Talk:Carolina Central Railroad

Page title

Since Sanibel sun thinks that consensus, discussion, and BRD are all optional, I am doing what he refuses to do and opening a discussion as to which title this article should use:

• Wilmington, Charlotte and Rutherford Railroad (original title)
• Carolina Central Railroad (current title)

Trainsandotherthings (talk) 22:11, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Let's assume good faith here. Do we have any sense of what name the line was best known as? It wouldn't surprise me if it was Carolina Central Railroad, given that it operated mostly and was merged into Seaboard under that name, unless most sources focus on the construction period. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 22:22, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

There are three topics here:

• the Wilmington, Charlotte and Rutherford Railroad, incorporated in 1855 and sold in 1873
• the Carolina Central Railroad/Railway, incorporated in 1873 and merged into the Seaboard in 1901
• the physical lines, some of which are extant

The article at present says almost nothing about the 1873-1901 period. Mackensen (talk) 22:23, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't disagree there, but I believe the guiding principle here is to track with what reliable sources call it. (Or we could split the article.) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:46, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

My personal rule of thumb is that if a company built additional track it should probably have its own article, and if a railway line was owned by multiple companies it should have a standalone article. I really dislike conflating lines and companies. Mackensen (talk) 13:50, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

I think the reasoning behind titling the article "Carolina Central Railroad" is because the cited 2000 R. E. Prince book, Seaboard Air Line Railroad has a titled section "Carolina Central Railway" wherein the Wilmington, Charlotte & Rutherford Rail Road Company is briefly discussed with inaccuracies and most of the first paragraph is regurgitated here (as well as many other tertiary sources). It is my opinion that the article should be titled, "Wilmington, Charlotte & Rutherford Rail Road" since that is the name of the parent company that actively planned and built the line. The Carolina Central did little to expand the line. But I'm biased. Jhscarborough (talk) 21:42, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

I retract my comment. After reviewing the article history I see no legitimate reason for the name having ever been changed from WC&RRR to CCRR. Jhscarborough (talk) 00:43, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Proposal: Unmerge and restore the Charlotte Subdivision article

The Charlotte Subdivision is a very active and important line on the CSX system. Personally, as an avid railfan on this track, I will be able to provide as much information as you could see on any other article. I am proposing to unmerge and restore the independent article. Who agrees? Panthers22 (talk) 00:04, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

Do you have examples of significant coverage in reliable sources (no rrpicturearchives.com photos, no trainorders.com discussion boards) that demonstrate notability for the subdivision independent of the railroads that built and operated it? Because most of the existing subdivision articles on Wikipedia are anywhere from poorly-sourced to not sourced at all and I'm of the opinion they don't merit individual articles. Unless you can identify such sources, I am not in support of the subdivision having its own article. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 20:58, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

The ICC valuation reports are probably sufficient for sourcing the history. Mackensen (talk) 21:28, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

The history of the larger rail line, maybe. But subdivisions are in many cases artificial divisions of larger rail lines. I don't get why many railfans are obsessed with them. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 23:39, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that obsession needs to be object of anyone's contempt. It's the name the thing is presently called, and there aren't many examples on the English Wikipedia of descriptive railway line names (e.g. Charlotte-Wilmington railway line) to guide them. Those line names are also used in government planning documents and occasionally in the popular press. WP:OFFICIALNAME and WP:COMMONNAME don't provide easy answers in these cases. The fact that many of the existing articles are inadequate is beside the point. Mackensen (talk) 00:45, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree here. I don't even know what "Carolina Central Railroad" is and I see trains and research the Charlotte and Monroe subdivisions almost every day.

This is the exact reason why I'm asking for independent articles. There's no better way to differentiate the sections of track than to use one of the two names the railroad gives them (the subdivision name and the one-to-three digit letter code for the line, such as A, SG, or SFE). And I think we should have enough information about most of them to support their own pages. Again, I can help a ton with the Charlotte Sub.

If we don't agree on splitting up subdivisions into separate articles, I think we should at least consider breaking up the lines (most of them, at least). The S line gets an article, the SE line gets one, the A line gets one, the Z line gets one, the SF line gets one, the SG line gets one, and so on and so forth. We can include smaller, short subdivisions (such as the SFE Terrell Sub which is almost exclusively used by Charlotte's L656 train) into the larger ones.

I'm not really an advanced editor so I don't know what kind of process we use to determine whether we have consensus on an idea. I'm here because I tried to separate the Charlotte Sub by myself and an editor told me we need to have "consensus". But does anyone agree with me? Panthers22 (talk) 23:17, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Like I said in another reply, I'm pretty new to editing so I don't know whether you'd consider my sources (or even just my own facts) "reliable".

But, for example, when making the line template for the subdivision, the public has full access to the CSX Florence Division timetables and, of course, the blue ENS sign in real life on railroad crossings that display the milepost. I'm not sure how anyone couldn't trust that when listing locations, sidings, mileposts, and customers. You can see that I made a few additions to the Charlotte Sub template already.

I'd consider my sources to be reliable; I don't really use "news networks" or "trainorders.com" but I explore timetables, look on satellite maps, see things with my own eyes, and listen to the radio enough to know enough accurate information about the Charlotte Subdivision to warrant an individual article. Panthers22 (talk) 23:27, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia's policy on original research. We report what is in reliable sources, not firsthand information. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 20:25, 21 August 2024 (UTC)