Talk:Flying fox (cablecar)

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This stub was created after some discussion on the Village Pump. I'm not entirely happy with the name structure, probably megabat is the most common meaning of this term in which case it could be argued that the disambiguation page should be here, but when starting the project I didn't know any other name for the device. Foxtail has now been suggested as a possibility. However that would also need disambiguation to distinguish it from the ornamental device known as a foxtail, flown from the tip of an automobile radio aerial and popular in the 1950s and 1960s. Andrewa 20:58, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Er, that's not quite right... the children's toy is not a cablecar but rather a ball with a rope attached, allowing it to be thrown like a sling.

Good point about foxtail being a radio antenna ornament, too, and thanks for the disambig work. • Benc • 21:05, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Fascinating! I've removed the error! So, in American English, what does flying fox mean? The meaning I have stubbed here is Australian English of course. Andrewa 21:16, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Ah! That was stupid of me to assume User:Dramatic (New Zealander, according to the user page) meant the ball-and-rope toy; I should've asked for clarification. I don't think "flying fox" refers to the ball-and-rope toy in any English dialect (though I have been known to be wrong from time to time ;-)).

Anyway, to answer your question, most Americans would know "flying fox" as the the megabat, if anything. • Benc • 21:46, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Ah²! I suddenly remembered that we have such a thing on this side of the globe, which we call a zip-line. We already have an article for it, so I'm going to do a merge/redirect. (After verifying that a flying fox is truly a zip-line.) For the record, flying fox is a much better name. :-) • Benc • 01:17, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'd recommend against the merge. Zip-line seems to be a device for transporting people only. Flying fox is a much more general term. I'll try to dig up some examples of the term from notable Australian literature.

I'm also a little unhappy with the current wikilink to aerial tramway to avoid the redirect at cablecar. I think we're taking consolidation a bit far already. There's room for several articles IMO. Andrewa 03:40, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Sounds good to me, though I'm sure zip-lines have been used to transport goods and mail, too. Zip-lines are pretty much always gravity-powered, though, so that may serve to distinguish them from flying foxes. (In any case, I'm glad I waited before the nixed merge.) Should we delete the flying fox disambig so flying fox (cablecar) can be moved back? No need for a disambig when there are only two usages. • Benc • 20:21, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I adjusted the Cable car wiki link to go to Cable car (disambiguation) (which really redirects to Cable car but implies that I looked and confirmed that it was a disambiguation entry). a zip line or flying fox is not an aerial tramway as that would require two cables one to ride on the other as power. I my opinion after just fixing a hundred plus disambiguation links related to cable cars, the zip line and the flying fox (as a pair) represent a transportation not covered by Aerial tramway, Gondola lift, Ropeway conveyor, or Aerial lift but does closely relate to the either the Gondola lift or Ropeway conveyor. Jeepday 03:37, 4 March 2007 (UTC)