Talk:Train lights

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Theleekycauldron (talk) 03:01, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

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• Article history

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• ... that the first train headlight was simply a bonfire on a train car pushed in front of a locomotive? Source: A History of the American Locomotive, by John H. White: "Two small flat cars were coupled in front of the locomotive. A bright fire of pine knots on a bed of sand on the first car and a simple sheet-iron reflector on the car behind comprised the headlight." [1]
  • ALT1: ... that in the 19th century, the idea of putting headlights on trains was considered controversial? Source: The Day, "Locomotive Headlights" July 1, 1886. "On a road engine the headlight is of no earthly use to the engineer; it obstructs his vision so that he cannot see his switch lights, and I think that every thinking engineer will come to the conclusion that he would rather run in the night without a lamp, than with it, as he can see better in the dark." [2]

• Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Tibetan blackbird

Created by Trainsandotherthings (talk). Self-nominated at 19:18, 3 November 2021 (UTC).

• Good to go for the first hook. This review is for the first hook only, and not ALT1. Per the Reviewing guide at WP:DYKR, the ALT1 fact is not immediately followed by an inline citation in the article, so does not qualify at this time. Plus, I find the first hook to be much more interesting, and it likely would be to readers. The article is new and long enough, QPQ done, all non-lead ¶ with citations, a copyvio check reveals no problems, hook content is interesting and is verified with a citation to a reliable source in the article. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 17:22, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

• Promoter's comment to @Northamerica1000: Hey there! While I did end up taking ALT0, because it is more interesting, you should know that hooks generally aren't rejected out of hand because they're not cited inline; if you ever take a gander at prep set building, you'll find that you have to cite a lot of people's hooks inline for them. Gentle nudges, or do it yourself, it's all good! theleekycauldron (talk • contribs) (they/them) 03:01, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

ALT0 to T:DYK/P4

Make it more world wide.

I have tried to include some British stuff. The classification/marker lights which is currently talks about only applies to the USA and Canada and not the UK. I Like The british Rail Class 483 (talk) 20:52, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

It was so poorly written I had no choice but to revert it. Please also review WP:RS and don't ever use Quora or a forum discussion as a reference, because neither is anything close to a reliable source. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 22:55, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

@Trainsandotherthings I will rewrite it better. I Like The british Rail Class 483 (talk) 06:11, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

You basically wrote the same thing full of grammar errors. I have taken the liberty of rewriting. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 11:52, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the article is now a mess. It used to be just North-America-centric without saying so. But now, some parts of the article are specific to North America, some parts of it are specific to other places, and most of the parts don't say which locale they're talking about.

By the way, the lack of "true headlights" in the UK is not "despite" their use in the USA. It's because of the completely different set-up of British railways. Railway lines in the UK are, by law, protected by fences, so there's less need to see the track ahead at night. Dricherby (talk) 19:33, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

As mentioned above, UK law requires railways (other than tramways and certain light railways) to be fenced. Road vehicles have headlamps both to be seen and to see by. Unlike car drivers, train drivers don't need to steer around curves or watch for hazards, so don't need to illuminate what's ahead. An oncoming train will be on a different track, so doesn't need to make itself visible. In the days when semaphore signals were commonplace in the UK, their aspects were displayed at night by means of an oil lamp shining through a piece of coloured glass. Oil lamps are not as bright as electric lamps, and the coloured glass reduced the brightness further. A powerful headlamp could easily overwhelm the relatively feeble signal lamp, creating a potentially dangerous situation.

Trains in the UK typically had one or more lamps at the front so that signallers and station staff could distinguish one train from another - the lamps were arranged in various positions around the front of the locomotive, and sometimes had coloured glasses - usually green or purple, but never red. At the rear there would be one or more tail lamps, which always had red glass. Hence, the direction in which a stationary train was next going to move could be identified by the colour of the lamps - red: away from you; anything else: towards you. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:10, 4 August 2023 (UTC)