Template talk:Named trains of the Victorian Railways

Need to add

Following need to be added:

Regular passenger trains

The Great Northern Limited
The Mildura Sunlight
The Northerner
Sunraysia Express (1987-?)

Other trains

RAAF Recruiting Train
Rutherglen Red
The Weedex Train
Wirth's Circus Train (1888-?)

Trainsofvictoria (talk) 08:26, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Trainsofvictoria: This is a navigation template. Therefore, these trains do not need to be added until or unless there is an article or link created about them. Otherwise, they are not helpful for navigation and need not be included. Triptothecottage (talk) 09:12, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Triptothecottage: They were in the previous table when it was joined with Template:Victorian rolling stock. That navigation template also has links to pages that don't exist.

I would argue that adding them is not useless, as Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, it needs to list things that exist / have existed.

I am personally working on gathering information about the Wirth's Circus Train and Weedex Train so I can eventually make the pages. I can also provide references to the existence of all these that need to be added, but lack the information other then to say that they were in existence at a particular date (which isn't enough to make an actual page on here yet).

If they are not listed here, then I would look at Wikipedia an a non-reliable source of information (which surely must be against what this site is all about)

Navigation template also has links to pages that don't exist:

Trainsofvictoria (talk) 10:44, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Trainsofvictoria: You will notice I have substantially trimmed the rollingstock template as well to bring it closer to compliance with the guidelines. Please distinguish Wikipedia's encyclopedic purpose from navigation aids within the encyclopedia, which is the purpose of this template. Readers cannot navigate between pages which do not exist.

If you cannot gather sufficient information about the trains in question for a standalone article, it is probably because they are not notable, and therefore unsuitable for their own articles. You could add the information to Victorian Railways#Named trains and we could add a link to that section from this template once it actually offers something more than a plain list. Triptothecottage (talk) 10:50, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Providing examples of other templates full of redlinks does not strengthen the case for including them in this one. Please read the WP:NAVBOX guideline in its entirety.

I have done my own preliminary research on the trains you mention. I have no reason to conclude they are notable. Triptothecottage (talk) 10:55, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The Great Northern Limited and The Northerner are of the same type of train as The Geelong Flyer, The Gippslander and The West Coaster, if they are not included then the others probably should also be removed. Trainsofvictoria (talk) 11:01, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"Type" is irrelevant; all that matters is the presence of reliable secondary sources discussing the subject of the article. In fact, I have nominated The West Coaster for deletion on the basis that no sources are available. Please feel free to comment at the discussion. Triptothecottage (talk) 11:09, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Triptothecottage: I haven't read the policies you've linked above yet and I will do so when I get the chance. However, my preferred solution would be to have a list of all the named trains in the template, linking to individual pages. Those pages would be placeholders with auto-redirects to the Named Trains list until such time as there is enough information available to assemble a proper page for each, and we don't have to go back and fix/alter links later. Anothersignalman (talk) 11:19, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Anothersignalman: That is fine, as long as the list says something about each named train: where it ran, when it began, when it was withdrawn would be more than sufficient. Otherwise, consider the reader experience: read an article, say, about The Vinelander, get to the navbox, take interest in a link to The Great Northern... and just get redirected to a list which says precisely nothing about the train they were interested in. They get nothing out of it. And, when you read the guideline, you will find that an article should not generally be linked to repeatedly, as it would need to be in this case. If we just have a single link to the list, fine. Triptothecottage (talk) 11:24, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Further thought, maybe the best solution is to scrap the idea of individual pages for each named train, and have one Named Trains of the Victorian Railways page with entries for each in alphabetical order? Anothersignalman (talk) 11:20, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think that's an excellent idea. The existing articles can have a brief mention in the list article with the {{main}} template. There's no need to get rid of work already done. Triptothecottage (talk) 11:25, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'll have a crack at doing a draft tonight. Anothersignalman (talk) 11:31, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Triptothecottage:, here's a starting point. Not really sure about the title or format yet, and maybe the Geelong Flyer is detailed enough to stay on its own page? Either way, feel free to edit/improve the page as you see fit.User:Anothersignalman/Named Trains in Victoria Anothersignalman (talk) 12:24, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Looking good. I think the Geelong Flyer can stand on its own. Two suggestions: remove the empty subsections and place them at the end of the big sections in list format, otherwise the page is full of unnecessary ugly orange tags. A list format doesn't prevent anyone adding to the page in future. Second suggestion: the title when you move it to mainspace (and please use the "move" tool, don't copy and paste) should be Named trains of the Victorian Railways since all were primarily VR operations; it'll function nicely as a link from Victorian Railways and it matches this template. Once that's done I'll do any final cleanup and mark it reviewed. Triptothecottage (talk) 12:30, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

While the vast majority of the names are Victorian Railways era, some are VicRail, V/Line or private/heritage operators. "Victorian Railways and successors" was my original draft title, but I scrapped that because I thought it was too long. The extended title was used in the template to avoid being confused with "victorian era", but I think that's less of a risk here. I also don't consider the empty section markers as that much of an imposition, even when I reduce the window pane to roughly the width of my mobile phone screen. Anothersignalman (talk) 13:55, 20 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Triptothecottage: page is now published: Named Trains in Victoria. Not finished, but I think it is ready for other people to contribute and for various other pages to redirect to it. Anothersignalman (talk) 08:19, 21 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]