Template talk:Infobox Station

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Contents

[edit] Discussion

Initial thoughts:

  1. Looks good. Very good work.
  2. Is this going to be used on LRT station articles? Some of those "stations" are in street running segments; should the platform parameter be adjusted, another optional parameter added, or can it just be reflected as is?
  3. Is the plan to supplant existing infoboxes for Amtrak or NYC Subway stations?
    1. Will this handle shared stations (like Trenton) gracefully?
    2. Can it handle NYCS edge cases successfully? (think Times Square or the future Fulton Street Transit Center)
  4. Still looks good. Thanks, Mackensen! —CComMack (t–c) 02:46, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the input! Some responses follow. It's my intention, as with s-rail/s-line, to gradually supplant existing unique infoboxes. It ought to be possible to design a single infobox flexible enough to meet all reasonable needs. As this is derived in the main from the Amtrak box, it should be easy to replace the one with the other. I don't see why Trenton or other shared railway stations would be a problem, unless you're worried about indicating somewhere whose station it actually is, and whose lines therefore go in the line parameter. It might make sense to include all lines for which there are succession boxes, or which are heavy rail, and then reserving the other field for bus service. I'm not sure what you mean an "NYCS edge case." Finally, I don't see a problem using this for LRT stations, provided we have articles on them (platform=Street-level). Mackensen (talk) 04:33, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the fast response! Everything looks OK now except the adaptation to complicated NYC Subway articles. If you look at Times Square–42nd Street (New York City Subway) (the most complicated station in the hemisphere), you'll notice that, while the station complex (rightly) only has one article, there is a section header for each individual station within, each with its own infobox reflecting the individual history and structure of that station. This is a good system, and I think it should be kept, and I doubt that WP:NYCPT would appreciate it if it were changed without discussion at their talk page. So until then, and possibly overall, I would like to request that New York City Subway station articles keep their current infoboxen. —CComMack (t–c) 07:07, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
In situations like that, then yes, we certainly can't meet their needs. Mackensen (talk) 11:37, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
One obvious target are articles with hand-coded templates (CTA is one such series). Mackensen (talk) 16:28, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I've updated Trenton Rail Station (New Jersey) with an example of combining lines. Thoughts? Mackensen (talk) 16:49, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fare zone parameter

I had a thought, and ran with it. The template now includes a parameter for noting a station's current fare zone, for those systems with zone-based fares like SEPTA, NJT, and Caltrain. —CComMack (t–c) 07:17, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Services

Services allows inclusion of the s-rail/s-line boxes within the template as an alternative. Just leave s-start and end off. Mackensen (talk) 21:11, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two logos in the same infobox

I've improved articles for BART, Muni Metro, DART and MBTA so far. Now I'm looking to include transit authority logos which I am doing right now, but I have a problem. I'm trying to put two logos in the same infobox for each station on the same line. I kind of messed up on this (examples: Richmond Station (California) and Oakland Coliseum Amtrak/BART Station), so any help on how to do this and do it right would be much appreciated. For example: if a station was served by BART and Muni Metro in San Francisco. Cheers. GETONERD84 16:01, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, one way to do it would be to change the logo handling so that the full image code is specified, not just the name. The downside is that this will break every instance currently using the logo parameter. Mackensen (talk) 20:54, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
    • It looks like this may have happened. The logo is not showing on any of the BART station pages. Example: Dublin/Pleasanton Tuyvan 04:54, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
  • So what exactly is the fair use rationale for putting those fair use logos on these station articles? If they do not really identify the subject of an article, or specifically illustrate relevant points or sections within the text, how do they contribute significantly? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 04:09, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
    • I suspect there's an issue there that's insurmountable in most cases. I modeled the handling off the German infoboxes, but they've got "free" images denoting U-Bahn and S-Bahn connections. Mackensen (talk) 11:13, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
      • So, are you classifying these images as part of a wayfinding system? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 03:44, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
    • I don't understand how the image logo field in this template was itself a fair use violation. It was the use of copyrighted logos in the field that you say is the problem--so why didn't you take up the issue with the editors of the systems using the logos? Alterting the template didn't alert any of the users of the infoboxes that there was a concern and need for discussion. I only by chance noticed that the MARTA logos had disappeared from the station pages and like Tuyvan above thought the template was improperly edited. Anyway I myself don't know for sure if this is a fair use violation or not, so I welcome discussion and also am interested to know if wayfinding applies to this particular situation. Biomedeng 02:15, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Passengers

I've modified the passenger handling so that it's possible to show multiple years and/or multiple systems. An example of this functionality is at Kalamazoo Transportation Center. The old method still works fine. Mackensen (talk) 14:36, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Is it possible to selectively exclude or disable pass_percent? Tuyvan 04:42, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Not at the moment. If the passenger total is set, it will expect the pass_percent parameter. Mackensen (talk) 14:17, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Riding low?

Does anyone know why the current version of this template box is causing the articles it is included in to ride several lines too low? Example: Dupont Circle (Washington Metro). SchuminWeb (Talk) 15:57, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Hmph. I think I've seen that before. Let me play with it in my userspace for a second. Mackensen (talk) 15:58, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Okay, I think I fixed it. You might need to clear your cache. Mackensen (talk) 16:05, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
Looks good! Thanks. SchuminWeb (Talk) 21:53, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Schematic line templates in "services" section

I would like to add schematic rail line templates (ex: {{SEPTA Market-Frankford Line}}, {{PATCO Speedline}} ) into the "services" section in place of {{s-line}}, but when I do so, the template shows up with borders and looks really unattractive. How can I implement one of those templates into this one, so it does not have borders and looks organized? –Crashintome4196 19:50, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

  • By and large the use of those templates on articles concerning individual stations is discouraged. For my own part I think it adds unnecessary clutter to an article and such templates belong on the article about the line itself. Mackensen (talk) 19:55, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
I'm planning on making the schematic templates collapsible before I implement them into this template. –Crashintome4196 00:44, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
If you're going to pursue these kinds of templates you might want to have a look at what the WP:TRAIL people are up to. In any event, a schematic template describes a line, but we're talking about a template that describes a station. S-line describes the location of a station within a line and integrates well with other templates without taking up inordinate amounts of space. Mackensen (talk) 01:34, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Symbol of Access

Wikipedia's new "more free" symbol.
Wikipedia's new "more free" symbol.

I feel that Wikipedia's new "more free" replacement wheelchair accessible symbol is HORRIBLE, its way too small for our purposes, and it isn't the standard symbol in the transit industry, the industry this infobox was designed for. As a matter of fact, this is not the symbol for any purpose worldwide. The International Symbol of Access is. This symbol is copyrighted solely to prevent misuse, not for profit, therefore since we are using it the way in which it was intended to be used, in this case to show that the station is indeed accessible to those with disabilities, and seeing this project (Wikipedia) is working towards the common good of all, I believe we are well within the spirit of the copyright. I am following my right as a Wikipedian to be bold WP:BOLD and I am fixing what I feel is a really bad mistake. RickyCourtney 01:10, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Violates policy, no can do. -- Ned Scott 01:48, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
As someone who has been watching the debate unfold at the Village Pump, I am surpised that Ned you wouldn't point this user to the active disscussion. In fact it appears that this issue is far from resolved and that now a request for arbitration has been made. So it is fine with me if you want to remove the image from the infobox until this issue is resolved. But your statement "violates policy, no can do" is misleading since it failed to let the editors of this template know that there is currently a disagreement whether or not the use of this image in the rail station infobox is acceptable on wikipedia. I however do object with your use of because it appears to be a derrivative work of the ISA official image, and therefore does represent copyright infringement. Perhaps we should simply replace the ADA image in the template with the words handicapped accessible. Biomedeng 02:36, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
You are mistaken, this currently violates policy, and the editors who wish to use the image are asking for a change in policy to allow the use. Until such a change is made it does, in fact, violate policy. The only reason I didn't point him to the VP discussion was that I thought he already knew about it, given the timing of the template change with the discussion. But hey, thanks for assuming the worst of me. -- Ned Scott 03:05, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
I never disagreed with your assessment that the use of the official ISA image violates policy, so how am I mistaken? Anyway I just wanted to point out that if you are going to revert the ISA image back to the so called free derivative image then I think you should point the users to the active discussion(s) on the issue so that they can understand why you feel it violates policy. Usually when people revert something they specify which policy is violated, not just a "no can do." I think if you better explain your reasoning then you maybe could prevent an ugly edit war. I am not assuming the worst of you--sorry that you misunderstood. I do agree with you that current policy prevents the use of the official ISA image; I think maybe where we disagree is that I think we should ammend the current policy. This is why I said it was fine with me if you wanted to remove the image from the infobox until the debate is resolved. Biomedeng 03:35, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, I had no idea of the discussion at the village pump. I appreciate the heads-up Biomedeng. I will certainly make my opinion voiced there. Im sorry that I took this as the first venue to do so, but I really feel like this new symbol was forced upon us... and I also feel that that it was not correct. RickyCourtney 03:59, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

I also must apologies, I shouldn't have just assumed you already knew about the debate based on the timing of events. I would have defiantly approached this differently had I realized you did not know about the existing debate. -- Ned Scott 03:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] International usage

I'm working on adding parameters for using the template for stations outside of the US (specifically Australia, which doesn't even have a uniform station template and this is the best one out there). What are your ideas on this? Geoking66 21:29, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, I suppose we'd need to see examples of the infoboxes/tables already in use on Australian articles. What needs are not presently met? Mackensen (talk) 22:00, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Customization

Kalamazoo Transportation Center
Amtrak
Station statistics
Address 459 North Burdick St.
Kalamazoo, MI 49007
Lines
Blue Water
Wolverine
Connections Amtrak Thruway Motorcoach, Greyhound, Kalamazoo Metro Transit
Parking Yes; paid
Baggage check No
Other information
Opened 1887
Rebuilt 2006
Accessible Handicapped/disabled access
Code KAL
Traffic
Passengers (2006) 98,976 ▲ 12.1% (Amtrak)
Passengers (2005) 88,308 ▲ 17.2% (Amtrak)
This box: view • talk • edit

Is it possible to customize, at least, the top of the infobox by system? At Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New York City Public Transportation#Template:Infobox Station, I want to standardize the commuter rail infoboxes, but I also hope to retain some uniqueness for individual transit systems. For example, I would like to keep the top portion of Template:Infobox LIRR while using this template. Tinlinkin 08:21, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

  • That depends on how much customization we're talking about. I played with having customized heading colors a while back but never committed the changes. What needs aren't being met at present? Mackensen (talk) 10:47, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
I mean to use this infobox but to have a distinctive style for a transit system, via parameter "type" or another one, if it is appropriate. If you see Babylon (LIRR station), I hope to transfer the heading style (the "Babylon" station name and the blue bar above without the accessibility icon) to this infobox, but only enact it on LIRR articles. In other words, I want to override the default "name" style in certain conditions. Tinlinkin 11:05, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
Interesting idea. I've a notion about how to implement it–let me play around in my userspace. We should definitely tie in the type codes with what's in Template:S-rail/lines. Mackensen (talk) 11:18, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I've pasted an example at right of what this might look like. The style definition is in {{Amtrak style}}. 12:33, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I wasn't thinking about the colors, but OK. Wow. Your plan just might work. Would you be bold enough to apply the changes?
On a separate issue, I don't see "type" being used in a lot of station articles. Could it be because the appearance of "System station" on top looks unattractive? (This is my theory; I don't know if this is the case.) Tinlinkin 13:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
Well, part of that is that "type" was just (about a day ago) added as a parameter. I think this could be added as another parameter to the style template (e.g. "show_type"). Mackensen (talk) 13:50, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
That explains it. Lots of changes recently. :) Tinlinkin 14:11, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Okay, new change. The style template now supports the "display_as" parameter. Mackensen (talk) 14:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

No problem. Tinlinkin 14:26, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
Okay, now that we've established the idea and capability of modifying the appearance of the template without changing the structure, what else should be changed? Mackensen (talk) 14:28, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
I have no other suggestions for now. I will continue to tend to Template:Infobox NYCS. I commented that that template seems to be given a free ride for the time being. Tinlinkin 14:31, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I took initiative and added a "type" parameter to the top of the infobox, similar to what is shown on {{Infobox NYCS}}. It was altered by Mackensen, now I'm totally confused about how it works, even after reading the code. Before, you simply typed in a link to the system article and the rail type article, but now it doesn't work that way at all. For example, all SEPTA articles display "SEPTA rapid transit station" even though SEPTA operates rapid transit, light rail, and regional rail systems. I'd like to understand the usage for this parameter, otherwise I'll revert the template to the changes I recently made. –Crashintome4196 18:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

A couple points. First, there's a good argument to be made that rapid transit includes light rail and regional rail, but that's beside the point. The idea of "type" was extended to permit formatting changes to the infobox itself and now relies on a separate template, {{{{{SYSTEM NAME}}} style}} (e.g. {{Amtrak style}} or {{SEPTA style}}). Type should take the standard parameter for a system, as defined in S-rail. Now, what I'm going to add in just a minute is a second parameter, so that there can be variation within a system (probably type2). Mackensen (talk) 18:52, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
I think that is getting too complicated. There's no reason that another template should have to be made to go inside the template. I don't see what was wrong with the simple way it was previously done. –Crashintome4196 20:21, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
It's not a question of right and wrong but rather a question of what we're getting out of the feature. The gentleman above came asking for the ability to customize appearance based on type, about a day after typing was added to the template. It made perfect sense to me to extend existing functionality; the alternative would be duplicate type functions in one template, which wouldn't be a good implementation. It's also a situation where you can design once, then use repeatedly, much as it was with s-rail/s-line. Mackensen (talk) 20:32, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

To reiterate, my primary concern is to avoid duplicate functionality. Now, we could rename type and type2 to style and style2, and restore type to its original functionality. Mackensen (talk) 20:39, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

"type" was originally supposed to designate and provide a wikilink to a transit operator, is that correct? If a style implementation is not defined for a transit operator, "type" should not be affected. A different parameter should co-exist. I don't know why I didn't think of this issue before. I support reverting to the original functionality of "type" and the "style" parameter is what should be used to link any style information, and should be optional and independent of "type". (Unlike Infobox NYCS, I have yet to learn all the intricacies of this template, let alone implementing style info, even though that looks like it will be easy. So I don't intend to mislead either of you with my comments, as if I am throwing a curveball at you.) Tinlinkin 10:56, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
Not your fault; I got ahead of myself. I made the changes last night. Mackensen (talk) 11:12, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Is there a way to implement the style templates without requiring all the parameters to be specified? If not, it is not a problem. Tinlinkin 08:47, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

That is, if empty, use the default? It ought to do that anyway. I'll take a look. Mackensen (talk) 11:00, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Infobox class

The "infobox" css breaks the formatting of included s-rail templates, so it shouldn't be used in this template. Mackensen (talk) 20:14, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Do you have an example? —Ms2ger (talk) 12:41, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Any station article which uses the "services" parameter, and therefore includes the {{s-rail}} parameters will display improperly. I'd just as soon not re-break all the articles to demonstrate. Mackensen (talk) 15:59, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
With "breaks the formatting", I suppose you mean that the text isn't centered vertically in the cells anymore. If that is important, you could make sure it stays that way by adding vertical-align:middle; to the cells in {{s-rail}} & {{s-line}}. —Ms2ger (talk) 16:36, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Spacing

It seems that everywhere this template is used, there is an excess space/margin at the top. I'm not sure what causes this, but my only edit to this template didn't help (just now I noticed it was under 'noinclude' anyway... figures). In any case, can anyone please fix this? It's a very annoying problem. See for example: Kfar Saba Railway Station, Binyamina Railway Station. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 20:26, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

The problem is not with the template. There are many pages that do not suffer from the problem. For example Farrer Park MRT Station. I can't pinpoint the problem as yet, but i suspect it might be a side-effect of proper browser rendering/wikimedia software of both ltr and rtl languages in the same page. - oahiyeel talk 20:49, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

  • If I take the map_locator code out the problem goes away. Something in there is introducing an unnecessary break, at least when the code isn't called. I've seen that before. Mackensen (talk) 20:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the replies. Is there any way to solve the problem without hurting the template? How many pages use the map locator field anyway? -- Ynhockey (Talk) 21:05, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
That doesn't explains why the problem doesn't occur on Grand Central Terminal & Pennsylvania Station (New York City) and many other pages as well. I'm not trying to defend the code I added, but it is a carbon copy of the code above it for the services field, which is even more complicated since it nests a table in it. I think it is important to pinpoint the problem properly, hopefully an expert in wikicodes can take a look at it. Meanwhile, i'll carry out some tests of my own too. - oahiyeel talk 21:12, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
When examining the generated html codes for pages with the blank space above, the line causing the extra breaks appears immediately after the <!-- start content --> which is: <p><br /></p>, i'm now checking to see if any part of the code in the template may cause this extra line for any reason. - oahiyeel talk 21:28, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
Solved. It appears minor coding differences forces the "services" and "map_locator" on to new lines, causing the "spacing" problem. I've fix the coding so that the "new lines" are not required anymore. - oahiyeel talk 22:01, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] type not displayed

why is type no longer displayed? e.g. transportation hub or rapid transit? Sebastian scha. (talk) 20:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

  • Forgot about it when I changed the internal code. I'm working on re-adding it. Mackensen (talk) 23:19, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
  • It's back; there may be some style weirdness. Mackensen (talk) 23:49, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Oh thanks, I use it only for general information like rapid transit and so on, but is okay for like this Sebastian scha. (talk) 23:57, 6 June 2008 (UTC)