width in the next station cell. The solution is to surround the '/' with spaces in Template:MBTA stations, which I've done now. Things should look better. Mackensen (talk) 15:58, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I fixed the Template:MNRR Harlem style so the Harlem Line articles are fine now. The NJT articles never had any colors, so what's there now is actually an improvement from before, but I think the Template:NJT Rail style can use more improvement. Murjax (talk) 22:12, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks Murjax, although I could've swore that each NJT line had their own colors. I don't know if you can fix this, but now there's a problem with infoboxes for MBTA Commuter Rail articles. DanTD (talk) 18:27, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
 * The MBTA Commuter Rail articles look fine to me. They never had any color templates for their infoboxes although they could use one. Murjax (talk) 17:13, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
 * But there is a problem with them. A lot of the routeboxes are going off-center. DanTD (talk) 12:26, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Example? Mackensen (talk) 13:06, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
 * South Station (Boston), for one. DanTD (talk) 14:27, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Bizarre. That shouldn't even be possible. Mackensen (talk) 15:43, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Rail accidents
I suppose this has been discussed before but with the articles List of pre-1950 rail accidents and List of 1950-1999 rail accidents, shouldn't List of rail accidents follow suit sort of with a name like List of rail accidents 2000-present? Simply south (talk) 19:46, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I actually agree. List of rail accidents could redirect to Category:Lists of rail transport accidents.  BTW, I just made a new Infobox rail accident.--MrFishGo Fish 23:48, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

WP:MONORAIL
WP:MONORAILS could use a lot of help attracting members and editing articles in it's scope (seeing as there are only two members). If anyone is interested, please sign up! Basketball110 My story/Tell me yours 01:33, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Are there really enough monorails in the world to justify a WikiProject? --RFBailey (talk) 02:03, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * It's a taskforce, actually. And I believe the point you brought up is the reason why it isn't a WikiProject. Basketball110  My story/Tell me yours 02:07, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Sorry, my mistake. Although I'm not really sure of the practical distinction between a task force and a WikiProject anyway.  Essentially they serve the same purpose.  --RFBailey (talk) 04:32, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * And from time to time, both need self-reminding about WP:OWN. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Olana North (talk • contribs) 09:55, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I thought that maglev, even though it does run on a single-railed track was in a completelt separate class than monorails. Simply south (talk) 19:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

A little history: I started the monorails task force in February of 2007. After several months, it attracted no members at all, so I had it deleted. Then, this March, Basketball110 convinced me to try again, and so far, after 2 months, still nothing, really. If this little discussion continues to bring no one, I think it should be folded again until monorails really get popular.--MrFishGo Fish 23:44, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Amtrak in Texas
Hey folks, I'm putting together an article on the apparently dead proposal for a Fort Worth/Dalls&mdash;Denver train variously called the Caprock Chief or Caprock Express. Any expert assistance (like why it suddenly dropped off the face of the earth) would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Mackensen (talk) 11:17, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Royal Blue (B&O train) &mdash; Today's Featured Article
On Thursday, May 15, this will be Today's Featured Article on Wikipedia's Main Page. Because of the huge amount of anon IP vandalism TFAs attract (averaging 100+ for the day), anyone who can help keep an eye on this article and revert vandalism is requested.  JGHowes talk  -  00:34, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

NRHP Combo Infoboxes
I have noticed a slight problem with the Infobox nrhp combo infoboxes. When the NRHP infobox is added to the main infobox, it causes a few things to be excluded. One of which is the services. The services info is usually found on the bottom of most infoboxes however on some articles, this is still found in it's own box on the bottom of the page. If you try moving it to an infobox with NRHP info added to it, nothing will happen. If you try adding a style to the infobox, it will also be excluded. An example is found on the Selma-Smithfield (Amtrak station) article. Does anybody have any ideas on how to fix this infobox glitch? Murjax (talk) 00:31, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed. With that scheme services needs its own template . Mackensen (talk) 10:42, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Not really. The NRHP section in Selma-Smithfield station went off-center. Plus, I just tried something like this for Farmingdale (LIRR station), and it didn't help. DanTD (talk) 13:43, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, the centering issue comes from the fact that the NRHP template has a default image width of 235, while Station has 300. If you specify an image width of 300 for NRHP the centering issue mostly goes away. The ultimate solution might be a wrapper template for NHRP; I'm not sure why it doesn't center. Mackensen (talk) 13:54, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, in any case Farmingdale's services include "Full Service Ticket Machine, Daily Ticket Machine, Pedestrian Tunnel," but things like that don't show up with combined railroad-NRHP infoboxes either. Incidentally, there's a discussion on the NRHP board regarding historic railroad station infoboxes right now. DanTD (talk) 14:08, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * You have to put any text you want to go with services underneath the infobox station services template. I did Farmingdale (LIRR station). Murjax (talk) 15:02, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Notability guidelines?
I may very well be missing something obvious or have bad search skills, but is there any general guideline on what makes a class of locomotive, an engineer or a particular locomotive notable? I'm not sure when it's appropriate to start a new article. --Tombomp (talk) 19:40, 16 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Some of this is discussed in WP:TWP/MOS, but mostly we go by the main WP:N criterion of multiple independent sources. Slambo (Speak) 19:45, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Updates coming to TrainsWikiProject banner
I finally managed to scrape some time together this week to start on updates to the TrainsWikiProject template. The bugs noted on the template's talk page are getting addressed, but more importantly, I'm working on collapsible sections for associated projects/task forces as well as for tasks that need to be done. The idea behind the collapsible sections is to keep the banner from taking up too much space when there are multiple associated projects/forces/tasks on a page; I used WikiProject China and WP Australia as models for this. The needed tasks section is not yet implemented in the test database, but I'm planning for it to work similar to the associated project/force section (you can use the UK parameters to try this out). My work in progress (which doesn't have all of the associated project/force parameters and almost none of the required task parameters yet) is at User:Slambo/TWP test 1. Praise/gripes/comments? AdThanksVance. Slambo (Speak) 14:40, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Good work - always nice to see a well-documented template too.
 * Zzrbiker (talk) 11:57, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject:Chicago Area Public Transportation
I finally submitted a suggestion for a proposed Chicago Area Public Transportation WikiProject to the project council. Discuss the issue on this page. DanTD (talk) 23:19, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Help: Move New Page to GrandLuxeRail ???
Hi there,

I made a new page for GrandLuxe Rail Journeys, a train which used to be American Orient Express. I'm not advertising them and if you read the copy, it is certainly objective - neither flattering nor flaming. It's a real train with strong history and I'm surprised there isn't already a page for it.

I was told it was being deleted for the very strange reason that it was a redirect for an implausable type. (Hu???)

Per suggestion by RHaworth (below)I am asking someone on this project to move it to GrandLuxe Rail Journeys.

--User3232 (talk) 16:57, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

=
=from RHaworth========================= Since you have no contributions history, there is an inevitable suspicion that you are advertising GrandLuxe Rail. But reading your article, I have to admit that it is not seriously spammy. What I suggest you do is:


 * create the article at user:User3232/sandbox. Wikify it properly - there is masses of scope for links out to the various railroads and coachbuilders
 * leave a request at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Trains for someone to move it to GrandLuxe Rail Journeys.

That will give it a far greater chance of surviving. (And if no-one is willing to move it, we will know it is spam!) -- RHaworth (Talk | contribs) 20:25, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Seaholme railway station, Melbourne
Article has been AfD'd. Mjroots (talk) 04:27, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

MLW locomotives
Tagged article List of MLW diesel locomotives for WikiProject Trains Sv1xv (talk) 06:57, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

List of NZ railfan jargon
I've tagged this as needing references improving. The UK list has been completely reworked, and the US one is about to be culled of unreferenced material. Therefore the NZ article should be treated in the same way. Time should be allowed for references to be provided, and unreference entries culled and archived after sufficient time has been given to provide references. Mjroots (talk) 13:35, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
 * As one of the main editors of the page, I'd say that this is probably going to be a little more difficult than the US and UK lists. Since New Zealand's such a small and out-of-the-way place, there isn't a huge wealth of literature on its railways.  I can probably hunt down references for most of these, but some will be challenging.  I particularly am not sure what to do with the more recent terms, as the vast majority of references I can access are too old - for example, the livery nicknamed "corn cob" is a 2000s development, while most of my Kiwi railway books were printed in the 1990s or earlier.  In any case, I can vouch for pretty much everything on the list, and many of the terms are in my vocabulary, so hopefully some references can be found.  I'll work on this over the current week. - Axver (talk) 15:25, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
 * That is why the entries that are removed from the article will go to a holding page. When a ref is found, it allows the info to be easily re-added by copy & paste, rather than having to hunt through the history. Don't panic about doing it all in a week, the UK list was allowed a month before the big cull. Are there magazines in NZ for railway enthusiasts that can be used as a ref? Mjroots (talk) 04:32, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, sounds good. Would a good plan be to move all unreferenced entries to a holding page at the end of June?  I'd have no objections to that timeframe.  There are magazines on New Zealand's railways, but I personally don't have access to them as I live in Australia nowadays and I've never been able to find them in a library that's easily accessible for me.  Hopefully some of the other editors active in the NZR WikiProject can help out there; I'll go and ask them. - Axver (talk) 11:41, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * End of June sounds like a reasonable timeframe to me. Thanks for helping out here.  Slambo (Speak)  13:41, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Reminder call for collaboration
It's been a while since I mentioned this here, but at the NMRA national convention in Anaheim this coming July, I'll be presenting a clinic on the state of the Trains WikiProject since the last national convention last summer in Detroit (where I presented an introductory clinic on this WikiProject). In keeping with the wiki spirit, please take a moment to stop in at my clinic notes page and add anything that you think needs to be discussed in such a clinic.

I'm not currently planning to attend the convention next year in Connecticut (so if another editor wants to take on that clinic, I can forward any materials that are needed), but as a member of the Midwest Region's Board of Directors, I will be at the 2010 convention in Milwaukee, and I was already directly asked to present a few clinics there by the current Region president.

AdThanksVance. Slambo (Speak) 18:13, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion: Move "Wikiproject Trains" to "Wikiproject Rail Transport"
The name of this project is confusing since it obviously covers more than just the railed vehicles, which are a only small subset of railway systems, both economically and in terms of number of articles. It should correctly be named "Wikiproject Rail Transport", so that contributors who write articles on high speed rail lines, train companies, fare systems, train stations, etc. won't shy away from adding their articles here. -- Cambrasa  confab  10:29, 23 May 2008 (UTC)


 * It seems unnecessary and a massive updating project to boot. Mangoe (talk) 10:59, 23 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Let's see, I'd class myself as one interested in trains and locomotives rather than lines, companies, fare systems and stations. Despite this, I've written one article about a railway executive, one article about a speed recording device, greatly expanded two articles about railway companies, and written another article about token exchange apparatus, during which time I've only written ten articles on locomotives (my main interest) and I've only written one article about an actual train (as per the name of the project). I would have written these articles regardless of what the project was called, and to be honest I would have written the articles even if there was no Trains/Rail Transport project. I also note that the numbers of articles on railway stations seem to vastly outnumber the number of articles on railway locomotives, so I don't know that others are that discouraged by the project name.
 * Oh well, that's my €0.02 anyway...
 * Zzrbiker (talk) 12:48, 23 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Strong Oppose The justification is not strong enough, and it creates unnecessary work when they are other more important things to do e.g. article assessment, bringing top/high proirity articles upto GA/FA status. When these are done, then perhaps this could be considerd. Olana North (talk) 08:09, 28 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Weak Support "Rail Transport" is a more accurate term, though "Trains" is more familiar and casual.  I assume User:Cambrasa is volunteering to do the work.  Otherwise... --Thetrick (talk) 17:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose: although "Rail Transport" is a more accurate term, "Trains" is a reasonable enough name by itself. Plus it would be a lot of work to change everything related to this project, which is already well-known among Wikipedians with its current title.  --RFBailey (talk) 23:32, 28 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Oppose. As RFB says it's already known by this title; also, WP:RAIL is occupied by WikiProject UK Railways who are unlikely to see any reason to move, leading to more confusion. (Before anyone asks, WP:UKR is already occupied by those pesky Ukrainians...) —  iride  scent  23:44, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

GO Rail (Estonia)
I've just created an article for this company, which runs sleeper trains between Estonia and Russia. I'm quite a new member, and this is my biggest contribution so far, so if anyone wants to have a look and maybe improve it please do!!

Don't ask me why I chose this subject... I've been to Estonia last month and was browsing just now, bored on a quiet day at work, and this redlink grabbed me. Not in any way a train expert. I can't read Estonian either, so I'm sure someone that can would be able to add more, but I hope it's useful so far. I'm posting this to WP:Estonia too. — FIRE!  in a crowded theatre...  16:46, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

New Mexico mystery rail with trail
Rails with trails includes a map from a reliable source, showing 2 rails with trails in New Mexico. One is the Santa Fe Rail Trail along the Santa Fe Southern Railway, but I cannot identify the other. Based on the relative positions of the dots on that map, the mystery railroad is either somewhere east of Taos, or somewhere west of Albuquerque. Help? Please respond on Talk:Rails with trails. Thanks! --Una Smith (talk) 20:55, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Infobox needed templates
Does anybody know where I can find a tag for articles that need infoboxes? Because I wanted to add one to Mt. Washington (Baltimore Light Rail station). DanTD (talk) 20:12, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I've seen similar params on some other WikiProject banners. Since I'm currently reworking our banner, I could easily add it to the update (but I don't think I'll finish the update this weekend judging by the amount of time I've actually had available to work on it in the last couple weeks). Slambo (Speak)  20:20, 30 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Good, because I also tried to rename Hamburg Street Light Rail Stop into Hamburg Street (Baltimore Light Rail station), then I found out it was already redirected to Baltimore Light Rail, which I fixed. I wonder how many more of these pages are misdirected to the main BLR article. DanTD (talk) 23:45, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Notability (Places and transportation)
Just a note about the ongoing discussion at Notability (Places and transportation) which through the backdoor involves the notability of stations. Agathoclea (talk) 08:25, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Templates with red links/2008-Jan-Railroads
Hi, Templates with red links/2008-Jan-Railroads should be associated with this project. Cheers! bd2412 T 16:24, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

New Good Article
The article Everard Calthrop was recently elevated to Good Article status. How can it be added to the list on this page? --Michael Johnson (talk) 22:30, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
 * like this. Slambo (Speak)  10:55, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

More Infobox screw-ups; East Hampton (LIRR station)
The LIRR style tag for East Hampton (LIRR station) decided all of the sudden to relocate "East" over "Hampton" and folded up the blue underline that Long Island Rail Road stations have had for nearly half a century. DanTD (talk) 22:52, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Okay, now there are similar problems with Oyster Bay (LIRR station) and Sea Cliff (LIRR station); The titles have moved to the left sides and the blue underlines had disappeared completley. Who keeps screwing these up? DanTD (talk) 23:04, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


 * And it looks like you can include Greenport (LIRR station) and Farmingdale (LIRR station) as well. So far, this only seems to be affecting LIRR stations on the National Register of Historic Places. I'm going to have to check some Metro-North stations for this problem too. DanTD (talk) 23:08, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Hang on, I know why and I'll fix it. Unforeseen side-effect of the changes to . Mackensen (talk) 23:16, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Who else screws them up ;)? All for a good cause though. When I simplified Infobox Station I had to change the style handler; I forgot that the component variant of Infobox Station (needed for NRHP), also relies on styling but wasn't getting moved over yet. It should be fixed now. Mackensen (talk) 23:23, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, they all seem to be in halfway decent shape, so thanks a lot. DanTD (talk) 00:02, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

The New Haven Line is facing this problem now
With all my talk of checking Metro-North stations, now I find the New Haven Line is facing the same problems. So are the Pascack Valley Line and Port Jervis Line. DanTD (talk) 22:08, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I looked at a few random articles and didn't see any problems. Could you post an example? Mackensen (talk) 23:11, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Well the ones for the New Haven and Port Jervis lines seemed to have been fixed, but Spring Valley (Metro-North station) on the Pascack Valley Line seems to have lost it's color bar in the title. DanTD (talk) 21:22, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Mackensen (talk) 21:36, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Collapsible Station Infobox
Agr brought up an interesting issue with the South Station infobox. It's too long. Now long infoboxes exist on many other articles including Pennsylvania Station (New York) and Union Station (Los Angeles). Infoboxes are an inportant part of railway station articles, but there should be an option available to collapse them. I haven't been able to figure out how to do it, so any help will be appreciated. Murjax (talk) 18:03, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, the problem (as it were) is the services: one solution is to move them back out of the infobox to the bottom of the article. The other is making the whole section collapsible. I'll think on it. Mackensen (talk) 16:31, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I've always been convinced that long ones like New York's Penn Station, Union Station in LA & Chicago, and places like that really ought to have the routeboxes left out of the infoboxes and placed on the bottom of the pages, and I even think that should apply to shorter ones that have other infoboxes combined(i.e.; Railroad/NRHP). DanTD (talk) 19:07, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I have to disagree with you there DanTD. If you have the services box on the bottom of the page on an article such as New York Penn Station, a reader would have to scroll all the way down just to see it. Is possible to make certain parts of the infobox, like the services, collapsible? Murjax (talk) 19:29, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Maybe. I've switched the infobox over to using as a precursor and to make the template easier to work with. Mackensen (talk) 20:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, it's possible. See a working example at User:Mackensen/ff. Mackensen (talk) 20:23, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Well I tried adding the option to collapse the infobox, but it's not appearing as an option in any of the station articles. Murjax (talk) 16:37, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Comments sought on page move proposal
There currently is a discussion underway on Talk:Railroad about whether the Railroad disambiguation page should be moved and redirected to a primary topic. It would be helpful to have more editors review the page and express their views. --Russ (talk) 21:07, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Railroad now redirects to Rail transport, and the talk page redirects similarly. I see no trace of any discussion at Talk:Rail transport about Railroad as a dab page or a primary topic; did Talk:Railroad's contents get lost with the change to a redirect? If so, that needs to be remedied immediately. --Tkynerd (talk) 17:56, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The page move discussion is here. The content of Railroad was moved to Railroad (disambiguation), while the target of the redirect was changed so that Railroad redirects to Rail transport.  (Don't shoot me, I'm just the messenger.)  --RFBailey (talk) 18:28, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks...but unfortunately, the move discussion has already been closed. :( Oh well. I personally am inclined to agree with the move, so I'm OK with the outcome, anyway. :) --Tkynerd (talk) 00:15, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) I've just had a look at the edit history for railway, which is also a redirect to rail transport. Back in April it had exactly the same content that Railroad (disambiguation) now has, except that the latter uses 'railroad' for its headings. I am sure that railway/railroad were BOTH set as redirects to rail transport to avoid the UK/US terminology issues, and recreating DAB pages just re-introduces these issues -- there isn't a 'nice' way of integrating the two terms.

Is the new page really a disambiguation page? To me it looks like just a list of links, and rather incomplete, without any further explanation. Looking at the 'See also' section on Rail transport, it would be better to link to List of rail transport topics, within which there could be a new section listing the different types of railways (sorry, railroads). Then the hat note could be:
 * 'Railway' and 'railroad' redirect here. For specific types, see List of rail transport topics

That list page needs further work, but is sorely underused at present.

EdJogg (talk) 12:50, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Template:WP Trains fair use on TFD today
Please join the discussion. Slambo (Speak) 13:10, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * update - Since the only comment left in this discussion was a delete vote, it is likely that this template will be deleted. There are many images that use this template and that will need to be updated to keep them in compliance with current fair use policies.  If we don't make the updates, the images themselves could be in danger of deletion.  Slambo (Speak)  10:45, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't have the time to get involved with this, but is there scope for replacing the content of the template with words to the effect of "FUR information is in the process of being updated"? Obviously you'd need to set a time limit for this to be acceptable. Just a thought...
 * EdJogg (talk) 13:37, 7 June 2008 (UTC)


 * You could generally use WP:FURME to tag them as historic images, however, I'll note that a bot run by another user has been going through and tagging these for deletion as being non-compliant, so time is NOT on your side, regardless of the TfD.  MBisanz  talk 07:40, 10 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I've updated all of the places this template was used to now include a valid fair use rationale. In the process, I found a couple instances of unauthorized use (fair use images used where they shouldn't be), and a couple that should be easily replaceable or that don't fit as neatly with the article text as we may have thought.  Slambo (Speak)  23:11, 11 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Cool, thanks for helping out :)  MBisanz  talk 07:01, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Proposed move of First Transcontinental Railroad
Another editor has proposed moving First Transcontinental Railroad to First United States trancontinental railroad. Please join the discussion. Slambo (Speak) 11:24, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The discussion has closed with consensus against a move. Slambo (Speak)  18:15, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Move of Passenger car to Passenger rail car
A relatively new editor has moved the article Passenger car to Passenger rail car and made the original location a disambiguation page. While I can understand the reasoning for such a move, it seems to me that a better destination for the article about railroad rolling stock would be Passenger car (rail) (such as we have for Coach (rail) and Stock car (rail)). Comments? Slambo (Speak) 11:27, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreed. "Rail car" is a term used to describe a self-propelled carriage (eg: Railcar, DRC railcar) in some countries, so "Passenger rail car" could create confusion. Zzrbiker (talk) 11:50, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Agree with the move and dab (when I hear "passenger car," I think first of an automobile unless I'm already talking about trains), but Passenger car (rail) is clearly better. --Tkynerd (talk) 17:53, 9 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I've made the move to the properly disambigged name and fixed several links to the new location. Any additional help on updating links would be appreciated. Slambo (Speak)  20:54, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Mainspace is done. I love Wikipedia Cleaner. :) --Tkynerd (talk) 02:56, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Way cool, thanks. I've gotta try out these scripts some time.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:34, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I've finished the updates to the Portal:Trains subpages, and updated a few user sandbox pages as well. Most of the remaining links are in talk archives.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  14:20, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I do lots of other dab work, and I don't generally touch links on talk pages at all -- partly because I don't think it's as important, and partly because I don't like editing other people's comments. If you ask nicely I might do it :), but I'd kind of rather not. I will, though, also add this page to my list of adopted pages and keep an eye on it regularly. --Tkynerd (talk) 17:52, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Template:First Great Western color on TFD
Another editor nominated Template:First Great Western color today as unused. I looked around, but didn't see any mention of this on the various s-rail and s-line template documentation pages. If this is still needed, please join the discussion. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 12:52, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Nah, it can go. Mackensen (talk) 14:11, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Changes to the assessment scheme proposed
For those who don't monitor the assessment discussions, there is a proposal to modify the current article assessment scheme. The options currently being vetted for change are: Other discussions elsewhere on that talk page include a proposal to rename GA class as B+ class. The discussion linked here will close on the evening of May 25/26. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 16:10, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) no changes
 * 2) move A class below GA class
 * 3) add a new C class between Start and B classes
 * 4) combine A and GA classes into GA/A class
 * 5) replace Start class with C class


 * Great, we haven't even got around to completing the assessment of our articles, and someone goes and changes the rules!! I hope some clever person will get a "bot" to implement any required changes. Olana North (talk) 21:15, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

The two least disruptive options (no changes or add a new C class between start and B) have the most support. In the first case, we won't need to do anything, for the second, we add a category and take a second look at the articles already in start and B classes. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 13:44, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

The conclusions have been issued from the discussion referenced here. Right now, things stay the same, but there is growing consensus to add a C class article quality level. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 14:11, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Consensus has been reached and C-Class is to be added to the scheme. I've created the appropriate categories for this and most of the subprojects here, and I've added it to the rewritten banner template, but there's still more that needs to be added there before I move this updated banner live. There is still some discussion on what the criteria will be in the grading scheme as well as how the class will be initially populated, including one proposal to automatically move B-Class articles that have maintenance templates to C-Class. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 19:09, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Cheakamus River derailment
Talk:Cheakamus River derailment - there's been more than one derailment; this used to be 2005 Cheakamus River derailment; Already posted on WPCanada, but hoping someone here may know of the older derailments.Skookum1 (talk) 16:49, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Articles flagged for cleanup
Currently, 2031 articles assigned to this project, or 10.5%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 2008-06-18.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. --B. Wolterding (talk) 12:06, 25 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I would have thought that if they had been tagged, then they would have been given a "category" and the list you are talking to would be automatically generated. Olana North (talk) 13:28, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Whyte notation template
If it's useful to anyone, I've created a template to simplify wikilinking of common Whyte notations; for example produces. Feel free to use or improve as you see fit. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 17:11, 26 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Two quick items that I notice... The article about the 4-4-2 locomotive type is at 4-4-2 (locomotive) to disambiguate it from the other meanings listed at 442 (disambiguation); 4-2-4 (locomotive) is also similarly disambiguated (although 4-2-4 currently redirects to the locomotive type).  The second item is that in my references, I normally don't see a space between the wheel configuration and the tank type, as in "0-4-0T" or "2-6-2T"; the problem here, of course, is if we remove the space from the template output, we also lose the visual clue that the notation is linking to two distinct pages.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  17:59, 26 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I've fixed the template for 4-4-2; I've left 4-2-4 for the time being. I've also put in a narrow space between the arrangement and the suffix, but this may not display for some browsers. If anyone has problems, let me know or revert the latest change. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 18:35, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The hair space doesn't display correctly in IE6, so I've reverted it. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 18:40, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Updated banner ready for further testing/approval
Okay, I think I've got everything in the rebuild of the TrainsWikiProject banner. Please take a look at the new banner and let me know of anything that is missing. The biggest change is that the associated projects/task forces are now within a hide block and the pending tasks (unref, imageneeded, etc.) are in another hide block. I've also got it where if the associated project has a portal, that will be linked too. Unless there are any objections, I plan to slide this update live by this weekend. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 15:49, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Seeing no objections after a few days, I'm going to slide the update live. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:14, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The updated template is installed. It should be propagating out to talk pages soon.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:28, 30 June 2008 (UTC)


 * It needs a modification. On the line that says "This page is within the scope of one or more associated projects or task forces" the 'show' is obscured by the last few words. Here is an example Talk:Denbigh, Ruthin and Corwen Railway. Olana North (talk) 11:17, 1 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Hmmm... looks OK on my current screen, but I'm viewing it on a screen at 1440x900 resolution. In the short term, we could use the short text where it says just "Associated projects:", but it seems a better solution is needed than that.  I'll see what I can work up on forcing line wraps as needed for smaller screen resolutions.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  13:22, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
 * (aside) I also just noticed this morning that the locos task force isn't getting displayed. It's probably missing like the timelines task force param was yesterday.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  13:24, 1 July 2008 (UTC)


 * My monitor at work and the one at home is set to 1024x768 and the problem only occurs when the "zoom" is at 100%, any other zoom level and it appears as I would expect. Strange!Olana North (talk) 18:37, 1 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Today I changed the rating of an article from "class=start" to "class=C" and it worked fine, but I noticed that the "UK-importance" assessment did not come through on the template, but worked with the "class=start". COuld someone verify this and make the necessary changes. Olana North (talk) 09:29, 2 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Gah! Checking...  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  13:08, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Found and fixed. This issue affected all subprojects that had individual importance ratings. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  13:13, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Plattsburgh (Amtrak station) and other Railroad-NRHP combined infoboxes
Is there any way that the combined Railroad-NRHP infobox can be evened out? I thought removing the map would help, but it didn't. DanTD (talk) 03:00, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The photo on the top of the main infobox decides the width of the whole infobox. 250 pixels works well for Plattsburg and now the infobox looks even. Murjax (talk) 04:38, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Light Rail infoboxes/routeboxes
Another group of articles that have some problems are those for Baltimore Light Rail stations. The one at University of Baltimore/Mt. Royal (Baltimore Light Rail station) doesn't indicate that the next stop for the Penn Station – Camden Yards Line is the terminus of that line for some reason. While we're on the subject of light rail, looking at Steel Plaza (PAT station), I've noticed a redlink for Penn Park, and the 42 South Hills Village article indicating that Penn Park is "at" Union Station (Pittsburgh). Shouldn't that redlink be redirected to Union Station? DanTD (talk) 13:58, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Murjax (talk) 17:22, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Changes to the WP:1.0 assessment scheme
As you may have heard, we at the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team recently made some changes to the assessment scale, including the addition of a new level. The new description is available at WP:ASSESS.
 * The new C-Class represents articles that are beyond the basic Start-Class, but which need additional references or cleanup to meet the standards for B-Class.
 * The criteria for B-Class have been tightened up with the addition of a rubric, and are now more in line with the stricter standards already used at some projects.
 * A-Class article reviews will now need more than one person, as described here.

Each WikiProject should already have a new C-Class category at Category:C-Class_articles. If your project elects not to use the new level, you can simply delete your WikiProject's C-Class category and clarify any amendments on your project's assessment/discussion pages. The bot is already finding and listing C-Class articles.

Please leave a message with us if you have any queries regarding the introduction of the revised scheme. This scheme should allow the team to start producing offline selections for your project and the wider community within the next year. Thanks for using the Wikipedia 1.0 scheme! For the 1.0 Editorial Team, §hepBot  ( Disable )  21:26, 4 July 2008 (UTC)


 * This new class was added to the project banner when the latest group of updates was rolled out. Several articles are already classified as C class, and there are likely many more in both the B and Start categories that should belong here now. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  18:18, 5 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, but I suspect that upgrading Start-class articles to C-class articles, where appropriate, is going to be more "acceptable" than downgrading B-class articles to C-class articles, where appropriate. We will have to be Bold.18:28, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Aloha, my train people!
I was wondering if a few of you could help me out and answer my question over at Talk:List of rail diagrams. I am confused as to why this is an article. Mahalo and thanks! --Ali'i 19:18, 2 July 2008 (UTC)


 * So far, I have had 2 responses. Currently, it appears as if this list will be made into a category as it seems to fit the role better. I would be happy however to get any additional feedback before this is done. Thanks again. --Ali'i 13:55, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Cyprus Government Railway
I just added Cyprus Government Railway as a Start class article to the project. Sv1xv (talk) 11:48, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Some rather nice source material on Poland's Wolsztyn railway
In the next few days I hop to expand a few Polish articles with content from the following Australian Broadcasting Corporation program material, including Wolsztyn and even PKP class Pm36. In the meantime, I thought that some of our other editors might find the following bit of source material of general interest and enjoyment, particularly the actual program flash/broadband video links in "Further information" section. http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2008/s2299102.htm - Zzrbiker (talk) 09:42, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Template:Rail gauge
I removed scotch and added with samll and _not_ bold text (as opposed to the Scotch link before) some of the dominant gauges of the world. Template talk:Rail gauge TrackConnect (talk) 18:04, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

"C" prefix (New South Wales Government Railways)
Hay, I'm a NSW rail fan. If an admin could please visit this page, that would be nice. Any Aussie train fans here btw? Benshi —Preceding undated comment was added at 06:23, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject notification bot
There is currently a proposal for a bot that would notify WikiProjects when their articles have entered certain workflows, e.g. when they are nominated for deletion or for Good article reassessment.

The question is whether a relevant number of wikiprojects would be interested in using such a bot. You can find details of the functionality, and leave your comments, at the bot request page.

I am posting this message to the 20 largest WikiProjects (by number of articles), since they would be the most likely users. Thanks, --B. Wolterding (talk) 12:12, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Another glitch alert!
The SEPTA navigation box is currently breaking up! Can somebody fix it? DanTD (talk) 10:50, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Its working for me, I'm using Mozilla Firefox, version 2.0.0.15; and I've just tried it with IE 7.0.6001.1800, also OK. What browser are you using and what are the problems? Pyrotec (talk) 11:50, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I've got Windows XP, and it was just fine until today. DanTD (talk) 11:53, 13 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm using Windows Visa (the operating system), but I assume that you are using Internet Explorer to access the web [click on the helpbox, at the top of the screen, then the "about" button - that will give the name of the browser, and its version]. If I clik on, say, "SEPTA division" in the navigation box, that is where it takes me; same for other sections/subsections. It works for both Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 2.0.0.15 for me.Pyrotec (talk) 12:03, 13 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Ugh, evidently this is 6.0. Why should this even be a problem to begin with? DanTD (talk) 12:56, 13 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Well I can't find any problems, and you can. We need to ascertain whether the problem is on wikipedia, or on your computer system. Is it happening on the other wikipedia articles that you have been working on today? It would also be useful if another editor could state whether the SEPTA navigation box works or does not work for them.Pyrotec (talk) 13:10, 13 July 2008 (UTC)


 * So far today, I've only seen this problem on SEPTA-related articles. I checked LIRR-related articles and they work just fine. DanTD (talk) 13:18, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

✅ - I found a broken bracket in the template and fixed it. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 16:33, 13 July 2008 (UTC) This edit by 67.82.246.181 introduced the problem. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 16:35, 13 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks. It looks like somebody was trying to pave the way for adding an article on the never-built SEPTA R4 line. DanTD (talk) 11:54, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

AFD of several railroad bridges
The following articles are up for deletion for notability reasons.
 * Springfield Terminal railroad bridge, Deerfield
 * Rail Bridge, Northfield, Massachusetts
 * Amtrak/Springfield Terminal Railroad Bridge

See the batch deletion discussion for all of them here.

(Note: I did not initiate the deletion discussions and linked them here for information purposes as they fall into the scope of this project.) --Oakshade (talk) 04:49, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * That was a stupid thing to do. DanTD (talk) 14:27, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Deciding whether a railroad is defunct, etc.
(Note: this concerns U.S. railroads, though the same ideas probably apply elsewhere.) So we have categories like Category:Utah railroads and Category:Defunct Utah railroads. It's pretty clear that, for instance, Union Pacific Railroad belongs in the former and Utah and Northern Railway in the latter, since the UP owns and operates trackage, while the U&N no longer exists as a company. But there are definite shades of gray here.


 * 1) Companies that own but do not operate trackage. For instance, the Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway still exists as a company, and owns a rail line, but is operated as part of the Norfolk Southern Railway. Terminal companies may be owned jointly by multiple carriers, but treated as a joint line not owned by a separate company.
 * 2) Companies that serve as a "middle-man". The Warren and Trumbull Railroad is the operator of trackage owned by the Economic Development Rail II Corporation, but contracts out actual operations to the Ohio Central Railroad.
 * 3) Companies that operate only passenger/tourist trains. It appears that the de facto practice is to put these in the main categories if they provide normal passenger service (Amtrak, commuter rail lines) but otherwise to use Category:Heritage railroads in Utah.
 * 4) *Companies like the above, but that have not actually gotten STB approval to terminate freight service, and simply don't operate any because there are no customers on the line.

I'm sure there are more types. The point is that we don't currently have a definite way of deciding which category a railroad belongs in. Can we please discuss this? --NE2 22:54, 23 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm inclined to formerly viable but now paper roads such as the first case into "defunct", and I think the de facto solution for the third case is reasonable. In the second case I'm inclined keep the W&T out of "defunct" since presumably it could stop contracting to the Ohio Central and start operating in its own right. Mangoe (talk) 14:37, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * What about the Economic Development Rail II Corporation (if it had a separate article)? If the W&T stopped operating, the STB would probably require it to continue service or find a new operator. (That may not be true in this specific case, but it's certainly true in some cases.) I don't see how this is any different from cases like the CNO&TP (but not necessarily that specific case), where if NS were to kick it out it would need to continue operating. (Interestingly, the STB still considers the CNO&TP to be Class I, but it's grouped with NS and many other smaller companies as "Norfolk Southern Combined Railroad Subsidiaries".) --NE2 01:24, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Baltimore Light Rail rail color box glitch
If you go to just about any Baltimore Light Rail station article and look at the infobox, you will see that the rail color box is missing the color box and the line name is still there. I checked the color templates for any recent edits and found none. Does anybody know the source of this glitch? Murjax (talk) 03:28, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think I've tracked it down. A few days ago someone changed to use  for its output (which is a good move since that's a standard template). Most articles seem fine, but there was garbage getting output for the light rail color which wrecked the display. I gave the color template a slight tweak  and it appears to be fixed. Mackensen (talk) 10:44, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Well part of it is fixed, but there is still that odd box underneath them. Murjax (talk) 15:05, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Weird, that wasn't there before. Checking. Mackensen (talk) 16:19, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Got it; unclosed div tags in . Mackensen (talk) 16:21, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Template:Amtrak Palmetto glitch
There appears to be a glitch in the template that causes errors on the pages it it placed in. However, I can't seem to locate the source of the glitch. Can anyone find out where it is? Murjax (talk) 17:37, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * You mean the way it's overlapping the infobox? I don't think that's so much a glitch as a reason not to use these templates on station pages. --NE2 23:17, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The problem appears to occur with the right-hand route template when there is more than one route template in use, e.g. in Savannah (Amtrak station). It can be got around, for instance, by adding extra blank lines to the station article, but would probably work as well.Pyrotec (talk) 23:26, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * There appears to be some surplus text e.g. "| width="33.33%" align="left" valign="top" |
 * }" I can't see at present where this is coming from.Pyrotec (talk) 23:32, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Ah, that would be it; there was an extra |} in the template. I reiterate that these probably don't belong on station articles though. --NE2 23:48, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I saw that at a lot of North Carolina Station articles as well(i.e.; Selma-Smithfield (Amtrak station), Wilson (Amtrak station)). I've never liked the idea of adding these templates to every station article that's out there. DanTD (talk) 23:50, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Well I actually made and added these templates a few months back after seeing smaller ones on other articles and thought it was a good idea. I see now that these large multiple ones are somewhat of a problem though. A smaller one listing only major stations might not be a bad idea though. Give your opinions. Murjax (talk) 00:01, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I've always felt line templates are really better suited for line articles. But whether you use them for line articles or station articles, they can have glitches just the same. The problem I have with most of them is that they take up a lot of space. There are exceptions however, such as Walpole (MBTA station) in which they utitlize the huge space in the article. DanTD (talk) 00:18, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Wow, Walpole is horrible. There's supposed to be text at the beginning, not a huge template. --NE2 00:26, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't like it either, but until sombody adds some text there, I'm willing to settle for a huge template. And I'm sure there's plenty that can be drudged up and added here since the station was a former Union Station. DanTD (talk) 00:51, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm not. I'm going to remove it, because there's no reason for the text to begin below that template. --NE2 00:53, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Is it possible to put a smaller line template within the infobox of a station article, possibly underneath the services box? I like the idea of showing where a station is compared to the rest of the line, but I don't like the idea of so much space being taken. If we can make it small, it would seem more logical. Murjax (talk) 02:59, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * It would probably be best to put a dot on a system map, like so:


 * The only problem is the necessity of trial-and-error for positioning. --NE2 04:36, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I like it. I say we go with it. Murjax (talk) 15:05, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I think this is a great solution for commuter and transit systems. I don't know how it's going to do for Amtrak, though; it's a big country. Mangoe (talk) 18:29, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
 * It would only show the station's geographic location on the line itself. Similar to our line template, but more realistic and it would show the station's geographic location rather than in the middle of a list of stations. Murjax (talk) 18:57, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Massive data dumps need formatting/pruning
The Burlington Northern Railroad article had a massive data dump (about 85k of text) added to it over the weekend. I've moved the data to a temporary subpage because it looks like a potential copyvio; the data there needs a rather large amount of formatting and wikifying if we are to improve the quality of the main article with it. Looking a little further, I find that the user that added it,, has added similar data dumps to a number of other articles and that they will all need some work to bring them in line with the Wikipedia Manual of Style and other policies and guidelines. Any help on this and the other articles would be greatly appreciated. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 14:36, 28 July 2008 (UTC)


 * An unregistered user has reverted Slambo’s edit on Burlington Northern Railroad, and the edit I made to Northern Pacific Railway – I moved all the locomotive information to Northern Pacific Railway locomotives. I have reverted both of them, but an Administrator may need to keep an eye on the situation… Iain Bell (talk) 08:40, 29 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Update: User:Qy0f has reverted both articles back to his last revision. I don’t want to be involved in an edit war, so I will leave it to an Administrator to sort this out. Iain Bell (talk) 09:39, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Rather than undo the reverts, I've asked him to join the discussion here. I hope we can all come to consensus on how best to add and keep the information. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 11:11, 29 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I have undone the reverts because the editor has not joined this discussion after three days (and he was editing under that username a day after I added a note on his talk page, so he must have seen the box alerting him to the message). Now, let's work on getting the information formatted and summarized properly for inclusion in the appropriate places.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:18, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Links to Whyte notation from instances of the notation


Should we link instances of Whyte notation - e.g. in the captions in this article: Bury Bar Frame locomotive to Whyte notation so that users have a clue what the notation means? Should this become a general policy? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tagishsimon (talk • contribs) 08:03, July 31, 2008


 * Most common notations (including 2-2-0) have their own article, so you can link directly to this. The Whyte template can be used for this - e.g gives . — Pek, on behalf of Tivedshambo (talk) 14:14, 31 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't see a reason not to link to the specific type article. If "Whyte notation" appears in the text, it should link to Whyte notation; if "2-2-0" appears in the text, it should link to 2-2-0.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  14:21, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * But, as I think about it more, if the individual type article doesn't exist (i.e. 6-6-0), then it would be appropriate to link to Whyte notation. I've added a note on the template talk page to have it do that too.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  14:45, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Don't link to 6-6-0, because someone clicking on the 6-6-0 link will expect an article on 6-6-0. It may be appropriate to temporarily redirect 6-6-0 to Whyte notation, but the direct link will be a problem when 6-6-0 is created. --NE2 20:47, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * But if the template uses, it will automatically update in the text when the page is created.  It already uses ifexist to check if the text should be a link, we're just giving it more text to display if the page doesn't exist yet.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  20:58, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, OK - it's probably not a problem if you're using the template. (Though I still question whether it's best, since if all uses are via the template, there will be few or no links to 6-6-0 and people may assume there shouldn't be an article there.) --NE2 21:06, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * One obvious question - were there any 6-6-0s? It's not listed in Whyte notation. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 21:11, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Probably not. I used 6-6-0 as an example because it is a plausible wheel arrangement for which I know we didn't already have an article.  I say "probably" because whenever someone says "it ain't prototype" someone else comes up with a photo to prove otherwise. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:11, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Services box and NRHP box issue
Well it appears that if you put the NRHP box inside the infobox on a station article and the services box is also in there, the services box will often make the infobox wider than the NRHP box such as is the case in Main Street Station (Richmond). It appears the only way to fix the problem is to shorten the width of the services box. Is this possible? Murjax (talk) 16:11, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Translating article from dutch to english
Could anyone help in translating nl:I11 to english? STTW (talk)  21:14, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd suggest making the request on Dutch Wikipedia, as in my experience, Dutch people are far more fluent in English than most of us are in their language! —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 21:43, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt reply. I've made a request there. --STTW (talk)  22:09, 2 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Try 'Translate a web page' in google translator. That will get you started. Lightmouse (talk) 05:45, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

By general consensus, an unedited machine translation, left as a Wikipedia article, is worse than nothing - see Translation. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 07:43, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree with you. That is why I said "that will get you started". Lightmouse (talk) 12:54, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

GA Sweeps Reviews
You may know that there is an ongoing project to review all GAs listed before 26 August 2007, when the GA criteria were substantially altered. The intention is to check that these articles meet the current good article criteria. There are currently five articles tagged by this Trains project which have been placed on hold for up to seven days, mainly pending some improvements to referencing:


 * LSWR S15 class
 * SR Class Q
 * SR Class Q1
 * SR Class V
 * SR Lord Nelson Class

I hope someone from this project will be able to help these articles keep their GA status. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 12:56, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Street running
I just created Street running as use in railroad. (Original redirect goes to unrelated article). Please add information as needed. SYSS Mouse (talk) 18:19, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

List of early Class I railroads
I've compiled a list of the U.S. Class I railroads up to 1940 on User:NE2/US Class I. There are probably a few missing, but this should provide a good list of articles that need writing or improving. --NE2 12:10, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Duplicate articles
I recently called for a merger of Railtown 1897 State Historic Park‎ into Railtown 1897 or vice-versa. It appears to be one in the same place with two articles. Actually, I was hoping that Railtown 1897 State Historic Park‎ is merged into Railtown 1897 and renamed as ‎Railtown 1897 State Historic Park‎. Go to the Proposed mergers page to discuss the issue. DanTD (talk) 04:39, 5 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Another duplicate. This time, I'm calling for a merger of Link Belt, Pennsylvania into Link Belt (SEPTA station). Same procedure, discuss it on the Proposed mergers page, and any Wikipedians from Metropolitan Philadelphia, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong. DanTD (talk) 23:32, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Berlin-Schönefeld Airport railway station
I've started an article on Berlin-Schönefeld Airport railway station at User:Lambdoid/Berlin-Schönefeld Airport railway station. It's mostly based on the German article for the station and is very short, a stub. I'm wary of creating an article in the mainspace straight away in case it means overhauling a few templates. Thanks!  Lamb doid  04:43, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

"Family tree" diagram
Would something like this (in completed form, of course) be useful?

--NE2 12:26, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

PATCO Speedline infobox glitches
Right now, there seem to be a few glitches connected to articles on stations that are either along, or connect to the PATCO Speedline. They include Walter Rand Transportation Center, Lindenwold (NJT station), and Market East Station. DanTD (talk) 13:41, 11 August 2008 (UTC)


 * There was an extra newline in Template:Rail color box. --NE2 15:04, 11 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I fixed Lindenwold, but Market East Station is still the big hold-out. Who fixed Walter Rand? DanTD (talk) 15:23, 11 August 2008 (UTC)


 * You didn't need to fix anything; a null edit was all that was needed, since I fixed the template. I'll figure out the Market East problem. --NE2 15:28, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The problem here was with Template:PATCO lines, and it is now fixed. --NE2 15:30, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Another station in the Philadelphia Metro area
Okay, now that the problems related with PATCO Speedline stations have been fixed, there are a few other stations in Metro Phily that I've been struggling to fix. Recently I was able to get the tag removed from 15–16th & Locust (PATCO station), with some success, but there are still a lot of tags on Morton (SEPTA station). it has become clear that adding history and some referecnes aren't enough. What else can I do, short of moving to Morton, PA, and gouging the local library's history department? DanTD (talk) 02:31, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Hamm (Westfalen) railway station GA Sweeps Review
Talk:Hamm (Westfalen) railway station, a GA tagged by this project, has just been reviewed as part of the GA Sweeps Project and has been placed on hold pending the resolution of a few issues. The review can be found here. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 14:45, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Notability guidelines?
See also: Wikipedia_talk:AIR, Notability (aircraft).

The WP:AIR project has drafted some notability proposals that have not had a lot of discussion but are generally followed. One of the concerns that came up in actually implementing these guidelines was that they were too specific. I was considering whether or not it would make sense to have a unified transport notability guideline, since planes, trains, and automobiles have similar boundaries for notability (i.e. notability of broad types, individually notable vehicles, etc...).

Does this project have any notability rules that could be rolled into making a unified "notability for vehicles guideline?" Would this kind of guideline be helpful or appropriate? SDY (talk) 19:35, 12 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Quite some time ago, I started WP:TWP/MOS; the notability comments, especially those about train/railway/metro/tram stations have since been extracted to Notability (Railway lines and stations) for further discussion. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 19:50, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Project banner thought...
So I'm going through the unassessed category again this month and I start thinking about the banner again (dangerous, I know...). Anyway, would it be helpful to anyone else if the banner displayed the date that the article was last assessed for quality and importance? What I'm thinking here would be a new parameter, perhaps called <tt>revdate</tt>, where the reviewer would enter the date that the article was assessed at the same time as entering a value for the class and importance parameter.

For example, I just reviewed the article Flint and Holly Railroad as a stub-class article. In this case, I updated the banner call on the talk page to read: If I wanted to add the date that the article was reviewed, I would then put: The banner would then display (with the links removed from this page for clarity here) the review date on the same line as the quality rating as in: Stub   This article has been rated Stub-class on the quality scale. (assessment comments) (reviewed August 12, 2008)

We could have the banner also sort articles into categories based on the year that they were last reviewed so we have a convenient auto-maintained list of articles where the last review has occurred over some period of time in the past. With such a list, we could then concentrate on those articles that were last assessed, say two years ago, and sweep through them for reassessments or quality improvements.

So, would this be helpful or am I just looking for work here? Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 19:06, 12 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Judging by the lack of responses, I'm guessing that there aren't very many other editors who think this would be helpful. So, unless I hear otherwise, this idea is shelved for the moment.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  17:35, 14 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm just concerned it might lead the possibility of more articles being deleted. DanTD (talk) 20:54, 14 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Interesting outlook, but I haven't seen an article's age or the length of time since an article was last reviewed listed as a criterion for deletion. Granted, I haven't been hanging out on AFD recently, but I think this is less of a problem than it could be.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:23, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Occasionally I bump into obscure articles that haven't been edited for a year or more. Also, there is the (unlikely but theoretically possible) concept of an article being 'complete'. In either case a re-assessment would be pointless, although the date would show one being overdue. My point here is not 'against the banner addition' (which actually might be useful to the assessors) but against the use of 'time since last edit (or review)' as a factor in AfD discussions. I don't know the facts, but I would be very surprised if lack of recent editing/review activity was a factor in an AfD discussion about an established article.
 * EdJogg (talk) 12:09, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I fail to see what this has to do with deletion: we don't (or, at least, shouldn't) delete articles on grounds of quality, which is what is being assessed here. It seems a reasonable thing to introduce: it makes it clear how long ago an article was assessed, and so the version assessed could then be dug out of the page history for comparison.  (I wouldn't say this means that dates should be added retrospectively, just added as the latest round of assessments is done.)  --RFBailey (talk) 04:31, 16 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't see the need for such as flag; as the date of review is not all that important for most articles. A article that has improved since it was last assessed can be reassessed and, if appropriate, given a higher assessment; but that is not necessarily date dependant. There is no WP  policy, that I know about, that articles should be reassessed at set intervals. The other side of the "coin", is that some articles are being down graded, because they no longer meet the current assessment criteria, usually because more emphasis is given to verification and in-line citations. As yet, I have not seen any call for tools to flag up articles for potential down grading. The group most likely to need the tool is the GA reassessment group - and that discounts most editors.Pyrotec (talk) 11:25, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

German railway project
I have been steadily translating and creating articles on German railways in recent weeks before I knew of this project. So far I have added: all DRG and Bavarian steam locos; history pages on most of the former state railways (Länderbahnen); a number of pages on German railway museums e.g. the Nuremberg Transport Museum; technical articles e.g. on the Krauss-Helmholtz bogie; and pages on some German railway pioneers e.g. Joseph Anton von Maffei. However, there is so much material on de.wiki and elsewhere that I will not be able to cover it all. In particular, I have left the post-1945 period and many of the (non-Bavarian) state railway locos because that's not my area of interest or expertise and it's too large anyway.

My question is: is it worth thinking about setting up a German railways project or task force to get some joint working on this? What are the pros and cons? Is anyone interested in joining in? --Bermicourt (talk) 17:09, 14 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Considering the number of articles that are currently categorized under the Rail transport in Germany category tree, I would think that a task force or subproject would be worthwhile. The WikiProject UK Railways or WikiProject Trains in Japan could be used as a model to build such a project for German subjects.  Personally, although I probably wouldn't be able to contribute much beyond assessments and style/grammar edits at this point, I will definitely add the necessary parameters to the TrainsWikiProject banner template to help out once such an effort is formalized.
 * There was also another editor interested in making translations of articles on the Italian language Wikipedia, but I don't think anything has been organized based on that effort. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  17:31, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for that. Can you please explain what needs to be done to set up the project and then to 'maintain' it? Should I mark all discussion pages of relevant articles with the Project template? How do I grade the articles? Guidance appreciated. --Bermicourt (talk) 13:45, 16 August 2008 (UTC)


 * First we would need to know if it should be set up as a task force within WikiProject Trains or as a separate WikiProject. In this case, since you're the only person that I've seen express a strong interest and since the scope is entirely rail transport in a specific region, it seems that a task force would be a better place to start; we can always spin it off later to a full WikiProject if there is enough of a need.  I've created the Rail transport in Germany task force page, and I'll update the project banner and add a category shortly.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  15:41, 16 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I've updated the project banner, so now adding "<tt>DE=yes</tt>" (as you can now see on Talk:Deutsche Bahn) will sort articles into Category:Rail transport in Germany task force articles and show the associated task force link. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 16:11, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Path line Glitch
If you look at the line template for the Hob-33 line, in any of the station articles, you will see the same glitch that we had with the Baltimore Light Rail not that long ago. Murjax (talk) 17:54, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed in the same manner. Mackensen (talk) 01:38, 18 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed. The way how I fix it also applies to other problematic route diagrams transcluded in the Infobox rail line. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 02:19, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

New York City Subway rollsigns
Good Afternoon,

Stumbled across these images at WikiCommons New York City Subway rollsigns, I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this or not, sorry if it isn't.

They all appear to be gif bitmaps, when vector based images would serve a better purpose. As I have had an attempt at doing some myself that hasn't been entirely fruitful, I have since found out that Inkscape has a handy trace tool and would assume that this would make the task alot more straight forward to do. I'm just looking to see if others feel this is required & if these new versions would be an acceptable replacement to the exisiting ones. Following is an example of what I am proposing.

Any comments or suggestions are appreciated. Thank you Rfsjim (talk) 08:17, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of List of passenger trains
I'm proposing this article for deletion for the reasons stated in the prod box over there. If anyone has any thoughts on the matter, please comment on the talk page. Textorus (talk) 02:49, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Grand Central Station (Chicago) at WP:GAR
Please come comment at Talk:Grand Central Station (Chicago)/GA1.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 19:22, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

The review closed as keep. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 11:10, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Syntegra
I have created a new article on a new type of bogie based on some basic google search. Perhaps someone with more knowledge on the topic can help expand the article. Thanks --STTW (talk)  18:34, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Locomotive Infobox
I noticed there were a few locomotive infoboxes, is there any particular infobox that we should be using, or are they all ok to be used. Joedamadman (talk) 01:29, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Which boxes do you mean? --RFBailey (talk) 04:35, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Infobox Locomotive was the first one created and is the most generic. Infobox Locomotive Auto was created as a way to automate some of the links for the locomotive manufacturer and a couple other fields.  Infobox LocomotiveNZR is basically the same as the first but with a different color scheme.  There are a couple others like these that are designed more for multiple units than for individual locomotives.  I've actually been thinking over the last couple weeks that we should consolidate the features of all of these into the first template location to reduce duplication; a similar consolidation scheme is used where Infobox SG rail uses Infobox rail but automates the gauge specification.  Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  11:20, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Also, when these were made we probably didn't have parserfunctions. Over the past few years, template:infobox road has absorbed many formerly separate state templates by various means. In the case of infobox SG rail, a simple gauge=SG should be easy to do. --NE2 12:04, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * An editor has been revising some New Zealand locomotive articles to use the standard Infobox Locomotive, not the New Zealand version with its pretty colours. Do we still need Infobox LocomotiveNZR? Can we not convert them all to the standard infobox Locomotive?


 * I have already done this with the British and Irish diesel and electric articles, which were using Infobox UK Train 1. Since the latter is no longer used I have marked it with deprecated, although it’s been stuck in WP:DOT for a month.


 * I have reservations about Infobox Locomotive Auto. The auto-linking only works if you remember to use the correct code, the auto-Category breaks the sort order in the manufacturers’ categories, the flag in the manufacturer field may break WP:MOSFLAG, the default for the trainbrakes field is US-centric (and post-late 1950s). I could go on, but the template talk page might be a better place. Iain Bell (talk) 08:53, 17 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I have copied and adapted Infobox German Railway Vehicle from on de.wikipedia, specifically to aid the transfer of the many locomotive articles from there. It automatically translates the German fields into their equivalent English terms which saves hours of time translating. However it may be worth looking at producing a pure English version of this because it may be able to subsume all or most of the existing templates. Advantages include: it's designed for all railway vehicles: steam/diesel/electric locomotives, railbuses, coaches and wagons. It also has numerous colour schemes for different railway companies already and could easily be extended to any others. Just a thought. --Bermicourt (talk) 08:30, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

MBTA Rapid Transit names
I didn't know whether I should add this to prject rapid transit, or project streetcars, so I thought I'd add it here. I was wondering how everybody felt about having separate named for MBTA rapid transit line stations. For example, Arlington (MBTA station) would be renamed Arlington (MBTA Green Line station), Stony Brook (MBTA station) would be renamed Stony Brook (MBTA Orange Line station), Suffolk Downs (MBTA station) would be renamed Suffolk Downs (MBTA Blue Line station), Harvard (MBTA station) would be renamed Harvard (MBTA Red Line station), etcetera. DanTD (talk) 20:34, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
 * EDIT: "Suffolk Downs (MBTA Blue Line station)."


 * I don't see the point, except where disambiguation is needed (where we should be doing that anyway). --NE2 20:45, 23 August 2008 (UTC)


 * It's supposed to be a means of distinguishing them from regional rail stations. DanTD (talk) 20:58, 23 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Again, I don't see why it's necessary except where they share a name. --NE2 00:23, 24 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Eh, just a suggestion. Not that I don't see your point. DanTD (talk) 01:16, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Anon IP edits
An anonymous IP 83.67.55.217 has been deleting names, categories, and stub tags from several railway pages. Can someone check to see if this is vandalism or good faith? Thanks, --Jh12 (talk) 19:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I asked him on his talk page. --NE2 19:49, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That didn't work; he's continuing. We need someone familiar with the railways in Wales to look at it. --NE2 20:24, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * He does seem to have stopped now. I'm checking through the contribs--most of them seem fairly inoccuous to me.  (Not all of them though!)  --RFBailey (talk) 20:41, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * OK, I've gone through them all. There were a few problematic edits, but he won't be winning a vandal-of-the-month competition.  --RFBailey (talk) 21:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Many thanks for the help. --Jh12 (talk) 03:05, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * No problem--nice to be appreciated for once..... ;-) --RFBailey (talk) 03:06, 22 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Some other anonymous IP(71.175.246.147, 71.175.245.170)keeps screwing up the Erie–Torresdale (SEPTA station) article. In his/her last move, the user revived some questionable and inapproprate edits and blanked out the talk page. I had to bring the thing back. The person claims "It was the home of The Star Wars Space Base Station from 1977-1986 on 27.125mhz" and puts an e-mail address there, both of which were in redlinks, and it the process screws up the structure of the article. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that Wikipedia articles aren't supposed to have e-mail addresses attached to them. DanTD (talk) 01:35, 25 August 2008 (UTC)


 * That's pretty blatant vandalism. I don't think you can have any doubts about that!  --RFBailey (talk) 01:49, 25 August 2008 (UTC)


 * The e-mail is a pretty stupid thing to put there, but what is it about this alleged "Star Wars Space Base station?" Is the person saying it was a local early spot for Star Wars conventioneers with HM radios? Are they saying it was some kind of covert-ops military radio radio station for SDI, years before Ronald Reagan announced his plans for it? It is a hoax? Or does some wack-job genuinley think it was used to contact the Millenium Falcon, Death Star or other fictional place within the creation of George Lucas? DanTD (talk) 02:35, 25 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Whatever it is, it doesn't seem to have much to do with a SEPTA station. (I suspect it's a case of WP:BOLLOCKS.)  I've removed it and hopefully it will never return.  --RFBailey (talk) 02:49, 25 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for pointing out that page! It has a useful shortcut (WP:CB) which may be of use in certain edit summaries...although it's quicker still to use the rollback facility (which really saves a lot of time!) where appropriate.
 * In this sort of instance it is likely to be someone being 'creative'. More often than not, if you delete it, it won't come back again -- and if it does, you can reasonably ask the editor to provide his source. This is a fairly clear case of vandalism (which takes many forms -- some much harder to spot than this) whose detection becomes easier with practice.
 * EdJogg (talk) 07:40, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Splitting a navbox?
Earlier this week I put a question on Template talk:US class III about the possibility of splitting that navbox into separate navboxes by state. My thinking here is that there are so many Class III railroads, especially when we include defunct railroads, that this template will become too large to be practical if we expand it to include them all. Please join the discussion there. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak) 21:25, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Bergen County rail
Hi, I'm looking to get some info on rail lines in Bergen County, New Jersey. I've got what I think is the list of rail lines on the talk page there, and would appreciate some review. Specifically, I hope to find of if this list is correct and complete, and what current rail lines own/use the lines now. If anyone can help, it would be appreciated. Please reply there. Thanks. --ChrisRuvolo (t) 21:32, 27 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Done. --NE2 23:15, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Categorization logistics
I've been thinking about categorization recently; let's use Category:Rail transport in Utah as an example. There are many different subjects relating to rail transport, and it's usually pretty clear where something falls.
 * Companies and organizations that own or operate lines, including heritage and commuter railroads: Union Pacific Railroad, BNSF Railway (via UP trackage rights), Rio Grande Western Railway (defunct), Heber Valley Railroad (heritage), FrontRunner (commuter)
 * Physical lines of track: Utah Division (D&RGW)
 * Stations (passenger or freight): Helper (Amtrak station)
 * Bridges and tunnels: Lucin Cutoff (also a line)
 * Museums, independently from any heritage operations: Western Mining and Railroad Museum

First off, would it make sense to rename Category:Utah railroads to something like Category:Railroad companies in Utah to make it clearer what the purpose of the category is?

Then there are private railroads like the Deseret Western Railway and Kennecott Utah Copper rail line. Are these companies, lines, or both? --NE2 02:25, 7 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Through my eyes, the railways can be split into two distinct areas: Firstly, Infrastructure and secondly, Operations. (1)Infrastructure. This includes the lines, stations, bridges etc. (2) Operations. This includes those aspects related to the running of trains such as train companies, etc.  Where an entity does both (vertically integrated company owning the infrastructure and running the trains, then they fall into both camps. Not sure whether this helps you with your decision, but it might add a new way of looking at things. Olana North (talk) 07:18, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
 * In the U.S., most railroad companies are vertically integrated (or at least lease the track they operate on). --NE2 07:22, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
 * This does not apply to the UK and it might not be the case in Europe.Pyrotec (talk) 12:35, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That's true, but I don't foresee any need to categorize London and North Eastern Railway (for example) into any of the proposed "Railroad companies in <U.S. state> " categories. Slambo <small style="color:black;">(Speak)  15:15, 7 August 2008 (UTC)


 * This summer, I felt obligated to create eight different new categories for SEPTA. One reason for this was while I was working on the category for Baltimore Light Rail stops, I noticed that while Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Newark, New Jersey, Hudson-Bergen Light Rail, and New Jersey Transit River Line all had categories for their own light-rail systems, SEPTA didn't. The other is the fact that one SEPTA rapid transit or light rail station was miscategorized as being a Port Authority of Allegheny County station. Since SEPTA has more than one system, I decided to add the Category:SEPTA Light Rail and then add three categories for the three systems(MSHL, NHSL, SSTL). To be sure that the Market-Frankford Line and Broad Street Line don't get mixed in with them(and since some stations in these categories also contain other systems besides SEPTA Light Rail), I decided to create the Category:SEPTA Rapid Transit, add two subcategories for MFL & BSL stations, and add the Category:SEPTA Subway–Surface Trolley Line stations as a subcategory for this one as well. Knowing that the Subway Surface Trolley Lines are a combination of trolleys and rapid transit, and have five different routes, I decided to create a separate category for that. I'd say after these, there's really no need for any new SEPTA-related categories. DanTD (talk) 21:41, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
 * EDIT: My mistake. It was actually 15–16th & Locust (PATCO station) that was miscategorized as a Port Authority of Allegheny County station, not a SEPTA rapid transit or light rail station. DanTD (talk) 02:50, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Black Diamond (passenger train)
I believe that I have taken this article as far as I can...will someone here help me expand it further so that it is at least C-class?  the_ed 17  03:29, 27 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Anyone?  the_ed 17  22:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Looks like you've already tdone good work in getting it to Start class. In a couple of weeks, I'll help by adding more content about schedules and equipment.  JGHowes <sup style="color:darkblue;">talk  -  01:03, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Thank you--I'm out of sources for the article, but I am very interested in seeing more information on it.  the_ed 17  01:09, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Looks like there's a lengthy history of the Lehigh Valley Railroad by Robert F. Archer from '77--I've put in a request at my library for it, but it'll be a few weeks ;). Mackensen (talk) 01:38, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I've added an image. Mackensen (talk) 01:59, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Thank you! (My library does not have that book.... =[) But thank you very, very much!  the_ed 17  02:28, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Bahnhof
(Copied from WT:GER) Mjroots (talk)

I notice that there are a lot of articles about train stations named in German, examples:

Berlin Dresdner Bahnhof Berlin Hauptbahnhof

and especially bad: Frankfurt (Main) Flughafen Fernbahnhof

Shouldn't these all be renamed into English, here on the English language wikipedia? Abc30 (talk) 21:26, 30 August 2008 (UTC)


 * A better option would be have a redirect with the English name (if it exists) to the German named article. If the English name is not available then perhaps we should ask WP:GER for help. Anyways WP:GER has a group working on transport related articles, which should definitely be consulted in this issue. --STTW (talk)  10:51, 31 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree that the use of German wording should be avoided as long as possible in instances where a more understandable English term exsists. In my opinion Foo Bahnhof should be moved to Foo Station, and Foo Hauptbahnhof to Foo Central Station. In comparison articles related to other countries, such as Norway, the stations are not named Foo stasjon and Foo sentralstasjon, but Foo Station and Foo Central Station. Similarly English names for "station" are used for stations in Italy, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, Japan (and any other country I checked). Navigating around the German train articles on the English Wikipedia must be quite the challenge if the reader does not understand the German language. Of course, it does not matter to me who understands German, but we German speakers can always read on the German Wikipedia instead. <strong style="color:green;">Arsenikk <sup style="color:grey;">(talk)  13:19, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
 * We should not invent English terms where the German terms are in wider use, as with Anhalter Bahnhof. Moving all "Hauptbahnhof" to "central station" is a bad idea in some cases as Bingen (Rhein) Hauptbahnhof, where the main station is on the opposite side of the river from the central station (and indeed used to be in a different independent city and a different state in earlier days). "Main station" is probably better, but the usual convention on Wikipedia is to follow printed English-language sources if such sources exist, and to use the local term if no English sources exist. Kusma (talk) 14:46, 31 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Personally I feel that it is correct to translate "Bahnhof" to "station" and "Hauptbahnhof" to "Main Station" in every such situation. Having been to Germany recently I found that announcements made on public transport are often given in both German and English when the bus/train is approaching an important station. "Hauptbahnhof" was always translated as "main station", this shows that there is an established English usage, and we should use this. I'm sure wikipedians in Germany can confirm this to be correct. Abc30 (talk) 23:37, 31 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd say just use "railway station" in the article name and only use "Central" if it is part of the name. An example of this is Amsterdam Centraal railway station in the Netherlands. Mjroots (talk) 08:19, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes we should use "Central" if it is in the name. If the name is "Hauptbahnhof" we should always use "main station". Haupt = main. Abc30 (talk) 12:09, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

(un-indent) I don't think that "Hauptbahnhof" needs translating at all, first because a direct translation is tricky, and secondly because it could be argued to be part of the station's full name. For cases such as Berlin Ostbahnhof, no translation is needed either. For instance, in Paris we have Gare du Nord, Gare Saint-Lazare, etc. --RFBailey (talk) 14:13, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Relatedly, what is the logic behind the title München Ost railway station?!? It seems that having faffed about deciding what the post-nominal "railway station" text should be, no-one remembered that the city has a well-understood English language name..... --RFBailey (talk) 14:15, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * In that case, what is wrong with "München Ostbanhof railway station" as a title? Mjroots (talk) 19:52, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * (Because it says "... railway station railway station", that's what's wrong with it.) My point is, if we're going to use the English term "railway station", we should also use the English version of the city name.  So we should either have Munich East railway station or München Ostbahnhof, not the hybrid.  --RFBailey (talk) 03:55, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * It depends whether the station name is München Ost Bahnhof or München Ostbahnhof, doesn't it? Mjroots (talk) 07:41, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Ach, Sie können Deutsches nicht sprechen. In German (as is well-known), the adjective is joined to the noun, which often leads to long words.  So "East railway station" translates Ostbahnhof, not "Ost Bahnhof" or "Ost Bahn Hof".  Likewise, "shopping centre" is Einkaufszentrum, not "Einkaufs Zentrum", "transport company" is Verkehrsgesellschaft, "white wine" is Weißwein, and so on. --RFBailey (talk) 13:29, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Jammerlijk spreek ik Duitser niet, maar ik begrijp een beetje over de bouw van de taal als ik enige Nederlands spreek. <g> Mjroots (talk) 14:26, 2 September 2008 (UTC) ''(Translation: Unfortunately I don't speak German, but I understand a bit about the construction of the language because I speak some Dutch) Mjroots (talk) 19:17, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree with RFBailey, the name should make some sense, not only for those who cannot speak German but also for those who can. Mjroots, could you please translate your comment to keep this discussion well documented. --STTW (talk)  17:31, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

There is no easy answer to this and it is not restricted to Bahnhof. How do we translate the names of railway museums ( Verkehrsmuseum Nürnberg or Nuremberg Transport Museum?), railway lines (Kochelseebahn or 'Lake Kochel railway'?), etc? There are probably no good hard and fast rules, but well known English versions like Munich, Brunswick, etc, ought to be translated. My Munich guidebook refers to the 'Hauptbahnhof' but puts 'Central Station' in brackets. Likewise for most other proper names. Personally I'm tempted to leave Hauptbahnhof in German, but translate Bahnhof to 'station'. Why? Because there's only one Zwiesel station, so no chance of confusion, but where there's a Hauptbahnhof, there are usually others, so even Brits would tend to talk about the Hauptbahnhof (usually pronouncing it "Howp-banoff"!) - it's part of the name. --Bermicourt (talk) 20:16, 2 September 2008 (UTC)