Talk:History of rail transport/Archive 1

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1990s Amtrak introduces the Acela Express on the Northeast Corridor.

Why is this significant? (Not being critical, just don't understand.) Andy G 18:21 27 Jun 2003 (UTC) (UK)

(later) OK, found Acela article. Presumably it's the premier rail service in the Americas. Created Acela Express redirect. Andy G 18:30 27 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Which someone has now flipped around: main article = Acela Express, redirect = Acela. Sigh....

Atlant 16:13, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Acela Express seems to be the official name, even after the Acela Regional was renamed. --SPUI (talk) 21:55, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

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From the article

1853 Indianapolis' Union Station, the first in the world, opened by the Terre Haute & Richmond, Madison & Indianapolis, and Bellefontaine railroads.

I'm somewhat confused by this sentence, is it saying that the world's first rail station was opened in Indianapolis in 1853. If so then Its blatantly incorect.

If its not saying that then what does it mean? G-Man 22:47 27 Jul 2003 (UTC)

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I had meant the first UNION Station, i.e. where a single large station serves a city, rather than several smaller stations each operated by, and serving the ines of, a different railroad. chuljin

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Not true anyway. Derby was opened in 1840 Chevin (talk) 07:40, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Why has the timeline been moved it was perfectly OK here G-Man 00:31, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

In longish articles, long timelines are typically moved to their own page so that they can be easily accessed from other pages. There is a List of themed timelines which indexes all of the timelines in wikipedia. That way there is only one timeline to maintain per subject, rather than parallel endeavors dml 14:24, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Redirect

Does anyone else think this should be a redirect to Timeline of railway history seem as its rather silly having two articles about the same subject. This article is a mess anyway -its a cut and paste job from several earlier articles. If no-one disagrees I'll do that. G-Man 23:26, 17 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think this article should be improved, not redirected. dml 02:15, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

A history article and a timeline are not the same thing. I've undid the redirect, as history article seems to have content not yet duplicated elsewhere. Article should either be left and improved or have all relevent content included elsewhere. -- Infrogmation 20:55, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)

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I think the article needs more labor history in the US and worldwide. In particular, I changed the Diesel entry to reflect that part of the motivation for introducing Diesel power was the complex and specialized skills needed for steam power and the resultant power of labor unions in the US and elsewhere. I think this maintains NPOV while opening a new dimension. Let me know what you think.

Edward G. Nilges (spinoza1111@yahoo.com)

Early History

I have altered some of the views expressed considerably. I hope that I have not gone against accepted wisdom, by misunderstanding what hadfield and Skempton wrote about Jessop. If I have, no dount some one will correct it. However before doing so, I would ask that the person who doies so should check the primary published sources, not secondary works based on them. If what I found (and altered) does reflect what is in print, there must be a difference of academic opinion, which ought to be explained.

I have not altered the statements about Germany, but I suspect that they are not quite right. The system used in German mines was differnet from the earliest used in England, according to Lewis. Peterkingiron 22:09, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

I have started to add and redit this section, though I have not deleted anything.

--Train guard 16:52, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I think something needs to be done to reconcile the fact that the article starts with "The history of rail transport dates back nearly 500 years" and proceeds to immediately state "The earliest evidence of a railway found thus far was...around 600 BC.", over five times the indicated length of history.96.225.212.89 (talk) 09:33, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Well spotted. Now hopefully fixed. Separated wagonways from railways.Pyrotec (talk) 09:56, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Purpose and scope of this page

The table "RAILROAD MILEAGE BY REGION" seems to be an isolated block of information and completely out of place here. Would it not be much more appropriate and useful in the US rail history page ? (which doesn't yet exist but will be extracted from the US rail page shortly ;-).

Given that there are rail history pages for many parts of the world, I assume the role of this page is to give a general overview and a comparision of the progress of rail developments around the world. --AGoon 05:39, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

James Watt

I am wondering why, if James Watt's engines were stationary, he is cited at the top of the section on early train's: could some one please tell me when his engines were first put into trains as this would be more useful and relevant. {unsigned comment added by 217.42.233.125 on 18 December 2006) (sorry, I don't know how to add that "the preceding unsigned comment" bit automatically).

James Watt's engines were never put into locomotives, and if they had been he would have thrown a fit. He objected to trains altogether. The reason he's in the article is because his work improved steam engines conceptually and practically to a point where they were powerful enough to make putting on in a locomotive became feasible. Which is more or less what the article says. \ Fnarf999 \ talk \ contribs \ 23:21, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

United States

Some history of rail in the US would be nice; at least a paragraph or two, as an introduction to the table of US rail mileage growth, which now appears to burst out of the middle of a paragraph about the birth of the London tube. \ Fnarf999 \ talk \ contribs \ 23:27, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Photos

Please seee here http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Merlin-UK#York for some photos from York Museum... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.100.255.157 (talk) 20:37, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

US rail growth...

The section 'Railroad growth in the United States 1830-1890' starts in an ambiguous way:

"In 1830, there were only 23 miles of railroad track laid in America"

Does this mean that only 23 miles were laid during 1830, or that by 1830 only 23 miles had been laid, or something else?

I tried to corroborate the sentence with other articles, such as Rail transport in the United States, Timeline of United States railway history, Oldest railroads in North America and even Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, but I still couldn't be certain what was intended. (Which suggests that these articles might be lacking too.)

Could someone attend to this please? EdJogg (talk) 13:51, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Pratt and Whitney

I have deleted this gas turbine manufacturer on the grounds of WP:TOPIC. I see the point, but one engine manufacturer among hundreds would need something compelling for inclusion in this broad article. I'm thinking of something of the significance of Robert Stephenson and Company, the first locomotive works. Views? --Old Moonraker (talk) 17:15, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

A good revert. If you want to bring in Stephenson, please do, but keep it brief. Locos are not quite my subject, but is there no article on early ones? It might be better to have a more detailed article on them, and not to expand this one much. Peterkingiron (talk) 16:45, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I seem to have been a bit misleading: I wasn't thinking of actually doing it, it was just an example of what might be on topic, compared with the aero engine maker. --Old Moonraker (talk) 16:54, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

High Speed Rail

This article claims (as of 2013-12-29), "The construction of many [high speed rail lines] resulted in the dramatic decline of short haul flights and automotive traffic between connected cities, such as the London–Paris–Brussels corridor, Madrid-Barcelona, as well as many other major lines." If this is correct, it's a strong argument in favor of building more high speed rail lines. It would help to have quantitative estimates of the magnitude of this effect including as a function of other characteristics such as distance. For example, what might be the likely magnitude of such effects from the proposed high speed rail between San Francisco and Los Angeles? Honest planners and policy makers would want reasonably accurate estimates of these effects to help them deal with the conflicts between the ideologues arguing for and against proposed high speed rail projects on potentially spurious grounds. The distance between San Franciso and Los Angeles is roughly 60 percent greater than between London, Paris and Brussels but less than 10 percent greater than the distance between Barcelona and Madrid. What has been the experience with high speed rail between Washington, DC, and Boston? I don't have time to research this myself, but it would be interesting and useful to have it available in Wikipedia (with appropriate citations), I think. DavidMCEddy (talk) 16:28, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Medieval railway

The image is detail from a window at the south end of the south transept. St Nicholas is shown bringing the boys back to life.

"The earliest known record of a railway in medieval Europe is a stained-glass window in the Minster of Freiburg im Breisgau dating from around 1350." This statement is supported by a citation to Stuart Hylton's "The Grand Experiment". I have been in discussion on the German Wiki about this image, I wanted to include it on this page. However it appears that Hylton has been fed a myth. There is evidence of mining on the bottom left and right panels, but no railway. The middle left panel has been seen by some as a railway, but is in fact St Nicholas restoring the slaughtered boys. The "lore" or wagon is a wash-tub. Further, it would be very unusual for the lower image which reflects the guild who paid for the window, to be connected directly with the main religious message; they are in fact separate panels showing separate stories.

Given that the citation is clearly wrong (have a look at the image yourself), how do we proceed? WP:VERIFY would suggest keeping it and WP:NOR means I can't remove it. Perhaps a discussion here will lead to a concensus? Martin of Sheffield (talk) 21:22, 19 June 2014 (UTC)

No response in nearly 2 years! I'm going to flag the statements as {{dubious}} in the text. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 14:06, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

I've come across a very similar scene with no connection whatsoever to railways. The image on the right is from Rochester Cathedral. The problem remains, Hylton is wrong, can anyone provide an alternative citation since to take action would be WP:OR Martin of Sheffield (talk) 22:07, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

There is no railway depicted in the window. If there had been it would have resembled the print in De Re Metallica or the actual minecart found in Transylvania. We can use common sense on Wikipedia. I suggest we remove the related statements from the article.Phmoreno (talk) 13:44, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

I've just had another look at the Freiburg window. The panel above the wash tub image is another story about St Nicholas - that of him giving purses of gold to three daughters of an impoverished man. See St Nicholas for the story. The Rochester window also has the same iconography, but is not included in this photograph. As the originator and researcher of this issue I still feel duty bound not to edit the main page; can Phmoreno or some other editor take a balanced view and act if appropriate. Thanks, Martin of Sheffield (talk) 16:02, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

• My reaction is to remove this: the source is a book on railways after 1820. It is most unlikely that the author has researched the subject. I also cannot see a leitnagel hund (LH) in the image offered me. I am familiar with the academic literature on the subject and have never heard of this before. The 1550 date in the article is probably too late. All we can certainly say is that the LH (which is a precursor of, but is not, a railway) is first recorded in Agricola, but may in fact be significantly earlier. Please remind me in (say) a week to deal with this. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:05, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

Not quite correct: see below. Agricola's woodcut is the first clear picture. Peterkingiron (talk) 16:36, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

Based on this discussion I commented out the statement regarding the stained glass window. There is no reasonable supporting evidence.Phmoreno (talk) 01:56, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

I have found a better source and have just added some material from it - Lewis, Early wooden railways, which remains a leading English language source. This discusses the Freiburg window, which was presented by a mine owner and (apparently) shows a variety of mining scenes. The one in question might show a man pushing a truck, but that is interpretation. As only the back of the truck is shown, it is impossible to be certain. Discussion of this may be appropriate in a comprehensive academic book, but an encyclopaedia article should avoid speculation. Peterkingiron (talk) 16:36, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

The washtub has no wheels. The babes are looking at the saint, not in the supposed direction of travel, and the "man pushing the truck" is a nimbed saint! Now the miners in Germany may have all been good men, but to suggest that they sported halos is an interesting idea. I have asked the opinion of a professional historian (she studied medieval glass as part of her MA) on this and she confirms that panel is part of the narrative and not related to the donor. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 17:17, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

To call it a railway would require showing both wheels and rails. Also, notice that there are barrel bands on the tub, which would imply the slats needed to be tightly compressed to hold a liquid rather than looser fitting to hold ore.Phmoreno (talk) 18:46, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

So-called ancient railways

I am questioning these so called early railways supposedly "cut" into stone. How does one know whether these were intentionally cut or just from the wear of wagon wheels, especially if they had iron tiers? Wagon wheel ruts can be seen in the stone streets of Pompeii. You will notice multiple, somewhat parallel ruts in certain areas. The reason for multiple ruts is probably that that there was no standard wagon wheel spacing. However, once the ruts became deep enough the wagon wheel spacing had to be within the width of the ruts, which would explain wagonways such as Diolkos. Phmoreno (talk) 13:32, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

Honestly I don't have a clue, what we do here at Wikipedia is to report what reliable sources say, such as the ones given in the section you describe. If you can find a reliable source which contradicts what is currently in the article, then feel free to put it in. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 19:34, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

After posting this I read *Lewis, M. J. T. (2001), "Railways in the Greek and Roman world", in Guy, A.; Rees, J. (eds.), Early Railways. A Selection of Papers from the First International Early Railways Conference (PDF), pp. 8–19 (10–15), archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-21 {{citation}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

This basically confirmed what I saw for myself in Pompeii. Lewis goes on to say that the Diolkos' ruts appear to have been carved in places and may have contained wooden rails. This is very likely because of the history of wooden plank roads, and if so, it could be considered a type of railway. However, this is better called a wagonway than a railway.Phmoreno (talk) 21:14, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

I get a 404 on that URL, and also on http://www.sciencenews.gr/docs/. Can you check it please? Thanks, Martin of Sheffield (talk) 21:34, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt response, the URL now works. Shame that Lewis repeats the Freiburg nonsense though! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 08:29, 19 September 2016 (UTC)