Talk:Brill Tramway

Map

A map might be useful. Jackiespeel (talk) 16:15, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments from Moni3

And take these a same grain of salt. I hope they don't seem rude. I simply don't understand some stuff.

• I know where London is, and it would help to see the train line in reference to London in the first map.
  • The direction to London is marked on all the maps. The "close up map" of the route would be significantly bigger if I actually showed the line, because of the angle it ran at. On the 1872 map there is no line to London; it hadn't yet been built. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• You just don't know how much it makes me argh! when people suggest I cut information after I write an article, although I do admit I tend to add kitchen sinks back to 1829. Somehow that morphs into my being super protective of the article text. At any rate, why is it important to know the medieval history of Brill?
  • I tried to keep it to a minimum; I was trying to convey to readers who aren't familiar with the area that this was an important enough town to warrant its own station, but at the same time a backwards backwater that didn't actually generate enough passenger traffic to make the station viable. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, the only son of Richard Plantagenet Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 2nd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, That's hilarious. Did you mean to make me laugh so hard? Or is British nobility making me laugh?
  • Technically we should be using his name throughout—Wikipedia doesn't approve of titles—but I just introduced each of the family once and from then on used "the 1st Duke", "the 3rd Duke" etc, and MOS be damned. The Grenville family all had (and still have) ridiculous names, and I don't want to keep repeating them. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• It transpired that the four-wheeled wagons used had an average weight of 31⁄2 tons and each carried 6–7 tons of goods, meaning this limit was regularly exceeded. Using the phrase It transpired means, at least to me, that something happened. Unless this is a phrase in British English that is not in my everyday vernacular, it's not clear what happened, or if this phrase is intended to mean something else.
  • What I'm trying to say was "it turned out that…"—that is, that they'd assumed nothing would weigh more than 10 tons but once they had it up and running they found the wagons were heavier than planned. Not sure how to reword it; "it turned out" is ugly IMO. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC) Actually, replaced it with "As it turned out…". – iridescent 15:23, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• The MOS is unclear about what is preferred, although I have some vague recollection that spelled-out fractions (three quarters of a mile) are preferred over 3/4 of a mile. That could be a thing from a couple years ago. I don't know.
  • Not sure on that one. I dare say if it's wrong Malleus will spot it. In my opinion, anything that keeps the word count down is a plus in this case. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• I removed another "It transpired that". It seemed to be going around the point.
• planned stately home of Waddesdon Manor uh, well...all I could her was the voiceover from the campy 1960s Batman series saying "Meanwhile at stately Wayne Manor..." American geeks...
• Aw. The cows! Not that I don't eat fired beef or anything...
  • It could have been a lot worse. I included the cows as an example of the type of accident; one of the books has a loving list of all the assorted critters mangled, squashed and burned by the trains. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• The newer engines went faster than 8 mph? There's a lot of detail so I re-read that section but did not see the top speeds of the new engines, one of which struck the servant girl at ... 8 mph? Did she see it 50 feet away and begin screaming as it approached her at a crawl?
  • Pretty much, yes; that part about the horses being used for passenger services because they were faster than the locomotives isn't a typo. This was the 19th century and the "s" word wasn't used (and certainly not for Lady Grenville's maidservant), but it seems most likely. I included the contemporary press report from the local paper mainly so readers could see there isn't any further explanation. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• In the 1830s century Is this a leftover from a long ago copy edit?
  • Oops, yes. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• What did the upturn in business in the Waddesdon Manor section mean for profits for the Tramway? Previous sections give me the impression it's hanging by a thread. I think I'm looking for a clause at the beginning of the section, like "Despite the rail line's previous financial difficulties, in 1876..."
  • Hard to say; because at this time it was 100% owned by the Duke and not incorporated, it didn't start filing accounts until 1894. They kept records of volumes hauled, which shows an upturn with all the bricks coming in, but not the profits. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• I don't quite get, or it hasn't been established, what the Brill Brick and Tile Works section means for the rail line. Should this be its own article or something?
  • The brick works was built on the rail line itself. The logic was that the Duke would make the bricks, and then wouldn't have to pay to ship them provided the customer was also on the line, so could undercut all the other brick factories. Because it's so dependent on the rail line—and Fenemore, who took it over when it closed, makes a brief cameo at the end of the article as one of the directors who shut the line—I don't really want to split it off to a subpage. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• Specifically for readers outside the region, whose familiarity with local geography is negligent, can you establish early in the Oxford, Aylesbury and Metropolitan Junction Railway Company section what this means to the Brill line? I don't know where Brill is in the scheme of this section. Maybe something like In 1837 Euston railway station opened, the first to connect London with the industrial heartlands of the West Midlands and Lancashire. "The Brill Tramway was one of several (systems) north? of London with the potential to be connected to the larger metropolitan rail system." And I think I mucked that up quite nicely, but the point of it is where it should be placed and how it should incorporate why two paragraphs separate the next mention of the Brill Tramway.
  • It includes "In 1873 Watkin entered negotiations to take control of the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the section of the former Buckinghamshire Railway running north from Verney Junction to Buckingham. He planned to extend the MR north from London to Aylesbury and extend the Tramway southwest to Oxford, and thus create a through route from London to Oxford."—do you think it needs more? I was hoping that between that and the map showing how the extension scheme would have worked, it would be enough. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• I know someone somewhere is going to remove the fact that the 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos died of diabetes, aged 65. Dude died, delete diabetes detail. Age probably, too.
  • Removed the diabetes, kept the age—I think the fact that he died relatively young is relevant to all the expansion schemes going on at the time. Guys in their 60s can still take the long view, guys in their 80s are less likely to care. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
• Similarly the details about who inherited what and how.
  • I think the inheritance side ought to stay. There needs to be an explanation somewhere that the 3rd Duke of Buckingham's heir was Earl Temple, not the 4th Duke of Buckingham (which common sense would make one assume), otherwise later in the article people will be saying "who the hell is this Earl Temple guy and why is he suddenly in charge?". – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I had to stop at Rebuilding and re-equipping by the O&AT because damn, this is a long article. Although seriously, I thought this article would turn me into this what with being bored. So far it's rather interesting and I'm fully engaged. I hope I can come back to the review soon. You know how I wander off. Remind me if I don't return after a few days. --Moni3 (talk) 14:35, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for all that! I know it's an inherently dull topic, but (as with all these 19th century articles) I do try to show that the people involved were no better, no worse and no different to people today, and that all these Grand Projects were ultimately stories about people, not machinery. I think it's worked on this one. – iridescent 15:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Do you think the article could tell the history and importance of the railway just as effectively by summarizing the Aylesbury Vale in the mid-19th century section:

Brill is a small town situated at the top of the 600-foot (180 m) high Brill Hill in the Aylesbury Vale in northern Buckinghamshire, around 12 miles (19 km) northeast of Oxford, and 45 miles (72 km) northwest of London. Historically the town was a significant population centre despite its relative isolation. In the 19th century, the 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, thought it necessary to construct a rail line connecting Brill to a connecting rail line at Quainton Road, despite his inheriting significant debt from his womanising and extravagantly spending father, the impossibly long-named 2nd Duke of a Steve Wonder song. The Duke intended to use his own land holdings to connect his estate at Wotton to the nearby and recently completed Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway.

I understand if you want to call me names for suggesting this, and certainly fix for accuracy, but think about it. Possibly for several days. --Moni3 (talk) 16:22, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

See my comments on Malleus's talk if you haven't already. What this section was intended to do (although it seems to be failing) is (a) explain why Brill was important enough that when they petitioned the Duke, he listened (the traditional way to make money out of a new rail line is to buy a plot of land, run a rail line to it from a population centre, subdivide the land into lots and sell it to commuters; by connecting all these existing villages without expanding them, the Duke was going about the whole thing ass-backwards); (b) explain how the town had been wrecked in the 1600s and never recovered, and thus was quite small and isolated in the 1800s; (c) explain why bricks were so significant to the town, which becomes important later on; and (d) explain why Wotton House and the land around it had suddenly become so important to the family once they lost all their other land and houses. (The scale of the properties they lost can't be overstated; Buckingham Palace is called that for a reason.) – iridescent 16:33, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Comments from David Cane

• Was the Rothschilds' energy facility just a gas works or was it also a power station? Gasworks usually converted coal into coal gas for lighting and/or heating. You'd need a power station to generate electricity. The Waddesdon Manor article says that Queen Victoria saw electric lighting there for the first time, so it must have been coming from somewhere.
• Arguably Bishopsgate and Fenchurch Street stations were not north of London but east of it.
• It might be worth stating how far out of London the MR had got when the extension to Aylesbury was permitted (i.e. Harrow-on-the-Hill).
• Need to check the use of full names and abbreviations for railway companies. Both are used intermingled (e.g. for the A&BR). More may follow tomorrow.--DavidCane (talk) 23:22, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

• I've found no mention of it being anything other than a gasworks. (I don't believe for one second that Victoria had never seen electric lighting before, either, come to that).
• Re the positioning of the stations—yes, but... The point is that the Met curved along the top of the traditional boundary without coming into it. If one considers the Tower as the eastern tip of historic London, then Liverpool Street/Bishopsgate and Fenchurch Street are north of it. As with the mini-biography of the Duke, the "history of the Met" paragraph is intended to provide just enough to provide a context to people unfamiliar with it; I don't want to get into a long sidetrack on the geography of London beyond what's necessary to explain why the early underground railways were built.
• I intentionally left the "how far out had the Met got" out. 99% of the world won't have a clue where Harrow is, and it's not really relevant. It would also mean a long "they were authorised to build to Rickmansworth, but hadn't yet exercised the option, and Watkin's plan was to go north via Chesham to Borehamwood and not northwest through Aylesbury, but then they took over two railways near Aylesbury so altered the Grand Central scheme to encompass them" sidetrack.
• I used the full name for the first occurrence of each company, and again if a company hadn't been mentioned for a long time or in sections where it's particularly important a reader understand which company is doing what. (The negotiations leading to the GW&GCJR, for instance.) With both a GCR and a GWR knocking about, it would be quite easy to confuse the two, and it's a long enough article that people might forget what stands for what. – iridescent 08:23, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

• I've no further comments. I think that this easily meets the Featured Article standards and it will certainly get my support when it gets there. If you're putting it forward for GA first, I'll keep an eye open for it.--DavidCane (talk) 22:51, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Spoil used for Stamford Bridge

I do not have my copy of the book any more but according to my copy of Football Grounds of England and Wales by Simon Inglis the spoil for Stamford Bridge came from the District line. Of course it could have come from more than one place, there was a lot of railway building going on in the area. Britmax (talk) 07:44, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

I'd removed it already; although I can source it, the dates don't add up for either the Metropolitan nor the District Lines. If it came from the Met, why would they be shipping their spoil to a site miles from the actual diggings, which wasn't connected to the area by rail so would have needed a fleet of carts? If it came from the District Line, what happened between the digging of the District Line in the 1880s and the building of Stamford Bridge in 1905? My money is on the Stamford Bridge spoil coming from the Piccadilly Line, and on the clay from the Met and District workings being fired into bricks. – iridescent 12:09, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Wolmar (p. 36) says it was from the original Metropolitan line working, but does not give a source. Stamford Bridge was an athletics ground before Chelsea moved there, but that did not open until the 1870s and maps of the 1860s show the site as a market garden, a place not likely to be desirous of a load of dodgy sub-soil. --DavidCane (talk) 23:25, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

The soil at the layer at which the sub-surface lines were dug is clay, and for a project which needed many million bricks it seems crazy for them to have dumped it anywhere, let alone somewhere like Chelsea which would be a logistical nightmare today, let alone back then. The more I think of it, the more sure I am that the Stamford Bridge earthworks were the spoil from the deep-level tunnel through Kensington which became the Piccadilly Line, and the MR spoil became Paddington Station and its associated embankments. – iridescent 23:36, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

In fact, thinking about it further: the original Metropolitan Railway subsurface section was 5 km long, at its narrowest was 7 m wide (broad gauge, remember…), and would have had to have been a minimum of 4 m high to accommodate GWR stock. That makes a minimum of 140,000 m³ of earth displaced for the tunnel alone, not allowing for the stations themselves or for the wider sections of tunnel. Quite aside from the logistics of transporting between half a million and a million tons of soil across London by road—and the rather unlikely idea that what was then a prosperous suburb would welcome a huge mound of rubble, heavily contaminated with industrial waste, raw sewage, and half-decayed corpses—the volume is out by a couple of orders of magnitude. – iridescent 10:15, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Just some feedback

Wow, who woulda thought so much can be said about a six-mile rail line! This article is very impressive in scope and attention to detail. Outstanding work. File:Thumbsup emote.gif -- œ^™ 11:26, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Passive voice

There is an awful lot of passive voice on this article. It really needs a good cleanup to favor the active voice. I fixed the capitalization; Brill Tramway is correct, but the tramway. --John (talk) 20:57, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm not a grammar expert, but I understand that passive voice is a lot more common in British English than American English. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 21:02, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

According to whom? I'd be surprised if that was true. If anything my impression is the opposite, not that it makes any difference to our efforts to improve the article. --John (talk) 21:07, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, to clarify myself, I meant that it's more likely to be considered incorrect in the US than in Britain. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 21:56, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Disused Rail Photos

The external link to the Roger Marks photograph site rotted near the start of this year. Is any new address for it known?

RAClarke (talk) 09:10, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

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