Talk:Streetcars in St. Louis

Latest comment: 12 years ago by Whitebox in topic Merger proposal

Untitled edit

(Jordan S. Wilson (talk) 04:16, 14 December 2009 (UTC)) This is too sweet! Thanks!!Reply

name move edit

perhaps this should be Streetcars in St. Louis, Missouri. That would be better fitting wikipedia standards, I think. DaronDierkes (talk) 22:49, 15 December 2009 (UTC)Reply

(Jordan S. Wilson (talk) 23:26, 15 December 2009 (UTC)) Yeah me too!Reply
Done. poroubalous (talk) 18:53, 12 September 2011 (UTC)Reply

Merger proposal edit

I propose that St. Charles City Streetcar be merged into Streetcars in St. Louis, Missouri. I think that because the St. Charles streetcars aren't operational and aren't really in any stage being close to being operational, the discussion of them might be better served on the main streetcars page. Thoughts? poroubalous (talk) 19:03, 12 September 2011 (UTC)Reply

I disagree, St. Charles and St. Louis are miles apart. I've heard it reported more than once lately that the St. Charles area has grown to be larger in population than Downtown and Central St. Louis, shouldn't the people of St. Charles be able to make their own worthy and fitting Streetcar page? St. Louis had many competing streetcar companies and the city was at one time shaped by streetcar lines being one of the top five largest cities in the US, that is a story and history that needs to be told in more detail. This seems a good bit like putting an independent surrounding town or deep suburb of the Chicago area into a downtown Chicago article. If anything the reason streetcar lines declined and were destroyed was because so many people moved out of the central city to the suburbs in our region, buying cars along the way. It seems like commuter rail or MetroLink are the better link between cities as far apart as St. Charles and St. Louis. Every city should have their own local streetcars. Whitebox (talk) 22:47, 17 September 2011 (UTC)Reply
Point well taken on the issue of population, but it doesn't address the issue of the St. Charles information in this article duplicating the information in the other article. based on your thoughts, it sounds like the St. Charles information here should be moved from this article to the St. Charles article, and this article should include a "See also" link there. How does that sound? poroubalous (talk) 18:46, 18 September 2011 (UTC)Reply
Yes, I think the St. Charles page should be expanded, and a good link between the two is a mention, and a see also or a category. I don't think there is much, if any duplication. Tell St. Charles' streetcar story. Some people may want to read both but I could see a person out of personal interest, search engine query, or historical research seeking out one or the other first or exclusively. I'd like to read more about the history of St. Charles streetcar lines (and more about the history of St. Louis' many companies and decades of service) these are distinct cities with their own identities and histories, let's bring that out to the casual reader. I think we in the era of cars and highways, and standardized media, can too easily lose sight of a time when many neighborhoods had a local paper, every other corner a tavern that was a meeting place and community center, and people needed a horse or they were going to have to walk a long way to take care of their local day to day affairs. What I'm getting at is a sense of place here. There could be connections between the St. Charles project and the University City project since they are contemporary potential projects, but neither of those are in St. Louis City. U-City however used to have street car lines connecting to the old St. Louis lines. Whitebox (talk) 01:40, 20 September 2011 (UTC)Reply
You're quite right about the University City lines connecting to the city lines via the same companies, while there were fully separate companies operating in St. Charles. I think the St. Charles lines (historical and future) deserve their own page (perhaps renamed "Streetcars in St. Charles, Missouri"), while the University City lines (historical and future) should be addressed here, as the Loop Trolley project is going to run between University City and the city of St. Louis and the historical lines were heavily interconnected with the St. Louis city lines. I'll withdraw the merger idea; thanks for the thoughts! poroubalous (talk) 21:32, 20 September 2011 (UTC)Reply
Streetcars in St. Charles, Missouri sounds like a great page title. We only need a few brief sentences to start off its history section. Maybe it can start as a section on the St.C Streetcar Project page? You're right, I think the loop trolley will transfer some passengers at the the Delmar Metrolink. The St. Louis side of Delmar is becoming almost as developed as the University City side. Also apparently at least once there was a St. Charles area vote on a Metro extension to St. Charles and voters rejected the funding tax hike at that time. Whitebox (talk) 06:38, 22 September 2011 (UTC)Reply