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Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra railway line, Sydney

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Hi all - I've done a fair bit of work on this article, and I think it could become a featured article in the near future, or at least a good article if it isn't good enough for that. I don't know where to go with this article right now, so I'm keen for some feedback and suggestions on how this could be upgraded to an FA status-article. Thanks. JROBBO 02:36, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a reason it's not at Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line or Eastern Suburbs and Illawarra Line? There's nothing else with the name, so the disambiguation is unnecessary.--NE2 03:00, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The name stems from a decision made by members of WikiProjects in Australia to have a consistent format for the name of every railway station in Australia with an article. Australia doesn't have any metros by which the stations could be named, so every station in a capital city is listed as "X railway station, City", and outside of a capital city is "X railway station, State". You make a good point though on the simple name of the line, so I'll add a couple of redirects. JROBBO 04:21, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is however a line, known as the "Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line" according to the article, not the "Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra railway line". If the common name is "Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line", the article should be titled that; see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names). (Also note that Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains/Manual of style says to use "and" rather than an ampersand, though that's for companies.) --NE2 04:29, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The line doesn't really have an official or most well-known name. Most people would refer to it as the "Illawarra Line", but that's not entirely accurate. I've changed it to the "Illawarra & Eastern Suburbs railway line" to reflect its title. Re the ampersand— that is how all the official documents refer to it— should I leave it as that or move the page to the non-ampersand version? JROBBO 05:53, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure - I'd say keep it with the ampersand. By the way, I apologize if it seems like I'm picking on you for a minor issue... I'll give the article a run-through later and give some more substantial comments. --NE2 07:07, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I am very surprised that an article of such quality could be written about something as obsecure as a railway line. Going over it, it seems fine: the prose flows, it is detailed and well-referenced, and there are ample images. I look forward to giving you a support when it goes to FAC. Sorry for not being able to find any noticeable qualms! michael talk 04:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

I've fixed up what I can find that was wrong with this so far, apart from perhaps the length. The references and links sections, I think look a lot better. JROBBO 03:09, 13 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is a good article and probably should be put up for GA or FA immediately. I don't think subheadings should come immediately after headings and after "history" both "mainline contruction" and "Initial proposal" could both be deleted.Grahamec 05:16, 14 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Grahamec. JROBBO 05:02, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Here's my reply to GI:

I've taken aboard most of your suggestions. The ones I haven't I'll address here. I thought overall the comments were fair and not harsh.

  1. References and dates - I've taken what I did straight from the Wikipedia policies and style manuals on references and dates. According to that, you only need a reference if something is likely to be challenged, or is a direct quote from somewhere. Accordingly, I've only used references for that purpose, although I have still used quite a lot of them and have generally been inclined to put one in even where I thought it wasn't exactly needed. Secondly, I've placed the citations where they refer to something explicitly, which may include in the middle of a sentence, which according to the guidelines is fine - having said that, though, I've generally fixed most of the ones you took issue with. Thirdly, the guidelines say years in isolation are ok where significant for the purposes of the article. I think openings and closings of parts of the line are significant for the purposes of this article, so I've generally left them in. I took all months and days out which are not acceptable.
  2. The Railpage and Geocities pages- I wanted to use some different sources, and these generally are reliable sources, even if the timetables are copyrighted. Wikipedia doesn't control the content of external sources, so whether they are copyrighted or not is beside the point - what matters is how reliable the source is. In the case of the geocities page, the source is the actual timetable that existed in 1991; I can't find a reference for the actual original ones kept in the State Library (they obviously don't have it there), so I'm inclined to leave the timetable where it is as it's the only source of one I can find. The Railpage page is not part of the discussion forums, which would be a dodgy source, but is a hosted site with a table sourced from a heritage rail operator on electric trains in Sydney, which IS a reliable source on the electrification of the system. I've updated the references to reflect that they are sources taken from elsewhere and not made up by the web operators, so that should satisfy your questions about the sources.
  3. Stations - I've said before that the status of stations and the stopping patterns of trains are an important part of the operational aspect of a line. The table is not overly long, unlike the old Sydney Buses tables we used to have, which took up an excessive amount of room on the page, and I don't understand how it "could be annoying to some readers" - how? I think it's fine that we leave it as is - there really isn't any valid reason why it should be put into a hideable table.
  4. Dive Tunnel - is a generic term, but doesn't have a Wikipedia entry.

I think I've covered everything else. Thanks for the suggestions. JROBBO 03:27, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In case you aren't watching that page:

Response - with some clarification of original points:
  1. Having read a bit more - I now understand that generally references should go at the end which does allow for mid-sentence refs... and I think we have artistic differences about which year references are significant, but you've addressed it.
  2. Thanks. IMO - the timetable source, should quote the timetable publication as the source document, and the website as the value of the place parameter. That makes it obvious that the source document is quite reliable - even if (generally) private web hosts aren't (this is a reliable document held in an unreliable location). For reliability purposes - are the same documents available off an internet archive site? - I will look at this one for you, would you consider changing the reference to an archive site instead of geocities?
  3. Artistic differences only. To me - a table that scrolls for more than one screen is a good candidate for hiding.
  4. Fair enough - I'm not a train / engineering guru, hence my question - it looked generic but I've never heard it before.
Honestly glad to hear I didn't come across over critical - I have rubbed ppl the wrong way on public transport topics in the past... Anyway the goal is to have it reach FA. It will be exposed to criticism on the way there...
In summary - mainly artistic / stylistic differences of opinion. It is the best Sydney public transport article I've seen. Garrie 10:18, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the feedback - To answer #2, I don't think the docs are available off an internet archive site; it's a 1991 timetable, which is almost pre-Internet - the CityRail website started in 1994, if I remember correctly from previous research on timetabling. The electrification info is also available in the State Rail Book though - I just felt that I could use some different sources - so I could add that to strengthen the source information. In regards to #1, if you find a year that you don't think adds to the article, by all means remove it. JROBBO 10:32, 21 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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