Talk:Metrolink (California)/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Arsenikk ^(talk) 19:59, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Comments

• The article is very meager, and should be considerably longer. For examples of articles, look at Trøndelag Commuter Rail, Bergen Light Rail and Copenhagen Metro.

I'll do my best to flesh it out with the cite-able information I can find. Unfortunately, rail service does not get much attention in the Southern California media unless there is a crash (car culture dies hard). Butros (talk) 08:36, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Don't use the term "currently". If no such term is used, it is presumed by the reader to mean now. If it is critical to mean now (and not, for instance, last year), use "as of [year]".

Done Butros (talk) 06:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Sick in "United States".

Done Butros (talk) 06:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Try to merge the lead into two paragraphs. Avoid stray sentences.

Done Butros (talk) 07:12, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Instead of "it served a total of 55 station", just say "it served 55 stations".

Done Butros (talk) 06:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Convert all US values to metric; use {{convert}}.

Done Butros (talk) 07:12, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Don't say "For the year 2010", but "For 2010..."

Done Butros (talk) 06:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Joint Powers Authority" is a common noun, and should be lower-case.

Done Butros (talk) 06:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• The history section is very short; I would expect a lot more detail, for instance dates, not just years. But there also needs to be more flesh. What was the political background for the system? Where there any major upgrades of lines? New rolling stock? Was there controversy about the change of operators?

Added information about the recent push for safety Butros (talk) 08:37, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• The list of lines is nice, but it should be supplemented with prose. Particularly given the short length of the article, consider prose to explain where the various lines run, major institution they serve etc.

Added a list of several destinations Metrolink serves Butros (talk) 09:48, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

• I don't know if defining a line by the roads it follows it good; this requires a very good knowledge of the road system. Consider mentioning the communities or valleys the line follows.

I tried to only reference well-traveled roads here; listing each community the lines run through would take a few paragraphs each, as they run through the multiple suburbs of Los Angeles Butros (talk) 07:12, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "25 cent" should be hyphenated.

Done Butros (talk) 06:44, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• I would have though service/frequency is more logical to say before fares.
• Don't start with saying there is little off-peak services; instead, state the peak service, and then contrast the off-peak. Also, please include numbers, not just relative terms. Ridership figures need to be specific; "very high peak-hour ridership" is not encyclopedic.
• Lines between to places use an endash, not a hyphen. see WP:DASH.

• • Comment: I'm not sure if I'm supposed to comment here or create a new section, anyway, the hyphen is in the common name, and looking over the good article criteria, as I understand it, only certain sections of the Manual of Style have to be followed for a good article. Is this correct? --TorriTorri^{(Talk to me!)} 21:26, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

I added endashes between the termini Butros (talk) 07:20, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I sometimes get this sort of feedback; my goal here is to improve the article, and sometimes I give advice which is not part of the good article criteria (whether it is MOS, advanced grammar, esthetical placement of images or other things), sometimes I remember to tag them as not a GA criteria, sometimes I don't. The goal of the review is to improve the article, and maybe even more importantly, give editors feedback where they are doing thing systematically wrong. If I did something incorrect, I would much rather that someone point it out to me than leave it uncommented because the review type was not to cover all aspects of good article writing. Arsenikk ^(talk) 08:09, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Port of Los Angeles" needs to have a capital "P".

Done Butros (talk) 07:02, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• 91 Line should be linked more than once.

Done Butros (talk) 07:02, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Don't use a slash in prose. Is it both or one of Beaumont/Banning?

Fixed Butros (talk) 08:52, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Metrolink owned" should be hyphenated.

Done Butros (talk) 06:58, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Year ranges in the rolling stock table should use endashes.

Done Butros (talk) 07:20, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Passenger Cars" and "Cab Cars" should be lower-case.

Does this refer to the rolling stock table? Butros (talk) 08:59, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• • Done --TorriTorri^{(Talk to me!)} 18:03, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
• The livery of the leased units needs a reference.

Would a photo suffice? Butros (talk) 08:02, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• The "2005 Glendale train crash" has no reference. This is very critical, because it contains BLP information, since it names the culprit. Perhaps, to make more sense, it should mention that the incident was presumed to be a suicide attempt (not just someone who accidentally left their car on the track).

Cited Butros (talk) 08:52, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• First it says " At least 26[41] people were killed" and then "Authorities announced 26 confirmed deaths in the collision." Why this vagueness and doubling of information?

Done Butros (talk) 08:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Avoid galleries. Just stick in the images as thumbs.

Done Butros (talk) 06:51, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• All-caps is a typographic choice, just like font or italics; do not use it anywhere on Wikipedia.

Done Butros (talk) 08:03, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Metrolink website" should not be in italics. "website" is redundant.

Fixed refs Butros (talk) 07:20, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• "Amtrak" is mentioned in the prose, so it doesn't need to be a "see also".

Removed Butros (talk) 07:20, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• Only a single logo (the current) is allowed for non-free images. The old logo needs to be removed.

Done Butros (talk) 06:51, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

• A lot of the images are not on the Commons. Except the logos, please move them to the Commons so other-language wikis can use them. This tool makes it easy.

Bada bing, bada boom Butros (talk) 10:11, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

• Don't force image sizes (except the map can be at 300px).

Done , although I think this makes it look a bit more choppy Butros (talk) 06:51, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't quite know what you mean by "choppy", but at least I can see the images now, and people with dial-up connections can force down the size so they can download them quickly. Arsenikk ^(talk) 08:09, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Overall nice work, but a bit short, and otherwise a few minor issues as mentioned above. I am placing the article on hold. Arsenikk ^(talk) 19:59, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

What remains to be done, good sire? Butros (talk) 10:14, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

• Ref 12 does not say that the change of operator was because of safety issues.
  • Fixed --TorriTorri^{(Talk to me!)} 19:18, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
• Ref 1 needs to be de-capitalized.
  • Done --TorriTorri^{(Talk to me!)} 19:18, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
• Images can be used to state uncontroversial things like "the trains have a green cheatline". For what you are asking about the leased trains, it is a border-line case of OR, and I would much prefer it was not done that way. On the other hand, if no other RS exists, it becomes a choice between not including the information and having weak referencing. It would never pass FAR. The other problem is that an image only says at a particular time, at least one car looked like that; you cannot generalize from it.

Removed I had to go ahead and remove the leased unit info. When I Google "metrolink leased livery" I get about 50 copies of this article and there is nothing on the Metrolink website about the livery. Butros (talk) 21:00, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

• The whole article is still a bit short, particularly because of the history section. The problem is that much smaller systems have a lot more extensive history sections; Metrolink is one of the largest such systems in the US, and even in an international standard is no small commuter rail system, yet virtually no sources seem to exists. If all possibilities at RS have failed, including news archive searches, then the article can pass, but don't try this at FAR FAC. Arsenikk ^(talk) 13:02, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

The problem I encounter is that when I search "Metrolink" on Google, most of my results are copies of this article. I have managed to find some information in news archive sites, but it appears not much was written about Metrolink even when it first opened. Butros (talk) 20:53, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Congratulations with a good article, and a deserved one as such. As my comments above show, it is not your, but the news outlet's fault, that the history section is so meager. Arsenikk ^(talk) 09:45, 5 April 2010 (UTC)