Talk:Metra

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November 27, 2006 Featured article candidate Not promoted
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[edit] Cats added

I added categories here for transportation in chicago and transportation in illinois and someone reverted them as redundant to existing category metra. Am I alone in the opinion that category metra isn't very useful and the other two supliment well? What do we gain by only using one (obscure) category? I'm not planning on an edit war so am writing this instead. Tedernst 02:36, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree completely with the above. If there are no objections in the next week, I'm going to change it back. L Glidewell 15:41, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Randolph street station

I was down there today and Metra is calling it Millenium station now. I would change it but I'm still not completely sure. Avalanche Knight 00:55, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

It's called Millennium Station on the time schedules and stuff, but the conductors almost always call it out as "Randolph/South Water." L Glidewell 15:40, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

There was a Board ordinance changing it to Millennium Station after the station was redeveloped. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.102.108.66 (talk) 17:41, August 24, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Accidents

I broke up the News heading into News and Accidents. All of those events should be here in Wikipedia somewhere, although I don't know if they need to be on this page per se, I do know they don't all belong in News so I'm working under the assumption that none of them do (once they stop being news, of course) and that they deserve their own heading. Any thoughts? Gws57 22:30, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The size of the Accidents section is growing, and it bothers me that it's now the longest section in the article. Few other railroads have Accidents sections that take up so much article space. Not that I don't think they are important, but I wonder if the other sections should be expanded, or the Accidents shrunk down a bit -- and how?Gws57 14:58, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

A recent edit to the Wojtyla accident may suggest to readers that there is a citation for this statement: "A wrongful death lawsuit brought by Wojtyla's estate was dismissed in 1996". That is not true. I have not found a source for that last sentence. The rest of the (very long) paragraph is fully documented. Zzorse 12:58, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I caused any confusion. My main objective was to change the references to inline citations and attach them to the relevant bullet point, not necessarily the sentence. As the references had no urls I could use to review the facts, I didn't know that last sentence was unsubstantiated. Feel free to move the references as you deem fit and accurate. --Millbrooky 17:16, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
I appreciate your edit. I moved the inline citations, see how it looks to you. The last sentence about the lawsuit doesn't really seem to fit, maybe it should be deleted? I do share Gws57's concern that the accident section is getting huge. That particular incident, however, has taken on a life of its own on the Internet, with inaccuracies. I felt it best to have Wikipedia nail it down with facts. For what it's worth, the Downer's Grove public library mailed me photocopies of the 2 citations, they are not online, at least not for free. Zzorse 17:58, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Define "express train"

I think I speak for the general Wikipedia reader when I say, what in the world is a "BNSF 'Racetrack' express train"? —Rob (talk) 12:52, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Please see the BNSF Railway Line article. The "Racetrack" is referred to express trains along the center track, traveling at high speeds. Calwatch 02:10, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Curious...shouldn't the section regarding the woman struck by the express train in Downers Grove be changed to reflect that, at the time of the accident, Burlington Northern owned that property? BNSF Railway did not exist in any form until 1995. -anon

[edit] Expansion

Okay... I want to see Metra service expanded as much as the next commuter. But uncited "plans" to expand to Milwaukee, Rockford, DeKalb or other places do not belong in an encylopedic article. I added citations to Metra press releases for the legitimate plans for expansion, but the others need to go away until we can come up with credible sources for them. Gws57 23:58, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I know that Racine, WI has fixed up their old C&NW station in anticipation of an extension. Has that officially been announced? --MasterA113 13:31, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pictures

I happen to visit the lake bluff station just about everyday. I can get better quality pictures and you can go inside the station and get pictures as well. I'll upload them as soon as I take them. In the mean time, I'm going to put up a picture of one of the trains.

Hi, it looks to me as though there are too many pictures of Lake Bluff. I'm not saying they are not nice, and I'm not saying delete them, but maybe if anybody has some other photos, please post them up. bobsmith319.

[edit] linked full dates vs. linked years

I propose that we remove the links which point solely to years. We should retain links to full dates as long as that is how the wiki software recognizes date preferences. MKoltnow 03:33, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree, as it makes articles easier to read, as unnecessary links break the flow of the article. I also think that it's more or less becoming consensus throughout the Wikipedia to delink years unless necessary to establish context, which most of these aren't.Gws57 14:58, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Accidents current event tag

I think we should revert to keeping the current event tag in this section. It refers to the last paragraph--where police are still investigating the cause of the accident of 2006-10-25. Until we rewrite this graf with new info, it should have a current event tag. MKoltnow 19:50, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Are both 553 and 555 still running?

I've only seen the 553 club car recently. Is 555 still running out there? --MasterA113 13:22, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New Trivia Section, Downers Grove reference

This bit of trivia is not particularly significant, and it is not really about Metra, per se. It is something about Downers Grove. I think it should go away. Trivia sections are not a good idea, in general. I will respect consensus, of course, but will endeavour to make this change by 16 April 2007. MKoltnow 19:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

It's not even true, as Evanston also has three stations (Main, Central, and Davis)

[edit] Notable accident?

There is a Metra accident mentioned on this page, Rachel Barton Pine. Whether it's worth including on the Metra page I'll leave up to others to decide. Zzorse 03:23, 28 July 2007 (UTC)


humm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.1.13.165 (talk) 02:21, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Naming of Metra Articles

The titles of articles for the Metra lines with cardinal directions (e.g., North or East) in their names use a "slash" between the direction and the word preceding it. For example, the Union Pacific North line is rendered "Union Pacific/North". Why is this? The website doesn't print the line names that way. -Rrius (talk) 17:20, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

When the sub-articles were created, the slash was used in the name of the lines on the written public timetables. This remains the case. I understand the confusion, but tend to think that the printed timetables supercede what is published on the internet. Gws57 (talk) 16:10, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
I can hardly see how the train schedules would be the be-all, end-all. I should think other, less utilitarian examples would shed more light. That is to say, there are reasons why the train schedules might use eccentric formatting. I fail to see why Metra's website would be other than a reliable means of judging how the names of Metra lines are formatted. If the front page is not enough, how about the press releases? In this release, Metra refers to the "Union Pacific North Line"; Wikipedia would refer to it as the "Union Pacific/North Line". Where the subject of the article uses a normal, unpunctuated form in standard text, why would we use some other form because they use a variant for the title of a small booklet? -Rrius (talk) 19:03, 26 April 2008 (UTC)
I personally don't care enough about the naming rubric of the articles to stand in the way of a mass change one way or another. I was just answering the question as posed, and explaining why I thought it had been organized the way it was. Gws57 (talk) 02:58, 27 April 2008 (UTC)