Talk:Presidents' Conference Committee (Toronto streetcar)

Restaurants, shops & farm sheds

Comments copied from another Talk page: The PCC main article lists retired PCCs converted into restaurants, shops and farm sheds. The list mixes such items with museum pieces and heritage streetcar operations; I will eventually split these out into separate tables. Do you want the items for restaurants, etc. deleted? Most have no REF. Many may not exist anymore. I think a sample photo would suffice as a substitute. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 13:47, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

If the ones converted into restaurants or shops don't have refs, then they are to be deleted. When I say refs, I don't mean something like a tweet, an Instagram post, a Reddit comment, a post on the UrbanToronto forums, or such. Refs need to be reliable. Johnny Au _{(talk/contributions)} 02:10, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

All Restaurants, shops & farm sheds were deleted. None of the re-purposed PCCs seemed to exist anymore. Any entry marked as "scrapped" were also deleted. None had REFs. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 02:49, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

@TheTrolleyPole and Johnny Au: Put them all back; I've found an RS: the Canadian Trackside Guide® ISSN 0829-3023, published by the Bytown Railway Society Inc. (www.bytownrailwaysociety.ca), lists pretty-much all Canadian rail equipment that didn't go from the original owner directly to the scrapper, regardless of condition. The most recent copy I've got is the 19th edition from 2000, but I'm sure there's newer ones readily available. Useddenim (talk) 04:29, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

That is good. Johnny Au _{(talk/contributions)} 13:49, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

Deteriorating PCCs

The following cars were dropped from the preservation table because there appears to be no serious or effective effort to preserve them: TheTrolleyPole (talk) 02:06, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

• 4404, 4472: in private collection in poor condition; for sale but no buyers; owner: Tahoe Valley Lines PCC Railway (Colfax, California) as per BERA
• 4460: stored in a field; partly damaged by fire; not in a museum; not owned by Southern California Railway Museum
• 4476 stored at Gomaco Trolley Company; to be scrapped as per BERA
• 4478 stripped for parts at Pikes Peak Historical Street Railway according to BERA
• 4524 at Vintage Electric Streetcar Company, Windber, PA; a.k.a. "Windber Trolley Graveyard"; CPTDB says "All vehicles are in various decomposed condition".
• 4662, 4663 Buckeye Lake Trolley(Buckeye Lake, Ohio); private collection; not open to public according to BERA; 4662 in poor condition according to photo

Major changes

I plan to intend out the following changes to the article:

1. The infobox will be deleted and be replace by section listing characteristics. The infobox suggests that all Toronto PCCs share the same characteristics whether air-electric or all-electric, whether new or used; the infobox does not work well for multiple varieties of PCCs. The infobox does not have any REFs. At a Doors Open event at Roncesvalles Carhouse, I photographed a specification sheet for an A8-class PCC; I will use this source and clearly state that it's just for one specific class. Transit Toronto has a copy of the specs for A6, A7 and A8-class PCCs, and the infobox mainly agrees. Thus, I will retain the infobox with modifications but clearly mark to it is only for 3 specific classes of PCCs. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 02:26, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
2. The Disposals section has a mix of (a) sales to other operators who scrapped the cars after use, (b) disposals to heritage streetcar lines and rail museums as operating cars, (c) static displays and stored cars, and (d) PCCs used as buildings. I plan to separate these out. I feel group d cars should be deleted as they are as good as scrapped. I might delete type c if there is no serious effort to restore or if I cannot confirm. Group b cars will be given prominence over group a.
3. The article will be expanded to have a new intro, summaries of each PCC class, background info on air versus all-electric, MU-operation, etc.

Comments are welcome. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 03:15, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Commemoration

A number of mass-market commercial posters prominently feature Toronto PCC cars:

• Untitled(?) by John Ward; depicts the rear of a PCC from the belt rail up on a winter afternoon, likely at High Park Loop
• Streetcar on Queen by George Boyer; side view of the front half of a PCC, I believe westbound near Baseball Place. Published by Poster Editions. [1]
• Toronto’s Old City Hall/1889-1965 by B. Liaskas; a 501 HUMBER car is prominently shown westbound on Queen on a snowy winter day. Published by Frameguild Moundings in 1984. [2]
• STREETCARS; shows five generations of streetcars (horsecar 16; wooden double-truck class BB “4203”; Large Witt 2470; all-electric PCC “4009”; CLRV “1706”) on a silver/grey background. Published by Fine Art Editions and Dynagraph. [3]

There are numerous others, but I have these four hanging on my wall. As they were widely distributed, do they warrant inclusion? Useddenim (talk) 17:35, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't think we should be listing commercial products in the article, even if artistic in nature. If you included a photo of the posters, there might be a copyright issue. From experience, the folks who police WikiCommons can be very strict. You might get away with taking a photo of a mug, pen, t-shirt, etc. all bearing the image of a Toronto PCC, to illustrate nostalgia for PCCs. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 00:46, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

Weight

The weight for an empty A8-class PCC after rebuilding is 37,400 lbs according to two sources. However, the sources give no weight for a full car. If the full weight were 117,000 lb as per the unsourced weight in the infobox, then each passenger in a crush load of 134 would weigh on average almost 600 lbs each! Perhaps, someone mislabeled the weight (53,000 lbs instead of 53,000 kgs). Since I can't find the source for "full" weight, I have deleted it from the infobox. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 00:50, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

December 14, 2018 deletions

Here are my comments on deletions performed by User:Joeyconnick: TheTrolleyPole (talk) 22:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

• no citations in titles/headings
  • The reason for "classes A6, A7 & A8 rebuilt" in the infobox title is that the specifications do not apply to all PCCs in the TTC fleet but only to certain classes after a certain rebuild project. Deleting the caption leads the reader to assume the specifications apply to all Toronto PCCs. And, why was the reference deleted? I thought its absence was a flaw of the old article. As an alternative, I could eliminate the infobox and put the specifications into a table with caption and REF. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 22:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
    • Another alternative is to delete all specifications from the infobox that do not apply to all PCCs, or simply delete the infobox altogether. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 22:57, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
• MOS:PERTINENCE, especially "strive for variety"; given the already extremely large number of images in this article, the gallery is clear overkill
  • The photos are pertinent in that the classes of second-hand PCCs had distinctive appearances, some aspects of which are mentioned in the text. There was one and only one photo per class to allow a comparison of differences. The purpose of the photos was to illustrate differences. I think the photos should be restored. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 22:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

@Joeyconnick, Johnny Au, and Radagast: Your comments would be appreciated. Thanks. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 22:14, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

If the information in the infobox only applies to a portion of the article, it should not be in an infobox and even if it were, you just don't have citations in headings as per MOS:HEAD. I understand that the infobox title is not actually a "section heading" in the traditional sense, but the idea is clearly analogous. Sources go in the body, not in the headings.

As for the gallery... does a casual layperson reader of an article on ALL Toronto PCCs need to see all the (I would argue relatively minor) visual distinctions between classes of PCCs? No. This is not a specialist fanpage, this is an encyclopedia presenting general information to a general audience. The article is already full of images of a variety of PCCs. We don't need to provide exhaustive visual coverage just because we can. We aren't a directory of PCC streetcars. —Joeyconnick (talk) 23:19, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

I agree. Wikipedia isn't Flickr, Imgur, nor Instagram. It's not a PCC photo website. Johnny Au _{(talk/contributions)} 02:45, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

There are articles with many photos either in a table (Toronto subway public art) or a gallery in its own section (Halton County Radial Railway#Gallery). Would one of these formats be acceptable to illustrate the PCCs? Four of the deleted photos show PCCs with rather distinctive features. The original article already went beyond "presenting general information to a general audience" before I started modifying it; for years it had and still has tables listing car numbers in gory details. The deleted photos are more informative than all those car numbers. If readers want only "general information to a general audience", they need go no further than Toronto streetcar system rolling stock. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 16:35, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

A representative photo of each class is useful, as there were noticeable differences between each group. Admittedly, there could be better views that make them more obvious.Useddenim

I can only choose the views that are available on WikiCommons. None of the photos are mine. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 01:17, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

@TheTrolleyPole: I don't understand why you complain about “listing car numbers in gory detail” and then add such fancruft as the dates of fantrips (October 15, 1950; February 20, 1972).Useddenim

I wanted to report the date a certain class first went into passenger service in Toronto, and the first trip happened to be a rail fan trip rather than regular service. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 01:17, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

There's no reason that an encyclopedia article has to be just a general overview of a topic. If the information is available an referenced, a comprehensive examination of a subject is perfectly acceptable. (And IMHO, TheTrolleyPole threw out some babies with the bathwater with his recent revisions.) Useddenim (talk) 14:21, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

I'm curious: What babies did I throw out? Were they the PCCs converted to restaurants, etc.? TheTrolleyPole (talk) 01:17, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

A representative photo of each class is useful. Is it, though? Why are class distinctions between defunct/potentially non-existent streetcars of interest? And useful to whom? And for how small a group of people? This is not a transit encyclopedia. And yes, there is very much a reason why this encyclopedia should be just a general overview: WP:NOTEVERYTHING (and the aforementioned WP:NOTADIRECTORY). This kind of detailed account is suitable for something like Transit Toronto, not a worldwide encyclopedia with an international audience.

That being said, I am not critiquing TheTrolleyPole for their overall edits; this page was a mess and it's miles better now. I just don't think anyone's made a good argument for continuing to include these images (especially if they don't actually show class distinctions particularly clearly). As for the other examples of large inclusions of images... I look at those and I can at least immediately see differences between most of the images, rather than a sea of sameness. That being said, the existence of other articles that include tons of photos does not mean that works here, is necessary here (or, to be honest, in the other articles either), etc. Frankly I'm not sure we need an image of every piece of public art in the Toronto subway either. We need to avoid being indiscriminate in what we include. Okay, there were class differences... is that interesting? Does it add to the article? Does the visual representation of said differences increase the value of the article? —Joeyconnick (talk) 22:09, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

So, in a nutshell, you’re arguing for the dumbing-down of Wikipedia? Useddenim (talk) 23:48, 16 December 2018 (UTC)

Continuing on:

I would like to suggest a compromise on the photos. There are currently 6 photos of PCCs in Toronto, 3 are photos are of near identical cars (A6, A8, A15). I suggest dropping 2 of these photos and replacing them with 2 photos of the more-distinctive second-hand cars which had been deleted. I may substitute photos showing 2 classes in one photo. I would put all photos to the right of text. TheTrolleyPole (talk) 01:17, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

I still have a dilemma with the infobox in that I don't know how to add a note to the specifications advising that weight, traction system, acceleration, deceleration are specific to the A8 class and may be different for other classes. Any suggestions? Or should I simply delete these 4 entries since they may not be in common to all classes? TheTrolleyPole (talk) 01:21, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

Note has been added to the infobox. I will dig into my photos; I know I have pictures of 4600 & 4601 (the first two rebuilt A-15H cars) in their unique CLRV paint schemes. I will also look for shots of the Cleveland and Louisville cars that clearly show their roof monitors. Anything else that needs to be illustrated for specific classes? (An A-7 MU train comes to mind, but even though I rode them often, I don't have any photos of my own.)

I do have an issue with the deletion of all of the information about cars that initially avoided scrapping. In general I am against removal of information that may be useful or of interest to somebody. TheTrolleyPole used “no RSs” as the rationale for deletion, but I’m pretty sure that you could find details in the UCRS Newsletter, Rail and Transit, Canadian Rail (ISSN 0008-4875), or possibly Modern Tramways. Useddenim (talk) 02:43, 17 December 2018 (UTC)