Talk:Superliner (railcar)/Archive 1

Photo

Does anyone have a better photo that can be uploaded and used for this article? The present one (of the end of a car) doesn't really give a sense of what they look like. LrdChaos 17:01, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Coach cafe Superliners?

Are there really coach cafe Superliners? The only café I've seen on a Superliner train was below the lounge. Chazzoz 21:56, Oct 18, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, have ridden and eaten in them, on the Pacific Surfliner. I think the coach cafe designation refers to the bottom level being where the snack bar is, and the upper level being the standard coach configuration. There may be a full diner on longer distance trains like the Coast Starlight or the Southwest Chief. knoodelhed 09:08, 19 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Yes, the "snack coach" added a snack bar to the lower level. Mackensen (talk) 13:13, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Use of numbers in headings

When I see the use of numbers in the section headings, it appears that the number is part of the designation or identification of the car. However, I believe it refers to the number of cars of that type built or in use. Is there a way to remove the number from the heading and incorporate it into the text? 71.131.186.112 17:38, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and moved the # of cars from the headers to inside the text. —LrdChaos 18:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

No men's rooms?

Why do coach cars have a dedicate women's restroom in addition to the unisex toilets, but no dedicated men's room? (Alphaboi867 00:13, 24 August 2006 (UTC))

One might speculate that it's because men tend to pee all over the place even when not on a moving train, and rarely tidy up after themselves, making problems for everyone but more for women than men. Alsihler 17:56, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

One might speculate that you have a vagina.

Perhaps many women want their own reserved facility, while many men don't really care. -Alika 16:34, 28 October 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Alikaalex (talk • contribs)

How much are dimensions of Superliner?

Hello. I'm translating this page:Superliner for Japanese Wikipedia. I want numerical value of Superliner to know which are big rolling stocks, but I couldn't find it in any websites. So I'll ask you size (or specifications) of Superliner: about Length, Width and Heights.

For reference, dimensions of Japanese Shinkansen cars are 25,000mm in length, 3,380mm in width, and 4,485mm high (for Double Decker).--Comyu 18:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

From the article:

Car length 85 feet 0 inches (25.9 m) (25,900mm)

Width 10 feet 2 inches (3.1 m) (3,100mm)

Height 16 feet 2 inches (4.9 m) (4,900mm)

76.21.8.213 (talk) 20:40, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Information needed

I've just been through and added a Train Rollingstock template, which I've now started to populate. There's a bit of stuff I don't know about though, so if there's anybody here who doesn't mind filling in the blanks?

Jb17kx 09:40, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

cleanup

Hope someone will volunteer to help out. This article needs to be cleaned up and have cites added. First thing I plan to do is put the Hi-Level stuff in it's own section. Since there is no page for those cars, I may spin it into a new stub just for them. --plaws (talk) 20:28, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

First photo not a diner

The first photo in the article, as presently written, is incorrectly marked as a dining car. The car is actually one of the converted Auto Train lounge cars mentioned later in the article. While it used to be a diner, the windows on the lower level are not present on an unmodified Superliner dining car.

Gummigoof (talk) 18:39, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Wet Bar (?) - please translate for non-Americans

I'm guessing this is some bizarre euphemism for a bar that serves alcohol dreamt up by people who think that alcohol is (or should be) illegal, but please could you explain what you're talking about a little more clearly?

Only half ;-)

Roy Badami (talk) 21:15, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

In American English, wet bar simply indicates it has a sink with running water. Bars are normally assumed to serve alcohol unless they're a juice bar or the like. Mahousu (talk) 18:10, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

File:San Diego train station.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion

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Requested move 14 January 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: no consensus. We appear to disagree on whether or not this article is the primary topic or not. (non-admin closure) JudgeRM (talk to me) 16:38, 22 January 2017 (UTC)

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• Superliner (railcar) → Superliner
• Superliner → Superliner (disambiguation)

– This article is the clear WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for "Superliner". Over the past year it's received more traffic than the other two articles, Mack Super-Liner and Superliner (passenger ship), put together. It's also the only standalone article with the exact name Superliner, as Superliner (passenger ship) has redirected to Ocean liner since May 2013 and Mack Super-Liner is hyphenated. Discounting redirects and disambiguation pages 22 articles link to Mack Super-Liner, 22 to Superliner (passenger ship), and 122 to Superliner (railcar). Looking beyond the numbers, as a railcar first proposed in 1975 and in operation since 1979 the Superliner has generated considerable coverage in reliable sources. The term for larger ocean liners has fallen into disuse with the collapse of the passenger trade and in any event it's a redirect and will likely remain so. Production of the Mack truck ended in 1988. Of the the first twenty hits for "Superliner" on Google all but four are for the railcar. Of the remaining four, one is a dictionary definition for a large ocean liner, one a hair-cutting product, and two for a truck bedliner (unrelated to the Mack truck). When our readers and editors write Superliner, this is the article they're looking for. Mackensen (talk) 21:11, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

• Support: This is clearly the primary topic, per Mackensen's research. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 21:58, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
• Support: Agreed, this is the primary topic. --RickyCourtney (talk) 22:13, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
• Support for reasons above Alázhlis (talk) 05:22, 15 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose singular "superliner" in books refers to ships not trains. the "superliners" test gets more mixed results. Also alerts @RickyCourtney: @Pi.1415926535: will alert editors of WP Railways by placing the template on this page, not WP Ships editors. Rail editors and ship editors in good faith surely see this question differently. (@Alázhlis: I'm neither btw) In ictu oculi (talk) 09:19, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

Also I cannot duplicate the Google Books results claimed in the nom, was Vanilla Google used? In books I get results like Picture History of the Cunard Line, 1840-1990 1991 p.14 "After the war Cunard acquired another superliner from Germany, the Imperator, which was renamed the Berengaria." In ictu oculi (talk) 09:28, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

Yes, Vanilla Google was used. I find even with Google Books the preponderance of results are for the railcar, not the term. I didn't ping ships editors because this doesn't impact them strongly; Superliner (passenger ship) is a redirect and would remain so, unless you think it's the primary topic. The visitation numbers don't support that. Mackensen (talk) 13:45, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

The problem with Vanilla Google is that it is a commercial advertising site, and picks up all kinds of Amtrak train ticket sites. I don't understand why Superliner (passenger ship) being a section within a larger article makes any difference. Ocean liner gets 514 views per day compared to 174 for this article. The fact that there are multiple ways of arriving there doesn't mean the redirect is the only one. Google search for example will go direct to Ocean liner without registering a hit on the redirect. Also "Superliner" appears to be limited to a small number of English speakers in America, wheras the majority of English speakers live outside America (the majority live in India in fact) and will probably think of "Superliner" as it is used in books, not on Amtrak ticketing websites. In ictu oculi (talk) 14:35, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

It matters because this is the only topic known primarily by the name Superliner. Obviously Ocean liner will get more hits as its a broader topic, but the numbers I quoted above suggest that people aren't searching on the term "superliner" in order to arrive there. "Superliner" isn't even a section in Ocean liner; the term is used twice in the article, in passing, and is never defined nor discussed. Mackensen (talk) 15:06, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

To add to that: The passenger ship redirect only gets 73 pageviews a day, the truck article gets 109, and the railcar article gets 239. That's a pretty accurate indication of where readers are actually going, and it favors the railcar. Superliner to refer to ships was nearly out of usage by the time the Amtrak Superliners appeared; that's why it's a redirect and will forever remain so. Pi.1415926535 (talk) 15:15, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

If we take that ngram as far as we can, we can see that since 2000, superliner to refer to a railcar has dropped out of use and that superliner to refer to an ocean liner was not only used more but for far longer. [[1]] Also, I’m not sure that 239 hits against 182 (73 + 109) indicates that it is "much more likely" to be sought.--Ykraps (talk) 07:56, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

Mackensen makes the exact same point I was going to make. As of this morning the term "superliner" is used exactly twice on the Ocean liner page and is only used in passing and without definition. If I may suggest a compromise, we could put an about-distinguish hat note that says something to the effect of "This article is about the Amtrak railcar. It is not to be confused with the type of ocean liner." RickyCourtney (talk) 17:05, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

• Well, we would have the standard dab hatnote at the top if this article moved; we need to do that anyway to accommodate the truck. Mackensen (talk) 17:11, 15 January 2017 (UTC)
  • But what about books, and the non-railway world? Why is it suddenly so important to pull in people not looking for the railcar to the railcar? In ictu oculi (talk) 17:12, 15 January 2017 (UTC)
    • We're saying that it's important to pull people looking for the railcar to the railcar directly, per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. The quoted numbers validate that choice, especially Pi.1415926535's ngram research on Google Books itself, which shows the usage of the term surging after the introduction of the railcar. Mackensen (talk) 17:24, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

But that's just it, 51% of 328 daily views even assuming (which is impossible) that the only way to get to the "Superliner" content on Ocean liner is via the 60 hits via the Superliner (passenger ship) redirect, and zero readers using Google, is still not remotely in the first criteria of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC territory, let alone the second criteria. We would normally expect 66-70% PLUS the second criteria being satisfied before deliberately ambiguating an article and making it less recognizable. In ictu oculi (talk) 20:32, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

The lack of traffic on the disambiguation page suggests that visitors to the redirect are coming from internal links, in which case this move doesn't matter at all for the liner. Mackensen (talk) 22:56, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. The term came into use c. 1900 to describe ocean liners of 10,000 gross register tons or more, and as tonnages grew it was used for the largest and fastest liners. That was its use for the better part of a century. To use it as the primary topic for an American railcar is parochial and an example of "recentism". Kablammo (talk) 14:41, 16 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. I would certainly think of a ship. The railcar is definitely not the overwhelmingly primary usage. Possibly in North America, but not elsewhere. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:45, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

  I suppose it depends on the definition of "overwhelming." It would be nice if WP:PRIMARYTOPIC had firmer guidance on this point. To the best of my knowledge the viewership numbers are global. See also my comment above about the lack of traffic on the disambiguation page. Mackensen (talk) 22:56, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose – no clear primarytopic. Dicklyon (talk) 21:42, 17 January 2017 (UTC)
• Comment: Here's the part I don't understand... if a "superliner" is such an important term in the world of ocean liners, why has nobody bothered to write a page on them in the last 16 years of Wikipedia's existence?Furthermore, why does the superliner not have have a section in the history of ocean liners? Even more confounding, why is the term not used more than twice on the ocean liners page? @Kablammo: your attempt to define a "superliner" ocean vessel shows the inherent problem... there is no good definition, because it was largely a marketing term created by the ocean lines. It's not a clearly defined term like say Panamax. The Superliner rail car is a clearly defined topic, the ocean liner is at best a loosely defined term used for marketing purposes. --RickyCourtney (talk) 00:38, 18 January 2017 (UTC)

Ricky, the term had a defined meaning at the turn of the last century. I will look at my books and get some authority for that. And Wikipedia did have a separate article on superliners; look at this page and its history. Kablammo (talk) 02:38, 18 January 2017 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.