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Linkspam?

User:TrainMan250 is adding a link to the "Campaign against the New Beeching Report" to dozens of articles. Does anyone have any opinions as to whether this link should be allowed to stand or whether I should dust off that "rollback-batch" button? — iridescent 15:44, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

My observation is that he is simply updating a link that already existed. Olana North (talk) 17:05, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
Indeed, in which case a mass rollback would be useless. However, I'm not convinced about the validity of the external link per WP:EL: it's appearing on articles (Gomshall railway station, for instance) which appear to have no direct relevance to the campaign site. --RFBailey (talk) 17:15, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
But in the case of Gomshall railway station, the link has been added new. There might be a case for adding this as a link from the north of England stations and line affected, but the connection with a very small station in leafy Surrey is not apparent. (Hence = Linkspam) Even for relevant stations, it could be tricky making it fit within WP:EL guidelines unless it has played a major role in the campaign mentioned. EdJogg (talk) 18:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
In my humble opinion, the link is relevant to the stations at Reddish South, Ardwick and Denton, but to no other stations. It may be that there is content of other stations buried within the "CANBER" website, but in this case surely the link should be to a specific article or post? ColourSarge (talk) 20:46, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Oops! I was so busy taking out these links (see WP:ELNO – links should be relevant to the pages; not a mass spamming) that I didn't notice this discussion! Hey, be bold, that's what I say! Geof Sheppard (talk) 15:14, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Would it be good if the project had its own banner instead of doing {{TrainsW1kiProject|class=start|importance=low|UK=yes|UK-importance=low}} ? Simply south (talk) 18:45, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

{{doing}}
Yeh will get on it now!
BG7 19:05, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
 Done
Called with {{UKT}} and looks like {{UKT}}.
There are various parameters beyond the norm: all can be found at Template:UKT/doc however, the main are:
{{UKT
|class=
|importance=
|ibox=
|map=
|stats=
|photo=
|nested=
}}
so we could have something like:
{{UKT
|class=NA
|importance=Top
|ibox=yes
|UK=yes
|UK-importance=low
|map=yes
|stats=yes
|photo=yes
|nested=yes
|category=no
}}
Comments please!
BG7 19:35, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Seems like unnecessary extra work to me. Perhaps instead we should modify the {{TrainsW1kiProject}} template to emphasise the UK component, rather than introducing a whole new template that would need adding to thousands of articles? A modification to the TWP template would be implemented automatically. --RFBailey (talk) 19:40, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't think that would be possible, as a) it's sysop only, and b) it's VERY complicated, and also would need changes to all the other sub temps in it.
AWB will do the job nicely, i'm up for doing it very soon!
The problem with the main temp is that importance ratings aren't handled to well!
Finally, if people bring up the too many banners argument, then we just nest it. It makes it smaller than the TWP temp that way!
Thanks,
BG7 19:46, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Funny you should bring this up today as I'm finally getting back to updating the TWP to try to fix a couple bugs that have been spotted (non-article pages still showing the importance rating needed and now the unref param isn't adding articles to the unref category). With what I had tried not working, I was about ready to start a complete rewrite to make it more modular for subproject specifications. Slambo (Speak) 20:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

BG7, perhaps instead we should specify what we want the banner to do, and have Slambo (or someone else who understands the "intricacies of template syntax") include that as part of the re-coding of {{TrainsW1kiProject}}. I'm not convinced have a separate banner is needed, especially as all UK Railways-tagged articles would also be TWP-tagged. --RFBailey (talk) 20:26, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Hmmm, I have heard that one before. There is another discussion on this page about article assessment, and someone was intendeding to run a "bot" (or similar) to automatically go through all of the articles that are tagged "UK=yes" and include a basic "UK-importance" tage, so make some inroads into the large number of articles that have "none" as the rating. I have yet to see any progress on this, an yet here we are suggesting that we introduce a "UK" banner to all the UK articles. It is not as simple as just adding a UK banner tag, it must be remembered that the "UK" related tags in the existing TWP banner would need to be "deleted" lest we end up with everything being stated twice over. For these reasons I declare total scepticism about the plans, and would ask the question "Do we not have better things to do?". Olana North (talk) 07:29, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
If you remember certain editors were against using a bot (to set the UK importance to the same as the WPT importance) because it might give the wrong answer and in their view no answer was better than the wrong answer. Funny how they don't seem to have contributed themselves. However, articles are being assessed manually, as can be seen here Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/UK Railways articles by quality log. If the new template is adopted then all this hard work has gone to waste.Pyrotec (talk) 07:50, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
A very good point is made by Pyrotec. As one of the editors that has been working on this, I would be very annoyed to find that my time had been wasted. In fact, if this were to happen, then I would have to restrict my contributions on the basis that the "leaders" of this project have "led us astray" and have failed to provide sound leadership. As I also patrol a large number of pages for vandalism, I hope this message is not lost. Olana North (talk) 10:32, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
Whilst I am on my soapbox, I also think that we need something a little more "21st century" as the picture in any new banner. An HST is a little behind the times. By the way, diesel trains are also becoming a little too un-environmentally friendly, and electric trains and further electrification is being pushed higher up the agenda. So if this banner is to be progressed, then perhaps a modern electric train might be more in keeping. Olana North (talk) 07:33, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
In reply to Olana North – any picture used needs to try to portray that railways articles cover both historic and modern. Electric power denotes the modernness certainly, but we also need to demonstrate the historic aspect. With that in mind, would a picture or either a Class 76/77 or one of the North Eastern Railways steeplecab electric locomotives fit the bill? Mjroots (talk) 08:19, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
I have struck out my earlier comment. You are quite right, the UK railways articles cover historic and modern traction, not to mention stations etc. My view was too prejudiced to my own interest. Olana North (talk) 10:28, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
Oppose, Strongly -- I trust Slambo to look after the project banners, and I see absolutely no need to go faffing about adding more and more, just so there's an extra UK-specific one. When we have a full complement of UK-rail featured articles, then maybe editors can think about wasting their time on futile changes like this. For me, my ToDo list will already stretch into next year and beyond, without seeing several hundred more pointless page changes in my watchlist. EdJogg (talk) 13:39, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
after edit conflict
To comment:
  1. The current ratings would not be lost – just transferred. I have set up the temp to cat into the same area.
  2. Why should we settle for a small box in the main banner? Why not incorporate the rest of the TWP into ours for UK article? We should be more prominent on UK Articles!
  3. Image – it was just a quick one, I have a project logo in mind.
  4. Importance tagging – how could a bot possibly tag for importance? Bots know nothing! I am prepared to go through every unassessed article using AWB and importance tag them.
  5. Once again, time has not been wasted – the current taggings will just be transferred into a more prominent banner, making us as a project stand out more.
  6. Finally, if changes to the TWP can make the project more prominent, I would support it. However, at the moment, I don't see how or why a banner for a project that appears to have a large US focus should be displayed prominently on "our" articles: this is by no means a dig to the fabulous Slambo or anyone else who has worked hard with the TWP and project, but more a comment that we should be making ourselves prominent. We shouldn't seperate or distance ourselves from them by any means, as their input is valuable. We just shouldn't rely on things that don't advertise our project very well, which the current TWP doesnt: a small one-liner with an image saying that it's in our scope!
Rant over, but I think the project would be making a mistake if we didn't try and make ourselves more prominent. Otherwise, what's the point, if we just are a mirror of Trains and don't have our own 'identity'.
Oh and finally (really!) I think we should at least adopt our own banner for "english" FAs, GAs and As, as they are our best articles that we should show off!
BG7 13:45, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
BG7 please be aware of WP:OWN, and then perhaps re-consider some of your statements. Olana North (talk) 14:21, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
How was any of that a WP:OWN violation? All is suggestions, I have not claimed to own anything. Has WP become soooooo bueracratic that we are not even allowed Free Speech anymore, or to air our comments. Someone said we should have a banner. I accepted and created it. In future I will not. I will not help. If I can help, I won't. Everyone be aware that I have neither the time or the knowledge to help contributing to articles, but I have the odd 5 minutes to operate a program and tag things, create banners etc. So can we stop saying that people are wasting their time?!?! I am not wasting mine, I am using it to do others a favour, rather than adding speculation or untrue info to articles, or damaging already good articles by making Good Faith but unconstructive edits.
I am leaving the project.
BG7 14:27, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
The point is that WP:OWN applies to WikiProjects, as well as individuals, so talking about "our" articles is a bit problematic: the articles don't belong to the WikiProject. What people are saying is that adding an extra project tag to talk pages of articles would create quite a lot of work, or require someone to program a bot, or to sit there tediously watching a massive AWB run, after which we wouldn't really be in a situation much different to what we already have.
(Personally, I'm sceptical about the whole article-tagging business anyway, and never really look at such tags: the "importance" and "quality" criteria are subjective and open to opinion.) --RFBailey (talk) 18:57, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
A view was expressed above to get (firstly) all the articles rated by UK class, and that has been done; and (2) rate by UK importance and that is half-done. Now the goal posts are being moved and the latest idea is to change the tag, which could waste all the effort done to date on assessing UK importance (but some don't think so). The effort has also resulted in more articles being tagged WPTrains and also UK trains. The "importance" and "quality" criteria, as you say, are subjective and open to opinion, up to B-class; but they are also open to challenge. If you if care to check Olana North, for example, has changed some of my assessments and I have changed assessments that Olana North has made; but I suspect that we would agree on the vast majority that we have both reviewed. You and I also appear to hold diametrically opposite views, so I would not be too surprised at your point of view. Having done several thousand assessments over the last few months mostly on WPT-tagged articles (and some editors have done similar numbers or even more) I see the value of such assessments. I probably don't look at tags unless I'm tagging; I can assess an article's quality without looking for a tag, importance is possibly not so easy (well to me). I have also contributed in a modest way on helping some articles, that I have an interest in, gaining GA status; some others I sometimes work with are way past the 20,000 mark, but I have other things to do with my time. If you cannot distinguish the difference between say a stub and a GA-assessment article, or see any difference in their value, what are you doing in wikipedia? Management is about measurement, if we "offer" to manage a group of articles within our areas of interest, it can be useful to assess articles by class and importance. We can then target areas that are deficient: some people might target unreferenced articles, others articles without maps (route diagrams), others concentrate on improving stubs, or getting B-class class articles up to GA-class articles, etc; and others only do what is local to them. For those that chose not to target local articles, flagging provides a means of priorising articles; and allows other to decry the value of other people's efforts.Pyrotec (talk) 20:45, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
In themselves, the article ratings are of little use. However, as part of a managed system, they can be used to guide editors towards the most important articles and those that need the most work. Within a project framework they can guide like-minded individuals to collaborate on improving articles. We are still in the first stage, assesing the articles. I look forward to the second stage where project members will make a combined assault on the articles most needing attention. Without this follow-up work, the effort of tagging will be largely wasted. EdJogg (talk) 23:40, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't mean to belittle the efforts of those who have been carrying out the tagging. EdJogg is right: if the tags are actually used to target improvements, then they are useful. Perhaps we should be having a discussion on what we should be targetting, rather than on a superfluous second round of tagging, which merely would duplicate earlier efforts. Any suggestions? --RFBailey (talk) 01:14, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

(outdent)Firstly, we need to get all UK railways assessed for UK importance. Once that is done, the priority should be improving top importance stubs, top importance start class articles, high importance stubs, high importance start class articles and so on. As has been said before, the importance grading allows prioritising of articles for attention – but articles need to be assessed first. Mjroots (talk) 08:51, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh boy, have we got a long way to go. Out of curiosity I checked the ratings for the following articles, which, by any grading scales should be amongst the most important that we could be looking after. (All are tagged by Trains and UKTrains projects, other projects also noted):
  1. GWR 'B-Class', Importance: Trains-High UKRail-High Projects: Bristol
  2. LMS 'Start-class', Importance: Unrated!!!! Projects: Scotland, Transport in Scotland, UK Waterways
  3. LNER 'B-Class', Importance: Trains-Mid UKRail-Mid Projects: Transport in Scotland
  4. SR 'Start-class', Importance: Trains-Low UKRail-Mid Projects: London Transport, London, Kent, Surrey, Sussex
  5. BR 'B-Class', Importance: Trains-Mid UKRail-High Projects: London Transport, Transport in Scotland
I would argue that all five should be at least 'High' and probably 'Top', if only to distinguish them from other (currently) high-importance articles such as 'Doncaster Works', the 'British Rail Class 67', and (astonishingly) 'Sandite' (!!!) For Trains I would argue that they are borderline High/Mid (ie on a global scale). I will re-visit these shortly to rationalilse this, especially the LMS page!! If nothing else, they should have equal importance, both nationally and globally.
What this does highlight is the inconsistency within WP as a whole. If the project is successfully coordinating anything then these five articles should be GA or greater before anything else is tackled. It cannot be for lack of reference material. I find it faintly absurd that we can have the SR Merchant Navy locos as a Main Page Featured Article yet Southern Railway is barely Start-class, despite being tagged by six different projects. (And before you say anything, I collaborated on the MN article page. I am just using it for comparison.)
Maybe the problem with these is that the topics are just too big. I know from current re-ordering work at 'Steam engine', and previous thoughts about 'Train' and 'Rail transport' (the destination for both 'Railway' and 'Railroad' redirects) that the article scope is so vast it can be difficult to know what should be included and (especially) in what order. Incidentally, all three of these articles have been identified as 'essential' by the WP1.0 team, yet none currently exceeds B-Class.
The difficulty for the project, I guess, is getting this band of volunteers to collaborate on these 'big' topics, when we are all quite happy working on the little articles.
EdJogg (talk) 13:05, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
OK, those have all been marked as Top importance for UK. Which brings us nicely to the pre-grouping companies. Are these to benifit from a blanket importance (High?) or a blanket minimum importance of mid? Or is it a case of each assessed individually? Mjroots (talk) 15:36, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
This is a slightly larger task... Having just looked at List of railway companies involved in the 1923 grouping, some of whom are still redlinks(!), it seems to me that the major constituent companies should be 'High', with the rest on 'Mid'. The distinction is easy, since the major constituents are all listed in {{Bigfour}}. This is working on the basis that all these railway articles should be parents for (and hence linked from) a relatively large number of child articles. Whether all constituent companies should be 'mid', however, is probably open to debate -- I would probably go by route mileage as a starting point, since there are bound to be a few tiny companies that warrant only low importance.
(PS -- I wasn't planning to change any more pages myself! - hint, hint :o) )
EdJogg (talk) 17:46, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
Note that my changes regarding the 'Big Four' do not align with the criteria laid down at Wikipedia:WikiProject UK Railways/Assessment which suggests that 'Top' is reserved for topics listed under {{Train topics}}. However, the topics in that template are 'Top' on a GLOBAL scale, so this restriction would mean that UK articles have one less available importance rating. (So I stand by my changes, and wait for the flack!)
EdJogg (talk) 18:37, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
"Global" in this WikiProject means the UK, therefore the Big Four and British Rail should be Top importance articles. I fully agree with the changes made. Mjroots (talk) 20:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
What started out as a discussion on a new Template seems to have morphed into a discussion on assessment ratings. Can we please get back to the original point. Olana North (talk) 12:40, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

(outdent again) IMHO I think that although it would be a nice idea to have our own banner, the discussion has highlighted that there are more pressing concerns to address. The ratings for BR and the Big Four in particular concerns me – these really should be among our "Rolls Royce" articles. So a new banner is a nice idea, but we should make sure we have great articles to stick the banner on first. ColourSarge (talk) 20:34, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I was out of town for the weekend at the NMRA's Midwest Region convention and couldn't get a reliable net connection at the hotel, so I'm just catching up on the conversation now.
One idea that I toyed with a while back was to have the associated projects' parameters display a separate banner if they are enabled, even though the parameters are used by the TWP banner. That would mean that {{TrainsW1kiProject|UK=yes}} could show the TWP banner and below it could show a UK-specific banner. We originally settled on the current scheme to avoid cluttering talk pages with too many banners (which was the reason that {{WikiProjectBanners}}, {{WikiProjectBannerShell}} and the small=yes options were developed). Since there's such a vocal group pushing to reduce the number of banners on an article's talk page, it seems more prudent to keep things together.
The notable exceptions are associated projects whose scope includes articles that are outside the scope of TWP. For example, the WPRT and NYPT projects' scopes include a large number of articles that are within TWP's scope, but they also include articles on road transport systems that are not within TWP's scope. For these projects a separate banner enables them to tag articles separately without needlessly including them in the TWP categories. It seems less likely to me that articles within UKRRAIL's scope wouldn't also be within TWP's scope, so a unified banner still makes the most sense to me. I'm not strictly opposing a UKRRAIL banner, but I see it as less of a pressing need at this point because of the two projects' scopes. Slambo (Speak) 13:31, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Doh! I should know the proper shortcut by now. B-) Slambo (Speak) 10:56, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

NA-Assessment of Redirect pages

I had a quick look at Category:NA-importance UK Railways articles earlier and discovered that the majority of the articles are redirects, or rather, they would be redirects if they hadn't been broken. For redirect pages it is essential that the project banner is placed beneath the redirect line, or the redirect will not work. I have fixed Talk:Penmanshiel Tunnel collapse, which you can now see in italics in the category, which confirms that it is a redirect. I haven't had time to tackle the others yet, so I dropped a note here to show what was needed.

EdJogg (talk) 18:41, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

 Done last night! BG7 13:03, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
Thank you :o) Might be worth a comment on the UKRail assessment page to avoid the problem in the future. EdJogg (talk) 00:22, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
No worries mate! From some of the comments raised in the above discussion, the whole page needs re-vamping – i'll tackle it in a few days.
Thanks,
BG7 08:01, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't think the talk pages should redirect to the article, more they should redirect to the article's talk page, which i will fix now. Simply south (talk) 08:59, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
Woops, sorry! DOn't worry i'll fix with AWB.
BG7 09:01, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Laxey Browside Tramway

Has been AfD'd. Mjroots (talk) 04:55, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Anglesey's railways

I've been beavering away on the Anglesey Central Railway for a while, and also recently on the Red Wharf Bay branch line. Most of the information that I've found has already been put into the articles, but there is some more stuff to be put in the ACR article about the recent history of the line. There will be some maps to add when I draw them, and I have some images that are old enough to be public domain, but have yet to be scanned.

The trouble is, I've been staring at these pages for so long that I'm getting bogged down, and losing objectivity. Could some other editors cast an eye over these, and perhaps make some suggestions as to what needs doing?

Thanks, Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 10:17, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

05/06 Usage Information

Reviving this section as it was a live topic....

User:Ansbaradigeidfran has added 0506 usage stats for all stations listed under Wales, and I have done the WCML currently from Euston to Stafford, including loops and some branches.

Is anybody working on any other areas so we can co-ordinate efforts and avoid duplication of effort? ColourSarge (talk) 17:15, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to start on the South West region soon 86.147.230.89 (talk) 08:19, 15 May 2008 (UTC) (also known as Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) when I remember to sign in!)South West region is done. Many stations had been updated already. Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 16:34, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

South East is done now. I'm going to attack the London area next, but not for a short while! Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 11:59, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Good stuff, we seem to be making some progress...I've had a few days off doing stats as I've been beavering away on the LMS artile re-write in my sandbox, but I'm taking a break while I wait for comments (thanks for your re-write of that sentence in the intro by the way, it does read better). My next usage stats push will be to continue up the WCML from Stafford, and to include the following "branches"; Liverpool, Manchester, Blackpool, Windermere, North Wales Coast, Cumbrian Coast. Then I think I'll stop for a stiff drink. :o) ColourSarge (talk) 21:34, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
North Wales Coast is already done, seeing as it's in Wales ;) My approach has been to go through each region alphabetically: I found that I got through them quite quickly that way.
Enjoy that drink! Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 14:45, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
If you do London and you see me with the edit summary "usage", please note that i am currently taccling LU usage and not this. Simply south (talk) 15:53, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Liskeard railway station

This article has recently been tagged as being a "Class B" article, yet I see no evidence of a review being carried out. Has the correct process been followed in assessing the quality of this article? Olana North (talk) 07:27, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

It's now been reassessed as Start class, which i'd say was a fair assessment at first glance. Mjroots (talk) 11:31, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
I agree that it should not have been assessed as B class; and that Start class is appropriate.Pyrotec (talk) 19:43, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Assessment examples

While nosing around {{Grading scheme}} I noticed that the template supports choosing the example articles. Wouldn't it make more sense for us to have railway articles as examples at WP:Rail/A? Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 18:37, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

If we are tying to be consistent across wikipedia then it is not necessary to have railway articles – (1) its just a case of copying across the wikipedia examples from the grading scheme; and (2) by clicking on this link Wikipedia:WikiProject UK Railways/Assessment it is possible to access all UK railway rated articles by class and importance.
However I can see the attraction of railway examples; but examples of each class would, I suggest, have to be chosen by consensus. If you look at UK rail-rated GA-class articles for example, there are 33 of them: five are railways or railway lines; a similar number are stations, the rest are nearly all locos, plus a bridge or two and an author or two. So what do we choose for a GA class example – one of each type or just one example; same question for all the other classes? You also need to bear in mind that the rules have been tightened up on in-line citations on articles of Start-class and higher; so an "old"-rated article might not be as acceptable as a "newly" rated article. Without wishing to stir up problems Ffestiniog Railway was GA rated in December 2005, but it might struggle on in-line citations if it were reassessed today. However, I'm not requesting any such reassessment.Pyrotec (talk) 17:03, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
What you mention about the rating of the Ffestiniog Railway is interesting, and worrisome. As someone that has done a lot of work assessing the "importance" of articles over the last few months, it concerns me that the ratings may also be flawed. What it suggests is that the rating and/or importance of an article may need to be time limited. In other words there should be a defined time limit for the rating of articles. This means that they lose their rating and fall back to a "normal" level if they do not get re-assessed within that time frame. This will ensure that all articles (especially those with FA/A/GA ratings get reviewed in the light of changes to the assessment criteria. Olana North (talk) 19:24, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Yes, but this is about Class, not Importance. I think that Importance is far more subjective than Class.Pyrotec (talk) 17:48, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
My preferred option is to "improve" it without formally requesting a reassessment – see the GA flag on the article's talk page. Its still Good, as in GA article and it was not a flawed assessment when in was made in December 2005, but the in-line citations are now rather "weak" and need to be improved if it is to avoid a future challenge. See also Inverclyde Line – that was challenged but an Admin upheld the GA status – it does not in my opinion deserved GA status, I'd rate it B-class. The Ffestiniog Railway is far better than the Inverclyde Line, and I'm probably biased towards Transport in Scotland!!!!Pyrotec (talk) 15:35, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

New franchise

I hope i haven't been too hasty with creating South Central franchise. Simply south (talk) 23:08, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

East Kent Light Railway

Could an uninvolved editor review the assessment of this article please? Mjroots (talk) 07:28, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

B-class, UK-importance=Mid (possibly High). With a bit more work would make GA; it might make a GA without much work, it depends who does it. (stub-class for dates :-), so I cleaned it up). There's not many wikilinks after the first two sections; and none afterwords for non-railway words, such as asbestos and weatherboarding. A very good article thought. I'm not familiar with East Kent, so no comments about accuracy; and I've not checked grammar all that carefully, but it looks OK. More pictures would help a GA rating.Pyrotec (talk) 17:19, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

South Central franchise

Someone has created a page about the South Central franchise. I think it should be deleted, possibly speedy.

Is this right? If so, could someone list it. Btline (talk) 20:42, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Before you do that, I suggest that you provide a reason, and also ensure that it meets the criteria for speedy deletion. As far as I can see, the article has provide a context (criteria #1), and has some content (criteria #3). It may qualify for deletion for other reasons, but I do not agree that it meets the "speedy" criteria. I also suggest that you place a tag on the talk article, and perhaps initiate a discussion on the talk page. Olana North (talk) 07:28, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
It doesn't fail the 'article' criteria 2, 5, or 7 either. As for the General criteria, it does not fail any of these either, so a request for Speedy Deletion would (almost certainly) fail.
I cannot imagine why this article should be deleted. It has been created as a result of information provided by a reliable source, which is more than can be said for many new articles. Admittedly it concerns a future event, but it is reporting the facts concerning an announcement and is no more speculative than the source. With further research you would probably be able to locate further references to corroborate the article.
I can only presume that the proposer did not bother to view the original news report.
EdJogg (talk) 12:19, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

No, you have missed the point. I know for a fact that the SCF will be set up. I do not think the article should be there until a confirmed operator with a name has started. Do we normally have articles like this? Should it be listed in the Future TOCs template yet.

Those are the questions I was asking. I know that "technically" the article is notable enough. Btline (talk) 12:22, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, that's a rather different ball game! and I do now see your point: this article concerns a franchise, but he related articles concern Operators.
It is an interesting question: should the franchise itself have a separate article, or only when an Operator is allocated. The answer to this, I would suggest, depends on whether a franchise can exist over more than one Operator -- that is, can the same named franchise be operated by more than one Operator during the life of the franchise, or is there a one-to-one link between Operator and Franchise? Is there a list of the franchises somewhere? I think there should be, and it would list the area served, the Operator and the periods when that Operator was awarded the franchise.
Should the 'Future TOCs' template incorporate 'Future Franchises' too?
Sorry, more questions than answers! EdJogg (talk) 12:42, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I have decided to take some actions and have redone the templates to accommodate this article.

I have also added to the article.

However, we still need to ask whether the article should stay. Btline (talk) 12:48, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Maybe i did create this a bit early although there is a notable change in June. Maybe this should be stored until the bids. Simply south (talk) 18:58, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
The problem with these operator/franchise articles is that because the franchise system changes pretty much every time a franchise is awarded to a particular operator, in a large number of cases there is a one-to-one correspondence between franchises and operators. Thus for the most part a franchise and operator can be described in a single article. In this case, the franchise in question is only a slight modification of the existing South Central franchise (the franchise held by Govia which trades as "Southern"), with two additional services incorporated into it (Gatwick Express and those on the Redhill-Tonbridge line). So at present it could possibly be described in the Southern article. Once the bidding process starts, and there will be more to say about it, then this could be reconsidered. Also, rather than deleting the article, it ought to be redirected to Southern, as that company already operates the current South Central franchise.
That said, the article that exists now is quite acceptable to be going on with (especially after I've copyedited it..... :) ), even if it does duplicate some existing material. --RFBailey (talk) 19:32, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

List of current systems for electric rail traction

User:Berk2 has moved this article to Current systems for electric rail traction. I have placed the following questions on this users talk page for him to answer:
(1) Why was it not discussed on the talk page?
(2) Why wasn't a reason for the move was given?
(3) Why wasn't a tage placed on the page before the move took place, indicating your intention?
(4) Why did you not consult before making the move thereby acheive consensus.
I feel that it is unacceptable behaviour to move pages without prior consensus or a valid reasonb being given (i.e. reference to a Wikipedia policy). Olana North (talk) 07:32, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Moving a page is a normal editing action: not everything has to be listed at WP:RM first. In this case, the article is clearly a list, so "List of [...]" is probably a better title. Remember we're supposed to be encouraging editors to be bold: not stamping on them when they follow this. An expression about mountains and molehills springs to my mind..... --RFBailey (talk) 15:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
As you say an article that is clearly a "list, ought to have a title that starts "List of", so why change it??? Also, are you suggesting that WP:BOLD takes precedence over WP:CONSENSUS?? I thought that this place was a collaboration of effort. Also, with WP:BOLD must come responsibility, and surely giving an explanation and a reason is just plain being WP:CIVIL. Please correct me if I have interpreted the purpose of Wikipedia incorrectly. Olana North (talk) 17:27, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
No, I'm not suggesting that at all. And stop shouting about civility. If (s)he'd said to you, "F*** off, I can move whatever page I like, ha ha ha", that would be incivil. You're supposed to assume good faith. Anyway, I agree with you that the page move was unnecessary, so I've moved it back. --RFBailey (talk) 20:12, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

The UK Transport Wiki

Hi All,

I am creating a wiki all about Transport in The UK. As this WikiProject is about UK Railways, it would fall under the scope of the UK Transport Wiki. If you are interested please leave a message on my user talk or on My UK Transport Wiki user talk.

Thanks – Dudleybus Spake 2 me 09:15, 4 June 2008

First Harrogate Trains

Members of the project may wish to participate in the following AfD discussion: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/First Harrogate Trains. Thanks, --RFBailey (talk) 20:19, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

British Rail Class 21 (Vossloh)

I have been looking through the 2008 issue of the Locomotives and Coaching Stock book by Platfrom 5 and I cannout see any reference to this locomotive. I suspect that this is a "hoax" article, but would like others to confirm/deny the existence of this locomotive and that it does have a TOPS class of 21 allocated to it. If nobody responds, then I shall tag it up for deletion (preferably speedy). Olana North (talk) 12:07, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't say hoax, but whether they (and other locos owned by Euro Cargo Rail such as some of the 66s) count at British Rail locos is debatable. This does bring up the 'what is British Rail' debate again, what is the difference between a 66 owned by EWS/ECR (never BR) and one owned by HKG for example? I can't confirm the detail in the article such as TOPS code, I'm afraid. The German ECR page de:Euro Cargo Rail does mention the TOPS code. Talltim (talk) 13:04, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
Probably not a deliberate hoax, more likely to be misguided. The reason given in the article for the class supposedly being given a TOPS code sounds a bit dubious to me, though; as far as I know, diesels aren't allowed through the Channel Tunnel under their own power, so why would they need to travel to Dollands Moor? --RFBailey (talk) 13:49, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
They would need a TOPS code if they are hauled on British metals, in the same way that freight and coaching stock has TOPS codes.
In terms of the article title, it is possible that "TOPS Class 21" would be more accurate, although whether anyone actually calls them that (which is how you should decide what the name should be) is another matter. (For that reason, NONE of the existing articles, includeing the Class 57s, should be renamed, as they form a cohesive set, even if in some cases the name is not 100% accurate).
EdJogg (talk) 15:45, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
[additional] The problem would not occur if these articles had followed the US model, so instead of "British Rail Class 47" we would have "Brush Type 4", for example -- manufacturer then model, as for car articles. (Admittedly it's not quite so simple when the locos are actually built by BR...!) Maybe the same should be done here, article renamed Vossloh G1206 with the "BR Class 21 (Vossloh)" title demoted to a redirect?
EdJogg (talk) 16:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
Be BOLD and move the article as suggested. --Stewart (talk) 16:31, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
We should need a Vossloh G1206 article sometime anyway, these locos are quite common (and owned by many operators) Talltim (talk) 18:33, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
Please don't let my suggestion stop anyone else from being bold...
Anyway, is the title "Vossloh G1206" consistent with other Vossloh locomotive articles?
(This is some distance from my normal editing areas, and also I have no more time to do it at present! )
EdJogg (talk) 19:08, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
There aren't any other Vossloh loco articles in the English wiki, (I was looking last week!) so we don't have a standard. There are a few articles about MaK locos (Vossloh's predecessor) which seem to be in their respecive owners grouping's.
I am in the process of translating the Vossloh G2000 article from the German wiki, so will need a common naming scheme soon.
I think Vossloh {model name} would be suitable, please could someone with the requitsite skills move/rename British Rail Class 21 (Vossloh) to Vossloh G1206 and I will do some tidying up of the article? Thanks Talltim (talk) 08:21, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Moved has been carried out as discurred above (even if I managed to make an error in wikilink to this discussion) --Stewart (talk) 16:18, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
thanks Stewart, I'll have get on with modifying it and adding the other owner's locos in now! Talltim (talk) 18:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Thank you to everyone who helped in this. Olana North (talk) 19:27, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Specification vs. implementation-of-specification

← Just to reopen to discussion; there is already SNCF Class BB 61000 (French classification for Vossloh G1206); which is the same problem, but in reverse. We also have it with British Rail Class 66/EMD Series 66 (and now CD66). —Sladen (talk) 12:51, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Good point, now you have really confused issues, especially with regards to the CD66 article! Here's a suggestion (which is contrary to my previous one). We have a manufacturer's page for each loco model, and then also pages on operators (state or private) for each loco type (this brings up the problem, would the EWS/ECR Vossloh G1206s be British Rail Class 21 (Vossloh) or ECR Vossloh G1206 or something else? (they haven't given them their own class name)).
Feel free to disagree with this suggestion, I'm not sure I like it myself! Talltim (talk) 09:49, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Need to take a step back and consider WP basics. The main article should be about the general loco (Vossloh G1206). This should then contain information about who operates the locomotive and the differences between them. IF there is enough information about one particular operator's examples (as is NOT the case with the EWS ones yet) then this can spawn a sub-article, that can link back to the main article for all the technical details, design history, etc. Looked-at this way, there will never be a British Rail G1206, but there could be an ECR Vossloh G1206, IF there is sufficient text to warrant it.
EdJogg (talk) 10:16, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Thats the conclusion I've come to too. Thus, for example EMD Series 66 would be the main article, with British Rail Class 66 (in this case) being a sub article*, the same as CD66 Talltim (talk) 10:44, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
  • I know wiki doesn't really work with nested articles.

Bristol Temple Meads

Bristol Temple Meads railway station is currently rated B-class, but recent edits have probably moved this close to GA. before I turn it over for a formal assesment, perhaps members of this project would like to take a look and see what else needs doing. Geof Sheppard (talk) 16:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

This is an interesting one, and it raises questions about the consistency of the assessement given to other GA rated articles on UK railway stations (Jordanhill railway station, London Paddington station, Preston railway station, Rugby railway station). The article on Rugby has only three references and has a tag stating that it needs more!! I like the maps of Preston, and something similar would really be good for a station like Bristol TM, which has had a lot of changes over its lifetime. I think it deserves a GA status, but it raise questions about whether some other deserve it. I think Rugby should be down-graded. Olana North (talk) 19:16, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
I agree on both Bristol Temple Meads (i.e. is a good GA candidate) and Rugby (i.e. lacks references); but the only problem with Rugby is lack of references. I mentioned Inverclyde Line above. The same admin awarded GA status to both the Inverclyde Line and Rugby; and a challenge over the Inverclyde Line was not upheld. Perhaps we need to ensure that this admin does the assessment on Bristol Temple Meads.Pyrotec (talk)
I have just looked at Rugby railway station on the date that it was reviewed and there was only one reference, and yet the reviewing admin put "pass" against the "well referenced" criteria. I fully agree with Pyrotec that this reviewing admin should be asked to explain his decision. Olana North (talk) 07:05, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
I am going to be slightly critical on the Description (not a typo). To me this section reads like a tour of the station. There are many useful facts that should remain such as the train shed having a notable roof and many things that could be left out. The sections could change slightly maybe with something about the facilities in a separate area. It also seems to read in this section that most of the facilities are located in the subway, which i think would be a rather odd place. Simply south (talk) 20:37, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
If I recall correctly, most of the facilities are indeed in the subway..... --RFBailey (talk) 20:43, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
The last time I used BTM, before privatisation, most of the facilities were in the subway, including toilets; but there was bookstall/paper shop (either WH Smith or John Menzies – I forget which) at platform level.Pyrotec (talk) 20:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
As someone who uses BTM on a regular basis (last time a week or so ago) I can confirm that is where most of the services including coffee, ATMs, pasties, other food, toilets, lost property office etc are to be found in the subway & yes the newsagent is at ground level by the ticket office info boards. BTW I think the article is getting much better in the last couple of days.— Rod talk 19:52, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

The description does indeed read like a tour of the station. The History section is aimed at people interested in why and how it became notable, the Description is for those who want to visit it now, so combines highlights of the surviving historical bits and information about how it works now. If you look back on the article history you will see that it was originally two sort-of lists which is a style that is unlikely to gain merit in a GA assesment. Geof Sheppard (talk) 16:35, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Humber Coast & City Railway

What should happen about this proposal? It seems to have fizzled out although it was proposed also as a subsidary of Hull Trains, according to some sources, and there is a current aspiration by Hull Trains for the lincolnshire services. Simply south (talk) 10:48, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

It is a difficult one. There clearly is a proposal still, but it is unlikely to happen now. Btline (talk) 16:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Given that it appears to have been an idea of Renaissance Trains without any other companies' input, I suggest we merge it into their article. Alternatively, in the Hull Trains article, their current aspirations (re Harrogate, Lincolnshire) should be mentioned somewhere, and this could then be mentioned as an earlier, alternative proposal. (Personally, I think this service was a mad idea, and don't understand how they ever thought there was a business case for such a convoluted route, but that's just my opinion.) --RFBailey (talk) 16:29, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
I agree. But it is even madder for them to be pushing it now, as two other TOCs will be starting much faster services soon. Btline (talk) 16:32, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Reference desk

Resolved

A question Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 June 10#Proper term for a flipboard? was asked on the reference desk and I thought someone here may be able to help provide and answer. - X201 (talk) 12:57, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Services boxes on station articles

How should service boxes be arranged on station articles? In alphabetical order? - as there appears to be a lot of articles with them not in alphabetical order. For example in this article they appear to be in the number of services provided order. I know this is only a small matter but it would be nice to have continuity between articles. Which is the best / agreed way? Year1989 (talk) 00:23, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Alphabetical order (I presume you mean by name of train operating company) seems sensible as a general rule; however, it might make sense to separate out the "limited service" operators and put them after the main ones. So, in the Chinley example you cited, Northern would go first, with EMT and FTPX afterwards. --RFBailey (talk) 03:58, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

S-rail, yet again

Hello folks, back again. If memory serves, the last serious discussion of replacing {{rail line}} by {{s-line}} took place in in November of 2007. My impression of the discussion was that there was no real opposition to replacing one with the other, but rather concerns over the level of detail shown by the boxes (e.g. stopping patterns). As an outsider I'm neutral on that question; what goes for one rail system does not necessarily go for another. I do, however, think the time is right for replacement. During the last discussion, I and others introduced changes to the templates to accommodate this group. Among them was a fix for the large whitespace issue and the ability to suppress termini system-wide. Apropos of the discussion above, there's practically no difference between the route boxes for Chinley using {{rail line}} or {{s-line}}:

Preceding station National Rail National Rail Following station
Edale   Northern Rail
Hope Valley Line 		  Hazel Grove or
New Mills Central
Edale
Limited Service 		  East Midlands Trains
Liverpool-Norwich (Hope Valley Line)
Limited Service 		  Hazel Grove
Limited Service
Dore and Totley
Limited Service 		  First TransPennine Express
South TransPennine
Limited Service 		  Stockport
Preceding station   National Rail National Rail   Following station
Northern Rail
Limited service
East Midlands Trains
Limited service
Limited service
First TransPennine Express

The primary difference, of course, is standardisation. Colours are defined centrally at {{National Rail colour}}, instead of on each article individually. If a TOC colour needs be changed, then that's one edit to one template, instead of hundreds of edits to hundreds of articles. It also means auto-linking for branches and stations, again defined centrally. In the long run this is a vast simplification of the template structure.

I'm coming here, hat in hand (as it were), to ask that this be given a fair trial. At the end of the day the articles will look the same. I'm not proposing that we show stopping patterns, nor that we display termini. Look at the example above: can you tell me which is which?

Thank you for your time, Mackensen (talk) 22:01, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree that this would make things simpler and I support using it. It would especially make things more simple with operator colours. The only thing is that there is nothing to say that an operators service at this station is a limited service but this could be added. Year1989 (talk) 22:47, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
While the output of the two methods looks pretty much exactly the same (especially now that {{s-rail}} has been adapted to make this possible), of course the code underneath making it all work is very different. The main difference between the two is that {{s-rail}} requires the setup of several subsidiary templates. However, if the proponents of {{s-rail}} are willing to contribute to assist with the enormous start-up costs of implementing this, then potentially we could go ahead.
One suggestion: in the following line of code
{{s-rail-line|system=National Rail|line=First TransPennine Express|branch=South TransPennine|previous=Dore and Totley|next=Stockport|note=Limited service}}
perhaps the "line" field should be renamed "toc" (short for train operating company) and "branch" renamed as "route"? Maybe a new "{{National Rail line}}" template with this functionality could be created. --RFBailey (talk) 23:11, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
It goes without saying that I'll bear the costs of the transition, and I suspect others as well. S-line templates are descended from rail line, and the two can co-exist on the same page without difficulties. Many of the subsidiary templates already exist, created during the November discussion. Not having termini displayed eliminates much of the work in that area. National rail line could simply call s-line with different names, if necessary. Mackensen (talk) 00:45, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
I've called it {{s-rail-national}} and updated the example above. Mackensen (talk) 00:56, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks--that's a help. I think {{National Rail colour}} needs updating to reflect recent changes: see here for an up-to-date list. --RFBailey (talk) 01:08, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Well, I've updated it to include First ScotRail's commuter rail services (including the background colours, which was interesting to implement). Mackensen (talk) 01:55, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
....and I've further updated it, adding and removing some TOCs (RIP GNER :) ). --RFBailey (talk) 04:58, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Going forward, I think the sensible thing (if there is consensus to do so) is to pick a TOC, it doesn't matter which, and migrate its templates, making sure to get all the routes and nuances right. If the experiment goes all right then we can start talking about a larger rollout. We'll also have to discuss First Capital Connect, which is using its own instance of {{s-line}} and should probably be coordinated with the National Rail templates. Mackensen (talk) 17:38, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok looks like a good idea to me. What about starting with First TransPennine Express as their network isnt too complex but it should be enough to test it. Also wouldnt the above example need to be like this to show that the services are limited services? Otherwise this is not made clear.
Preceding station   National Rail National Rail   Following station
Northern Rail
Limited service
East Midlands Trains
Liverpool-Norwich
Limited Service
Limited service
Limited service
First TransPennine Express
Limited Service

That makes it look more clear to me Year1989 (talk) 20:48, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

The route=South TransPennine<br>Limited Service bit seems to have screwed up the South TransPennine link. Perhaps this is ill-advised? Maybe the "route" field could have an optional "limited=yes" to produce a "Limited service" disclaimer? --RFBailey (talk) 23:42, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Its just this particular station the service is limited. Some selected East Midlands Trains services stop at the stations on the Hope Valley Line. Some only stop at Chinley. Selected First TransPennine Express services stop at Dore and some stop at Chinley or both. Year1989 (talk) 21:16, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
To clarify that, there are various "limited service" situations which could theoretically occur. Suppose the service box has been placed on the article about Station A, which on a particular line is preceded by Station B and succeeded by Station C. Then the possibilities are:
    • the whole line could have a limited service, in which case the service at A, B and C is limited;
    • the line sees a regular service, serving B and C ordinarily, but only occasionally serves A;
    • the line sees a regular service, serving A and and one of B/C ordinarily, but only occasionally serves the other;
    • the line sees a regular service, serving A ordinarily, but only occasionally serves both B and C.
How should we differentiate between these, without having "Limited service" all over the box?
Anyway, how should we define "Limited service" anyway? --RFBailey (talk) 23:42, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
It's been my understanding that this project, in dealing with these boxes, thinks in terms of "lines" and not "services." This may be a level of detail more usefully discussed in the article text; the primary purpose of the box is navigational. That being said, it would pose no special problem to add a "limited" field to the middle cell, although a more general "notemid" would be my preference. Mackensen (talk) 23:52, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
I agree: I think having such information can make the boxes overly cluttered. --RFBailey (talk) 01:23, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Branch/route, like line/toc and system is part of the core group of parameters which define the line; it isn't meant to handle notes of this kind and route definition. Mackensen (talk) 23:54, 9 June 2008 (UTC)
Okay, "notemid" now exists. Mackensen (talk) 00:04, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Thats better. Should we start implementing this now on the First TransPennine Express routes as I suggested? Or should we hold more talks first? Year1989 (talk) 19:43, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Maybe a better idea would be trial this on a certain line and not a certain opertor. If we trialed this on the Hope Valley Line it would be better. Year1989 (talk) 13:59, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
Fine by me; let's go ahead. Mackensen (talk) 14:20, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Hope Valley Line is more or less done, without incident. How do folks here feel about wider production? Mackensen (talk) 22:25, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

The Hope Valley Line roll-out seems to be fine; there is one bug, though--the previous/next links are to "X station" rather than "X railway station", meaning that the links always go through a redirect.
Perhaps a good place to start would be where there are networks which are relatively self-contained, e.g. c2c, Merseyrail, or the Glasgow commuter network?
I'd be happy to help out, but I'm going to be travelling for the next five weeks, so my wiki-ing will be quite restricted during that time. --RFBailey (talk) 23:56, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
That's more a feature than a bug--the station template looks for X station, then for X railway station. There's a bunch of articles out there which follow that convention, especially if they're mixed railway/tram/underground facilities. I noticed a bunch of X station redirects with nothing linking to them--they could probably be deleted, then it would link direct. Alternatively, the order of detection could be reversed. Glasgow commuter network would be a good test--I'm pretty sure the templates are prepared to duplicate the special colours for those lines. Mackensen (talk) 02:48, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

The rollout of s-rail on the Hope Valley Line has worked perfectly. I am currently updating the service boxes on the line between Cleethorpes and Doncaster and Cleethorpes to Barton-on-Humber. I will update them to s-rail while I am doing this if it is ok everyone. Year1989 (talk) 20:43, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Featured article candidates

At the risk of being accused of canvassing, there are currently two UK railway related articles that Featured Article candidates. These are

These require any criticism, and hopefully support in order to get them to FA status. Any help would be gratefully received. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 10:46, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I gave my views on the Talyllyn Railway some time ago, which was that the references are too heavily reliant on a small number of sources that are repeated just for a different page or pages. Boyd and Bate are overused, and I suggested that the a,b,c sub-references be used a bit more. I would make the same suggestion again. I fully understand that the references are limited for such a specialised subject, but I think it could be neatened up. I have not read all of the article as it not an are that I feel able to comment on, but I think it looks damn good. Olana North (talk) 11:52, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Goals

Since the question has been raised above, and two or more editors have made suggestions, one of the best set of goals I have seen was produced by Rodw for WikiProject Somerset. It is:

Goals

Roughly in order of importance

  1.  Done Get Somerset up to featured article.
  2. Create articles on all important sub-divisions and places of interest in Somerset.
  3. Maintain Portal:Somerset
  4. Add basic data such as population and maps to all sub-divisions of Somerset.
  5. Add at least one photograph to every sub-division and place of interest in Somerset.
  6. Possibly create an infobox for places of interest with maps, visitor numbers etc.
  7. Make History of Somerset, Geology of Somerset etc good, and ultimately featured articles.
My thoughts / comments
  • The UK's railways has a number of era: Early railway companies, Big Four, British Rail, and post-privatisation structures; plus traction, e.g. locos powered by steam, diesel, electric; and multiple units powered by diesel or electric. These are the equivalent of Rodw's WP Somerset goal 7 – but we might not rank them 7th.
  • It has, almost, a number of sub-projects, e.g. railway stations, Lines, Locos, multiple units, TOCs, etc.
  • It has a number of (for want of a better term) article house styles, e.g. info boxes, images / photos and route diagrams, that add value to articles. These are the equivalent of Rodw's WP Somerset goal 4 – but we might not rank them 4th.
  • There are also organisations like British Transport Police, ORR, HM Railway Inspectorate, British Transport Commission; and structures like canals, railway hotels, tunnels, bridges, etc, etc, that aught to fit in somewhere.
Suggestions

I suggest that Rodw's Somerset Goals could be reworked for UK Railways as a whole; and sub goals could be produced for e.g. early railway companies, Big Four, BR, Post-privatisation, locos, MUs, stations, Lines, TOCs, etc. The use of multiple goals provides scope for individual preferences, e.g. not everyone is interested in Big Four or current TOCs, or even the operators – stations, carriages, waggons, locos etc, could form part of some member's preferences.Pyrotec (talk) 22:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not really sure goals are appropriate for most projects. On a project like this, most people are happily working away in their own specialist area and will carry on working in that area whatever the project's goals are. So, the project could declare that bringing British Rail to FA status is top priority – but I'll still carry on writing on disused stations, EdJogg on early steam locos, Simply south on the Docklands Light Railway etc etc etc – because we know we've more to contribute in these areas. Needless to say this is all just my personal opinion... (If we're going to have goals, I'd say top priority ought to be George Stephenson and cleaning up the very messy Network Rail.) — iridescent 22:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
But you could then argue 'what is the point of the project?' If everyone who expresses some affiliation with this project just carries on with his or her own interests, who is going to tackle the bigger topics? It is unreasonable to expect a single editor to tackle some of these, especially as they may not be aware of the areas of information that are missing from the article (available reference books may not cover the breadth or depth needed for a WP article).
So we have two questions: What sort of goals might inspire project members to get involved? and How can we maintain the interest so that subsequent goals can be achieved? For my part, the thought of having an article included for Main Page DYK or (more so) achieving GA or FA status, tends to push me towards completing it. But I guess that not all editors look for such 'accolades'.
EdJogg (talk) 23:37, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Personally, I'd say what I see the points of the project are, are: discussing standards for consistency ("should we use chains as a measurement?"), and alerting others of things that need attention ("while writing Railway stations in Cromer I noticed the article on Cromer Tunnel is quite poor, but I know nothing about tunnels – could someone fix it?"). But this is getting off the point... Speaking of goals, add cleaning up Nigel Gresley to the list; I might have a stab at him some time myself, but I don't know much about steam so will probably make a lot of day-one mistakes. — iridescent 23:55, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
All of what is being discussed shows one of the real benefits of the assessment work. Once completed and audited for "correctness" (for want of a better word), then it will clearly indicate the articles that are important, and hence define the "goals" of the project. Olana North (talk) 07:28, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

If the goals were set out similar to Somerset, i would guess it would look something like this:

Goals

Roughly in order of importance

  1. Get Rail transport in the United Kingdom up to featured article.
  2. Create articles on all rail topic related to the United Kingdom.
  3. Maintain Portal:UKT P:BR
  4. Add basic data, such as rail usage to railway stations, date built to railway locomotives etc.
  5. Add at least one photograph to every appropriate article.
  6. Update existing infoboxes.
  7. Make History of rail transport in the United Kingdom, High-speed rail in the United Kingdom and all other topics etc good, and ultimately featured articles.

Remember these are only rough an just a mock up of Somerset. Simply south (talk) 08:45, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Job #1 looks to be creating the portal Portal:UKT... if we think we need one. Olana North (talk) 08:56, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
The banner that started this discussion links to Portal:UK Railways. So we may have one of the goals part-achieved already.
EdJogg (talk) 09:29, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, that was my fault, i thought the link already existed as a shortcut. I way meaning Portal:UK Railways. And can someone come up with more suggestions for goals. The above was just a suggestion. Simply south (talk) 09:49, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
The portal was last updated in early October 2007, so its been over six months since it was updated ... perhaps its a candidate for deletion. If we cannot use the portal to advertise our goals and achivements, then perhaps we can do without it. Olana North (talk) 09:59, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Some portals are inactive for months before becoming active again e.g. P:LT so i would say do not delete. Simply south (talk) 10:08, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Some portals are inactive for months before becoming active again e.g. P:LT so i would say do not delete. Simply south (talk) 10:08, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
I'll do some work on it later. By the way P:UKT is taken by UKTrams, so don't use Portal:UKT or it will be confusing!
BG7 10:18, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
P:BR<whistle></whitsle>Simply south (talk) 11:43, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I did suggest the possibility of a nested set of goals. There are no reason why there cannot be goals for the UK project as a whole. Goals for the early railway builders – someone was keen on George Stephenson; goals for post-privatisation network infrastructure operators (Network Rail and Railtrack – that's a tough one to prioritise). I like the Somerset goals (for Somerset), but they were put there: (1) for discussion and (2) to provoke those who don't like them to come up with a "better" counter-proposal. If the word "Goals" is a problem, lets have some other descriptors, e.g. targets, aims. Pyrotec (talk) 16:41, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Goals – 'Big Four' articles

Goals As we are the UK Railways Wikiproject, I'd say that the articles on BR, SR, LNER, LMSR and GWR should all be brought up to at least B class, if not GA. Maybe Network Rail could be included in this, but I don't know enough about the modern railway to say for sure. I sort of lost interest once all the slam door stock started disappering. What I'd suggest is that we have a month with each article being targeted for improvement. As we're halfway through May, that gives a couple of weeks before June starts, which could be the first of the months with a targeted article. Mjroots (talk) 06:51, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'd agree that as a project we should have a "core" set of articles which we raise to the highest standard in terms of content and readability. I did a quick check, following on from a similar check done by another editor in a now archived discussion, and BR, GWR and LNER are all B class, LMS and SR are start class. Therefore if we do take the "one a month" approach, I would recommend prioritising LMS and SR in order to raise the overall average soonest.
I think that we need to agree "what great looks like" for these articles – not so much in terms of just the GA guidelines, but also in terms, perhaps, of what section headings we should have and what each section should include. The five articles each have different headings, but I feel a common theme would be beneficial to allow proper comparison. My starter for ten would be:
  1. Introduction (obvious)
  2. Geography (overall spread, areas of competition and monopoly, geographical quirks (i.e. LTS part of LMS in LNER area), overseas operations)
  3. History (formation, early history, golden years, WWII, post-war)
  4. Operations (premium services, pioneering use of technology, non-railway operations, most profitable services, quirky and non-standard operations (i.e. narrow gauge or rope worked etc), safety record)
  5. Traction and Rolling Stock (locomotives, rolling stock, multiple units, liveries, works and depots)
  6. Public Relations (advertising campaigns, public perception, branding etc)
  7. Notable employees (general managers, chief engineers, but also for example drivers awarded for bravery in WWII etc)
  8. Gallery (variety of images from across timeline and representing each of the sections listed above)
  9. References, Further Reading, External Links (i.e. all the usual good stuff)
Clearly this can be improved upon, anyone care to comment? ColourSarge (talk) 09:00, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, your starter for ten only has nine items. I'd suggest that the tenth should be Accidents, covering major accidents, in a similar manner to articles on Airlines or Airports. Mjroots (talk) 09:32, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
There may well be others, but this looks like a fairly comprehensive set to start with. Where would 'Routes' go? Under 'Geography' or 'Operations'? EdJogg (talk) 12:25, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Hi guys, yeah I know my list only had 9 items (starter for ten being a University Challenge catchphrase, but you could argue that if you split References, Further Reading and External links into seperate sections as per the convention, it has 11! To answer your questions, I would imagine that Accidents would be included under Operations, where I noted safety record would go. This could include any major accidents that occurred during the company's lifetime, with links as appropriate to articles for each accident.
As for the routes, I would see this going under the Geography section if you mean describing the physical routes, i.e. "London Euston to Bletchley to Rubgy (with a loop via Northampton)...." with any notable services (notable in terms of premium levels of service, speed, length, number of portions included etc) going into the Operations section.
However as I said, these are only my opinions, if you feel strongly that either of your suggestions should form seperate sections, or if there are any others that should be included, then I'm perfectly happy with that – I think the key thing here is to agree a consensus among the more active members of the project (i.e. the ones who are most likely to re-format the articles) and agree that by putting them into that kind of format we would be likely to achieve GA status, and also be able to highlight any areas in which say the GWR article is fine but the LMS one is lacking.... ColourSarge (talk) 13:36, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Resetting the Indent.

OK I'm being bold! I've created my sandbox page and imported the current LMS article, I've also imported the headers I suggested above and am about to start on a reformatting to show what the "proposed" article would look like in comparison with the current one – should at least show whether its a sound basis for expanding articles up to GA status.

One thing that is obviously missing is an infobox – is there one currently in use for railway companies? I know there are for TOCs etc and for stations, but this really seems like an obvious oversight. I wouldn't have a clue how to produce an infobox, so would anyone with a better idea of the "how" care to have a crack?

Again, my suggestions for what to include would be: Crest or company logo; dates for created and abolished; acts of parliament which created and abolished the company; route mileage; track mileage; major consituent companies; no of stations operated; non railway operations (i.e. headline only so Hotels, Shipping; Road Haulage ; Airlines etc); General Manager / Chairman; Headquarters

What do you thinkColourSarge (talk) 14:02, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

OK I've now completed putting the existing article into the new format on my sandbox – a few obvious gaps show up straight away, particularly in Operations, Gallery etc while Traction and Rolling Stock and Notable Employees consist solely of lists to other articles. I'm going to take a break now, partly to give myself time to reflect on the new format, but also to allow time for other members of this project to have a chance to review and comment on the proposed format.... The article can be found here ColourSarge (talk) 14:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I've had a quick glance over it (I think this is the link you meant to use), and your ideas for fleshing the article out read quite well. I don't have much knowledge myself of LMS (I'm starting on the ACR article and "working my way up"!) but I'll have a look now and again and make any suggestions that come to mind. Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 15:17, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Oops, yes, instead of a wikilink I appear to have done a knilikiw!ColourSarge (talk) 16:56, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
This article Glasgow, Paisley, Kilmarnock and Ayr Railway, which has just gone through GA re-assessment, has an info box. Its an early company, and I did not produce it, but I do like it. Pyrotec (talk) 18:05, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
That one uses {{Infobox UK railway}} which sits inside a routemap, so it might not be quite what you're looking for. EdJogg (talk) 19:12, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm currently tinkering with an infobox on a new sandbox page I've created to provide a re-written LMS page,here, which can then be compared to the version that has been simply re-formatted. I'm far from an expert in these matters though, so anyone with more experience is welcome to come take a look and give friendly advice on my talk page. Also I've left a note on the talk page for each of the Big Four highlighting this discussion and inviting contributions to the discussion. ColourSarge (talk) 19:19, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

The infobox for "railroad" companies is {{Infobox rail}} – this is a stand alone box, rather that one that needs to be embedded in a route diagram. Track gauge is mandatory and there is space for a system map which is probably more appropriate for the larger companies. Watch out for "locale" which seems to mean country. Geof Sheppard (talk) 07:34, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Hi Geof, yes I saw that one but wasn't too impressed with it really – thought it a bit too "yankish" for UK railways...I've had a stab at putting one together using a generic template on my "proposed rewrite" page,here, but for some reason it only displays three of the five sections I have created (you will see what I mean if you edit the page). Was looking for a project member with experience of creating infoboxes so we could have one which would work for the Big Four, but also for the predecessor companies... ColourSarge (talk) 17:11, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
I see what you mean about the missing headers. Not an area of my expertise, unfortuneatly. I notice that the examples on the template page only run to three headers too.
I have never been too happy with the railroad infobox, although it looks better now that the header is no longer black on gold! With my West Country interests I am a bit concerned that it may not really work for the GWR – the predecessors will be longer than the page, and as for "presidents"...! Geof Sheppard (talk) 07:46, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I created {{Infobox UK railway}} just before last Christmas as I was not too happy with the combination of {{Infobox rail}} and a routemap on the same page when I was working my way around the Scottish railway companies. The main reason was the two boxes on the right hand side were having on the body of the text and their differing widths. I do not have too much experience on creation of infoboxes, normally taking an existing one and using it as the basis of the the new one being created. --Stewart (talk) 18:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I've edited the code for {{Infobox generic}} to include the two missing sections, and it shouldn't have broken any other pages using the template (if they don't use them, it won't show up). Ansbaradigeidfran (talk) 11:36, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Go Great Western!

When I looked at the Great Western Railway page, I felt that the B-class rating was not really deserved. Rather than downgrade it to Start-class, I have padded it out in as the first stage in preparing for a GA nomination. I have followed the ideas that are being tried above but found, as expected, that the GWR needs some different treatment to the "simple" (i.e. 25 year) histories of the other Big Four. Instead the treatment is more like that which will be demanded by the more complex Pre-grouping companies such as the Midland Railway and London and South Western Railway.

The sections that I have ended up with are:

  • History – in my mind History must come before...
  • Geography
    • Key locations
    • Engineering
  • Operations
    • Passenger services
    • Freight services
    • Ancillary operations
  • Traction and rolling stock
    • Locomotives
    • Carriages
    • Wagons
  • Public relations
    • Tourism
    • Cultural references
  • Notable people – technically Brunel was never an "employee"!
  • References, etc.

The {{Infobox GWR}} has similarly been adjusted to suit the complexity of the GWR, combining the best bits of the trial LMSR infobox, the "railroad" infobox, and the UK stations approach...

  • History – all dates have been kept to just the year in order to keep the box slimmer
  • Constituent companies (with dates)
  • Successor organisation (with date)
  • Key locations
    • Headquarters
    • Workshops
    • Principal stations
  • Route mileage (at various dates that link with the history and constituents)

Any more thoughts, anyone? Geof Sheppard (talk) 13:02, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Geof, looks good – only thing that was obviously missing straight away for me was the use of diesel railcars under the rolling stock section. But then that could be because I happen to think the GWR railcars were some of the best looking trains ever produced. ColourSarge (talk) 23:09, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

The railcars (and steam rail motors) have now appeared in the Passenger Services section. No doubt they will be covered somehow when the Locomotives section is revised (coming soon...!). If anyone fancies a crack at the History section, this is still just a congeration of the odd paragraphs that were already there when we started the rewrite. If not then I will lock myself in a quiet room for a couple of days next month and see what I can do. Geof Sheppard (talk) 12:50, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

The title of your edit above made me think about railcars – in fact I am sure I have seen pictures of them hauling milk / livestock vans, so I guess you could call them locomotives too. But why not include a section on experimental / pioneering rolling stock to allow this to be compared across the Big Four?ColourSarge (talk) 21:36, 19 June 2008 (UTC)
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