Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Streetcars

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Welcome to the Talk page for Wikipedia:WikiProject Streetcars. This should become a great place to talk over our ideas and work out our differences.

I am from Richmond, Virginia, where Frank J. Sprague is credited with creating the first successful electric trolley-powered streetcar system on some of our 7 hills in 1887-1888. The last streetcars operated here in 1949. However, Richmond has plans underway here for a heritage streetcar system, such as currently described in the Wikipedia article streetcar.

Please enter new messages at the end of the page. I hope we can have some fun here. Happy Rails!!Vaoverland 23:09, Dec 24, 2004 (UTC}

Contents

[edit] Listing of existing WP articles related to streetcars

For reference purposes, here is a listing of some of the WP articles which relate to streetcars. Please add to the list for project for working purposes. revised Vaoverland 00:35, Jan 6, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] terminology, U.S. vs others

When working on articles for Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains, we have been confronted with a problem in major differences in terminology used around the world. This is going to come up in this WikiProject as well.

Here are 2 examples already:

  • streetcar Should this really be redirected to tram, which is an obscure usage in US? I have never heard the term tram used here except referring to some small rubber-tired people movers used for parking shuttles at places like theme parks and major events.
  • subway should this really be redirected to metro, an inapplicable usage in US? The only time I hear metro used here is occasionally for the formal or slang name of a subway system, such as Metro in Washington, DC.

How can we incorporate the differences and educate everyone?

Comments on the above, anyone? Vaoverland 22:57, Dec 24, 2004 (UTC)

Well, I think if the article is talking about a system in an American city, then we should say streetcar. Tram simply isn't used in the United States. Ditto with metro. Mackensen (talk) 23:54, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)
That is my thinking also. I think we should have articles under subway and streetcar which indicate to SEE metro and SEE tram respectively for the non-North American version, and vice versa, if that is the proper way to differentiate. This would help readers find what they are looking for. This approach would allow us to pull out most of the U.S. related content in each article, and make room for more photos and content. I think the next step would be to post this on the talk pages for tram and metro, and solicit comments and help from other writers to be discussed here. Vaoverland 19:32, Dec 25, 2004 (UTC)
Sounds like a plan. Mackensen (talk) 19:35, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)
It appear we have a quorum, so I will make it so, and we'll see what we hear. Vaoverland 20:04, Dec 25, 2004 (UTC)
Progress Report: already, considerable work has been done to separate the subway/metro and tram/streetcar articles. We now have new articles at subway and streetcar. The need to have these was clearly demonstrated by the comment that we didn't have a famous Pulitzer prize winning play entitled "A Tram named Desire" <gr> 22:21, Dec 26, 2004 (UTC)

I'm glad to see that this was reversed, at least for tram and streetcar... believe it or not, they are the same thing and therefore should be on the same page. Separating them just as an excuse to give more attention to the USA is not a good thing.

I agree. Splitting the articles up is not a good approach. One page has to redirect to the other anyway, and it really does not matter which article redirects where, as long as the same information is available. Øyvind Svedman 17:23, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Project title and scope

I don't believe the title of this new project is consistent with its scope. The title suggests a general involvement with streetcars/light-rail/trams/whatever. But the scope seems to imply that the project is really only interested in former streetcar systems. Could I suggest that either:

  • the project title is changed to 'WikiProject Historic Streetcars', or
  • the scope is changed to include the many current, new and proposed future systems

If it is the latter, I'd certainly be interested in helping out. If the former, I wish you good luck. -- Chris j wood 16:18, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I can't speak for the initiators of the project, but the new articles Trolley, Streetcar and Subway all deal with past and present. I think that they want the project to advance historic streetcars more than we now see them, but not exclusively. Just my impression. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 16:45, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Here is a draft of how we could redefine scope to be more inclusive. It is perhaps a bit wordy, comments?:

[edit] Scope

(first DRAFT revision) This WikiProject aims primarily to expand Wikipedia coverage of urban and interurban public transport rail services, including streetcar, interurban light rail and similar systems. We want to expand information and articles to include historical, current, and future people, companies, technology, and systems. Initially, we will include bus rapid transit, subways, metro, monorail, and heavier commuter rail services. Some of these may form the basis later for a split as the streetcars project progresses. Essentially, we are limiting subjects to land-based transportation of people the majority of whom are traveling 40 miles or less one-way to and from home, school, and places of employment on services which utilize a dedicated right-of-way.

That sounds pretty good. Mackensen (talk) 23:03, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
I'd remove the last bit; as I understand it, interurbans were sometimes used for longer trips. -User:SPUI
Umm... well if the project is streetcars, not rapid transit, or mass transit or urban transit, I can't see the logical scope including bus rapid transit, monorails, commuter rail, and only peripherally, subways or metros. I mean, a streetcar runs in a street (duh!). Light rail is a reasonable extension, but not other things. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 01:39, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Interurbans were pieces of streetcar systems, nothing like modern commuter rail systems. Sometimes a streetcar company built its line for a long distance, and sometimes a separate company built the interurban. As for subways, those definitely relate to streetcars - the first one in the US (Boston's) was built to take streetcars underground in the downtown area. Ones built from scratch like DC's might not apply to the project though.--SPUI 01:43, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Well, I'll disagree that interurban were "pieces" or extensions of streetcar systems. In general (with notable exceptions) the interurban company was a lightweight competitor to steam railroads, leasing the tracks of streetcar systems (or rapid transit systems) to reach downtown; they definitely have that important relationship. But like elevated trains that operated on city streets, they were not streetcars themselves. Having said that, I'm more interested in helping accomplish some of the tasks of this project—define it any way the participants like, but including bus rapid transit and monorails is stretching "streetcars" further than I can. -- Cecropia | explains it all ®
I'm most familiar with New Jersey, in which there was one big company, Public Service. Originally there were a bunch of smaller systems that were brought together and linked using what are normally known as interurbans, connecting its systems. Also, interurban until today redirected to light rail, which is a modern term for streetcars. --SPUI 03:55, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
The project has brought up some important Wikineeds, essentially the necessity of not submerging the US experience in transit to the Eurasian experience (A Tram Named Desire, The Taking of Pelham Ace Deuce Tray), but that is tangential to "streetcars." -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 01:39, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I will buy the concept that bus rapid transit, subways, metro, monorail, and heavier commuter rail services are generally outside our scope. However, I believe that the electric interurbans are generally accepted by the followers of the streetcars in the U.S., since most used rails of the local streetcar systems in populated areas. I would ask that we include the interurbans in this project. May I assume that everyone agrees that cablecars (IE San Francisco) and funicular inclines (IE Monongahela and Duquesne Inclines in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, may also be included? Alao, I was trying to define local transportation as opposed to long distance travel, assuming we need to. Comments?

Try this one for revised wording of Project Scope folks:

[edit] Scope(revised 12/27/04)

(revised DRAFT)

This WikiProject aims primarily to expand Wikipedia coverage of urban, suburban, and interurban public transport rail services, including funiculars, horsecars, cablecars, streetcar, interurban, light rail, heritage streetcars and similar systems.
We want to expand information and articles to include historical, current, and future time periods. Subjects should include people, companies, technology, vehicles, rights of way, and systems. Some of these may form the basis later for a split as this project progresses. Essentially, we are limiting subjects to land-based transportation of people the majority of whom are traveling 40 miles or less one-way to and from home, school, and places of employment on services.

Vaoverland 03:44, Dec 28, 2004 (UTC)

The preceding revised text for Scope has been placed on the Wikiproject Streetcars page. Vaoverland 00:38, Jan 6, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Putting streetcars back on our streets

Where is it appropriate to link ideas and projects related to putting streetcars back on our streets? I think that if we had electric streetcars powered by wind turbines, and enough of them that go where enough people want to ride to and from, we could cut way down on the number of automobiles on the streets, reducing heat production, air pollution, noise, and traffic congestion. I think the automobile and oil industry owe penance for what they've done, for the situation they've put us in, and they should start cranking out windmills, making them cheap and plentiful. In order to have enough labor to install rail systems rapidly enough to do any good with regards to global warming and getting off the oil, we need to have a Barn raising. (That is why I linked that page to the streetcar page.) --KarlHeg 00:48, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Anybody got a photograph of a California Street cable car?

I've just added a section on 'Cars' to the article San Francisco cable car system and I'd like to illustrate the difference between the single-ended cars used on the Powell lines and the double-ended cars used on the California Street line, with recent photographs of both types of car.

I can supply any number of photographs of the single-ended cars, either by moving existing images in the article or by uploading more photos I took on my last two trips there. But I cannot find a usable picture of a double-ended car. Can anybody help?. -- Chris j wood 14:53, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Streetcar/tram/light rail merge?

There's some discussion about whether there should be a split between streetcars and higher-speed light rail. Both sides of the argument are at Talk:Streetcar#Streetcar vs. Light Rail; it would be nice to get more opinions. --SPUI (talk) 17:39, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

SPUI, please stop merging rail articles into Uberarticles. Wikipedia policy is to have articles under the common names by which the subjects are called, not to invent uncommon expressions: "urban heavy rail" just so we can have super-articles. A person looking for "Streetcar" or "Tram" or "Funicular" should find pages devoted to those topics, no have to wade through a giant article.
It makes no sense at all to have micro-articles for every variants of R1-9 subway car and each subway service but make "light rail" cover every variant of street railway. That is what categories are for. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 19:59, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
See my remarks under: =current streetcars?= Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, C.E.E. -86.83.155.44 12:57, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Improvement drive

The article on Transportation is currently nominated on Wikipedia:This week's improvement drive. Vote for Transportation there.--Fenice 09:11, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ideas for reintroducing tram in Mexican town.

I am an architect in Chicago, originally from San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, a very charming, but very crowded colonial town. I love this little town but it's going down the drain fast -little planning, too much real estate demand. I am searching for as much information on electric-powered trams to develop a proposal to the town to generate interest in changing the public transportation methods and introduce electric-powered vehicles.

San Miguel had a horse-powered tram during the first half of the 20th century. It connected the train station (low elevation) with the downtown (approxiamtely 60 meters higher). I believe the return trip consisted of a free fall..

I believe re-introducing the service would raise the consciousness, initially at the tourist/visitor level and ultimately help reduce the number of vehicles and associated parking in the historic center.

I know little about the tram/streetcar topic, so this is a first stab. Can you share your experience with a similar situation, or ideas on how to approach a utility/manufacturer/transit authority in the US, Canada or Europe to sell, donate a fleet for my perpose? I know of sister city relationships that have produced great results in donating fire and rescue equipmnent to undeveloped world locations.

Thank you

Federico Vidargas

[edit] Proposed changes to {{TrainsWikiProject}} for subprojects

I've proposed a change to {{TrainsWikiProject}} that would incorporate links to the various subprojects of WikiProject Trains. Your input on the template talk page would be appreciated. Thanks. Slambo (Speak) 18:39, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

The "Streetcars=yes" parameter now adds articles to Category:WikiProject Streetcars articles. Slambo (Speak) 11:20, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion: "Wikipedia is not a timetable"

A policy re: station and station stop articles is being proposed for Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains and it has been suggested that it be considered here as well. Please come and comment at User:Mangoe/Wikipedia is not a timetable. Mangoe 19:55, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] current streetcars?

there seems to be a lot of discussion about changing the "goals" or "mission" but it still seems to be about historic streetcars. are current streetcars valid info for this project?

Justforasecond 17:15, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The scope on the mainpage mentions "Historic, Current, and Future streetcars," so in short - Yes. However, alot of modern "streetcar" projects are labeled as light rail, so there may be terminology confusion. Skabat169 13:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
May I draw your attention to my (Dutch) comments in Talk:Tram about LRV-trams so to speak: Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, C.E.Eng. (rtd.) → HTM LRV GTL8 -\-See there under the last article: "WikiProject UK Trams", quoted hereunder; - 86.83.155.44 13:30, 11 September 2007 (UTC)


Do we still need "This WikiProject is believed to be inactive" at the top of the page? n2xjk 17:40, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I removed the inactive tag. n2xjk 18:33, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Project directory

Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory. This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you. B2T2 23:25, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tram and bus stops

Is every tram and bus stop on six continents deserving of a Wikipedia article? How about this one: South Pier tram stop? What's the policy? Is there a policy? Hu 22:11, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Strongly concurred. Seems like it would be more useful to have a single page about the line, listing each stop in order, than to have a separate page for each stop listing just previous/next. Do we really expect to have viable content anytime soon that would warrant a whole page for just a single stop, vs a sentence or two (if even that much info is available) in a unified list on one page? DMacks 22:42, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 16:17, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Titles of Articles

I have been struggling with what to call the page on Washington streetcars which I'm presently rewriting. I don't like the present name because Washington can mean any one of several cities or the state. I noticed that the New Orleans page is entitled Streetcars in New Orleans. I greatly prefer that format and I was wondering if we could set a standard that articles for a single city be called "Streetcars in ..." Thoughts? Cranor 05:12, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New WikiProject: buses

I have created WikiProject buses to manage articles about buses and bus routes, including their history as streetcar lines. --NE2 18:21, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] History of Trams

i have created this page History of Trams which is made up of different sections from Trams Tram systems and Light Rail. If there is no objections i will revise the sections that link to this new article by summarizing or removing the respected sections that have been used. L blue l 01:45, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Please see my remarks under → current streetcars? ← Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, C.E.Eng, (rtd.) HTM, and hereunder as well (↓); see my book too: HTM LRV nl:GTL8, The Hague (Netherlands) / HTV - 2000 / Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, Dr. H.D. Ploeger / ISBN 90-9013935-4.. The HTM LRV nl:GTL8-trams are, with the TW 6000-trams from Hannover, the first big RCT-choppercontrolled advanced tramseries of Europe. The predecessor was the Hague five (1336-1340) PCC-type thyristorcontrolled pioneer-serie with an early 70's very advanced ACEC resonant commutation circuit: again, the first in Europe ! 86.83.155.44 16:22, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

2° remark: RCT = Reverse conducting thyristor-choppercontrols for both TW 6000 as nl:GTL8 LRV's at maximal ½ MW = 625 V x 800 A per tramcar (two thyristorchoppers à 250 kW). Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, C.E.Eng -86.83.155.44 09:48, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject UK Trams

Hi! WikiProject UK Trams has now been started at WP:UK Trams, and I wondered if anyone was interested in joining. We aim to expand Wikipedia's coverage of UK Trams and Tram Systems. Please help! There is also a portal at P:UKT. Bluegoblin7 19:03, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

May I draw your attention to my quote here above (↑), and under current streetcars?, c.q. my remarks below your article in Talk:Tram about the current LRV-tram in The Hague - Holland: HTM LRV nl:GTL8 and difference between Light-Rail and Tram, solely German/American dated from 1970 on, since modern tramways (in the UK as well) started... Ing. D.A. Borgdorff, C.E.Eng.(rtd.) - nl:GTL8 >86.83.155.44 18:13, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Is this project a child project of Transport?

Hi. Can I ask if this wikiproject is a child project of Wikipedia:WikiProject Transport as I am trying to establish which projects are, so that the list on the main page can be sorted out. Thanks. Tbo 157talk 21:14, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Portal and Userbox?

Would we like a portal and a userbox for this project? I can (try) and make a suitable one if nesecary. Please let me know! Bluegoblin7 10:24, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A new wiki specially for Trains... And Trams/Streetcars etc...

Hello readers of WikiProject Streetcars!

I just wondered if any of you would be interested in joining up to Train Spotting World, a wiki just for railways and similar things, including trams - and the tram section might even be split into another wiki - Tram Spotting World!!!! We are also in the process of setting up several "Workforces", similar to WikiProjects, and were wondering if anyone wnated to help!

Various wikipedians have goine over there, including myself, User:Tbo 157, User:Slambo, User:EdJogg, User:Timtrent and User:S.C.Ruffeyfan.

If you want more info, or have joined up and want some guidance, let me know here or there on my talk page!

Thanks,

Bluegoblin7 18:35, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Need for verifiable references on town tramway list articles

I have recently systematically added "Unreferenced" tags to a large number of worldwide town tramway list articles (e.g. List of town tramway systems in the United States), as they do not curently include verifiable reference sources, but the primary author has repeatedly and inexplicably removed the tags without adding any citations. I would have thought that the primary author was in the best position to be able to provide reference links since he/she presumably knows where the information comes from, but perhaps other members of this project can assist in adding citations. Thanks. --DAJF (talk) 06:03, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

The lists are certainly well-referenced. The problem is that you did actually remove the links to the references. The section "references" contained a link to the main list labelled Books, Periodicals and External Links. The original list was divided into sub-lists in order to reduce article size. Perhaps this solution is not clear enough regarding sources for the sub-lists. Duplicating the references section of the original list is a solution, but perhaps not the best one. Suggestions? --Kildor (talk) 06:59, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, I understand the situation better now, but the relevant references will need to be transferred to the respective sub-lists. --DAJF (talk) 07:34, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Still - the pages are not unreferenced. With your edits, it looks like these articles have no references whatsoever. Until a better solution is found, would you please restore the articles to their previous versions that at least have a link to the sources in the reference section. --Kildor (talk) 07:57, 31 March 2008 (UTC)