Talk:Politics of light rail in North America

POV article

Why does this page seem only to deal with criticisms of light rail. It seems a bit one sided. - POV? (I should clarify that. Even where the content put aguments both for and against, the structure of the eadings seems to suggest that it is a POV article).—Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.168.41.103 (talk • contribs)

Anon, please sign your posts with four tildas like so: ~~~~. As for POV, what specifically would you like to change? There is a pro and an anti LRT section, with more arguments in favor of light rail than against it.--Loodog (talk) 15:05, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure I like Dunn's anti-LRT book as an outline for this article because it sets the article's outline to follow the anti-LRT agenda. I would like to remove that constraint to organize the article better. While the section dealing with Dunn's third point entitled return on capital investment does have pro and anti LRT sections. I think the arguments pro and anti need to be organized better. However, the first and second sections dealing with spacial mismatch and travel time do not. The arguments presented are clearly the anti-LRT sections. There are no balancing sections or even where the unreferenced rhetoric is balanced with the facts. I would like to see a discussion of the groups pushing both sides. To me, it seems like there is a nation-wide concerted effort to oppose light rail from a few right-wing libertarian groups such as the Reason Foundation and the Tea Party. The pro-LRT camp seems to be grass-roots, progressive community members.  kgrr ^talk 16:53, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

The issue is that the article already gives a sourced argument for us, already organized into 3 prongs. For a proper rebuttal, we have to find sources that argue the opposite. I'm sure they can be found.--Louiedog (talk) 14:23, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

It's very limiting since most Anti-LRT lobbyists are using different arguments. But that's OK. I'm sure that you won't mind adding more prongs to Dunn's outline. I certainly can find sourced rebuttals for his three prongs and other arguments. kgrr ^talk 18:48, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

We can add whatever we want that's sourced. It's important to keep the prospective growing and fairly neutral.

The reason I'm being rather cautious is because the article seems to biased rather anti-LRT and you seem to be the initial editor. I don't want to step on toes, but I have been involved here in Seattle and have read through a lot of the literature. Please understand I, like everyone else am biased. Hopefully, I won't let my own bias stand in our way of creating a very useful, neutral and balanced article.  kgrr ^talk 23:28, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

What's a bit dangerous about this article, as you may have noticed, is that this article is from mature and anyone could come along and - accidentally or not - wind up creating some synthesis out of a few stray bits found on the internet. We have to weigh these things both in deciding how to emphasize the sources and how to organize the article. Ideally, we've have someone who has read some published analysis overseeing to make sure we're getting it right here.--Louiedog (talk) 21:54, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this article is far from mature, yet it's been here for quite a few years. I will gladly discuss the literature that I have read. I would like the article to read more so that the layperson can get a fair reading what the real issues are and what the two sides have to say about them. I also think it's important to keep the article covering all of North America because Mexico's politics are different. Their cities are still urbanizing rather than sprawling. And their politics are not heavily influenced by the big Libertarian think tanks (lobbies).  kgrr ^talk 23:28, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Name change

Should this article be named "Politics of light rail in the United States" instead because it only talks about the United States? If not, then the article should be changed so it at least talks about Canada and Mexico. --Apollo1758 (talk) 22:19, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree; changing the name and removing the "not a worldwide perspective" tag seems like a good idea to me. Agnosticaphid (talk) 21:34, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Question about verification for sources in anti-light-rail section

I've been reading through this article and referring to the sources cited in it. Mostly this paper by Mr. Wendell Cox is bandied about as supporting the claims that light rail is expensive, dangerous, and pointless.

My question is, how much data do sources need to have to be regarded as "verifying" a sentence? For example, the article states, "[l]ight rail systems have high construction and maintenance costs, nearly seven times the cost per person kilometer of an urban motorway lane." This statement puzzled me; I'm sure that construction costs for light rail probably are higher, but I am skeptical that it costs more to maintain a railroad track than a highway. So, I went to the article cited, and the quotation is based off of a chart whose data was "[c]alculated from Federal Highway Administration data and National Transit Database." There is no table or citation to the reports used to "calculate" the results or any other supporting information.

It seems to me that this statement cannot be "verified" because it is lifted from a document that has no stated source itself. I believe this statement, and other similar, ones, should be removed pending a more reliable authority.

Any thoughts? Agnosticaphid (talk) 21:29, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Wendell Cox is not a scientist studying light rail, but a paid anti-light rail consultant/lobbyist. Unfortunately, his opinion or interpretation of the data is skewed to represent his point of view. Wikipedia can only document his point of view. kgrr ^talk 17:28, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Transit City

There should be a section on Transit City in this article. This is a major example of the politics of light rail transit in Canada. By including this discussion will the article no longer be too US-centric.

Transit City was a proposed light rail system in Toronto. It was supported by former mayor David Miller and his deputy, Joe Pantalone, emphasized the Transit City proposal during Pantalone's mayoral campaign in 2010. However, Rob Ford, who opposed surface light rail transit, became mayor and scrapped all but the Eglinton Crosstown LRT.

In short, there should be a section for Canada (with Transit City as a start). Johnny Au _{(talk/contributions)} 18:26, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

It is so much better now, but still needs citations and other improvements. Johnny Au _{(talk/contributions)} 13:08, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Mexico is also part of North America. There are light rail systems in Mexico City and Guadalajara. kgrr ^talk 04:02, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

So now I understand why the section was there. I removed it without realized, but stand by the removal. I appreciate what you tried to do with Transit City, but almost every US light rail system has a similar narrative. Honestly, the majority of this article could just be written as a blend that incorporates both, rather than relegating Canada to the bottom. --Louiedog (talk) 22:52, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Wendell Cox, dubious data

[15] On page 41 of the Cox report entitled New Light Rail in the United States: Promise and Reality, it is claimed that "during the 1990s, light rail has been considerably less safe than buses and metros, and less safe even than the automobile (Figure #12).115" and the reference for this claim says calculated from U.S. Department of Transportation Data. No reference is given to the U.S. DoT Report, which is now almost 15 year old data.  kgrr ^talk 15:42, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

That's tricky because as much as we would like to exercise our individual judgment on these things, we ultimately have to go on what's published. Of course statistics can always be massaged to read one way or the other and the guy has an anti-mass transit bias for sure, but he's also highly notable, considered an expert in his field, and has his own article. In order to challenge Cox's statements, you would need a published third party article making that challenge that you could quote.--Louiedog (talk) 15:56, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it is tricky. But to be a credible source, Wendell Cox's claims must be properly tied to facts. A vague statement saying his facts were calculated from an unnamed US DoT source is dubious at best. Cox's claims completely counter what the DoT says in their 2009 report: [[1]] Refer to figure 2. kgrr ^talk 16:13, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Again, this is a case of reality vs. wikipedia policy. Unfortunately, we can not report what is true, only what is verifiable.

In the pro section, I'm sure you won't have a problem when I report what the US Department of Transportation says in their 2009 report: Light Rail is the safest form of transportation - far safer than the automobile and buses. Please note that the DoT report is a peer-reviewed publication and considered to be a very reliable secondary source.  kgrr ^talk 18:23, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

Then it's totally legit to use that as a means to argue with Cox's conclusions in this article. The point being that wikipedia neutrality dictates that we must describe the controversy.--Louiedog (talk) 23:22, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

But to be a credible source, Wendell Cox's claims must be properly tied to facts. This implies that the verifiability of a source is subject to the independent investigative judgment of wikipedia editors. Unfortunately, this is not the case. The acceptability of a source is dependent only upon where it appears and who's writing it. This is frustrating, as I've seen a lot of published news articles repeated an incorrect fact as truth, but until an equally reviewed source can debunk it, my arms are tied.--Louiedog (talk) 16:45, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm removing all citations to Cox. Cox has a reputation -- he's not a reputable source. 24.59.15.74 (talk) 04:16, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Spatial Mismatch - More unsourced dubious claims

1) "The low-density dispersal of residences and employment in modern American metropolitan areas prevents mass transit displacing a significant percentage of automobiles" Light rail systems in Houston, TX, Dallas, Tx, and Los Angeles (all very sprawled cities) for example are displacing a large number of vehicles. In fact, light rail systems in Mexico city and Monterrey have the highest ridership in all of North America. The vehicles are being displaced in urban areas where the travel is short. Commuters coming in by car drive a long distance from the bedroom communities to come into town. Percentage of VMT is a very poor measure of measuring the number of vehicles that are actually being displaced. 2) "These percentages are considerably higher for suburb-to-CBD commutes, but these trips have dramatically declined as a percentage of VMT since the 1970s" (same argument, really) The number of Suburb to CBD commutes is actually increasing while the Infra CBD commutes are also increasing. But the VMT is long for suburb to CBD and short for CBD to CBD commutes. I propose that I give paragraph 3 and parts of 4 rhetoric one more week to find proper sourcing or they be deleted. It Wikipedia it's not a fact if it can't be traced to a source. Sorry.  kgrr ^talk 12:13, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Travel Time - dubious claims

1) The initial claim was "Though modern light rail systems have higher average speeds than their older counterparts, LRT is, on average, about half as fast as automobile transit" This is a dubious claim because light rail is not a trolley. Furthermore, the reference given to this claim says that LRT is about as fast as automobile travel and faster than travel by bus.

I changed this sentence to reflect what the referenced article says.  kgrr ^talk 05:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Someone else has since edited the sentence further. It now says, "Light rail is faster than non-express bus service[5] but slower than express bus service and automobile transit.[6]" This makes sense. At least in my city, the local buses stop every few blocks. Because they stop so often, they move the slowest. Light rail stops less often, so it's faster. Express buses stop the least often, so they're the fastest of all. Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 02:50, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

2) "When taking into account the additional time required to reach the rail system, this is even slower." Sure there is some commute time from home to the LRT station. But this claim is dubious as well since LRT travel does not involve finding a parking space at the destination. You can't claim one without the other. I don't buy the biased rhetoric. Needs a reference to the anti-LRT lobbyist that spewed this nonsense.  kgrr ^talk 05:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

I agree the point is unsourced, however it does seem rather commonsense. My personal commute is: 10 walk minute to bus stop, 5 minute wait for bus, 25 minute bus ride, 10 minute walk to work. If I miss the bus, it's a 30-40 minute wait. Toronto's plan for LRT is for stations to be further apart than typical bus stops, making the walk longer, although obviously this increases the speed of the LRT. In Mississauga, a lot of people drive to the rail station, and then (as you say) look for a parking spot. Most suburban workers who drive park at work, spend zero time looking for a spot. In winter time, you have to clean off the car, warm it up, and shovel the drive, which takes time, but then your trudge to the bus probably also takes longer. Transfers between lines adds additional time, unless very lucky or frequent service. Anyways, just seems obvious Feldercarb (talk) 22:53, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

3) "These averaged figures do not account for the degree of congestion, however; light rail on its own right-of-way is considerably less vulnerable to gridlock than automobiles or buses operating in mixed traffic. For example, Los Angeles' heavily used Blue Line (the United States' second busiest light rail line) which is slower than automobiles at off-peak times but during rush hour, is very competitive with automobiles traveling along the extremely congested Long Beach Freeway (I-710) it parallels." This is all original research. Where are the hard numbers?  kgrr ^talk 05:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

4) "The Harbor Transitway busway nearby is faster than either mode, due to fewer stops, but construction of its dedicated right-of-way was expensive given its very low ridership." More original research. An example of one instance of where bus travel is faster does not make it true nationwide. It really needs a reference.  kgrr ^talk 05:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

5) "Light rail makes sense in areas that suffer from sufficient congestion to make it competitive with cars, and along routes that are too heavily traveled for even bus rapid transit systems." A pretty obvious statement. It would be nice to back this with a source.  kgrr ^talk 05:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

What should this article be like?

This article has hardly any references. What should this article look like, if it had the references it needs? What it should not contain are the opinions of wikipedia contributors. It shouldn't even look like it contains any opinions of wikipedia contributors.

I'm from Canada, and I looked at the section about Canada. The first sentence of the article currently reads: "Politicians in Canada have generally echoed the views expressed in the United States concerning light rail systems." This claim is unreferenced, and, IMO, dubious.

Some Canadian politicians may covertly echo the views of American politicians, but to be caught doing so would be the end of their political career. I doubt the assertion is true. I checked the main article, Light rail in North America. I seemed to me that, once one trimmed out the original research, there is nothing left in this article that is not already in the main article. With a lot of work I believe an article on the politics of light rail could be written. But it would have to be well-referenced. Geo Swan (talk) 17:19, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

While I accept that the general topic of "Politics of light rail in North America" is likely covered in sufficient depth in scholarly articles, books, and in the popular press, to be a topic worthy of a separate article. But the current state of this article contains none of that.

I looked at Talk:Light rail in North America, and couldn't find any discussion of the value of forking out its existing section Light rail in North America#Politics of light rail in North America. I am afraid this article looks like an instance of a WP:POVFORK.

This article is poorly referenced, and seems to contain a lot of unverifiable and highly questionable original research.

As I see it, the options, at this time, are:

1. Apply a {{mergeto}} tag here and a {{mergefrom}} to the base article, which would probably result in this becoming a redirect back to the original article, as I don't see anything worth merging.
2. Strictly cut back everything that is unreferenced, or that repeats something said in the main article. This would leave a very small article.
3. Insert editorial tags, like {{cn}}, {{dubious}} and {{who}} after every problematic assertion. Unfortunately, the sheer number of problematic assertions would leave this article looking like heck. Maybe in its current state, it deserves to look like heck.
4. Find the good, authoritative references, and totally rewrite the article so it cites, quotes, or summarizes those 3rd party references in a way that complies with WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and other policies.

IMO, the article should not be left, as-is.

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 22:34, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Sections which should be trimmed

I've written that this article is almost entirely unreferenced WP:original research. Unreferenced original research can be trimmed, without any loss of value to the project, as it never should have been contributed in the first place.

I am going to suggest we start by trimming Politics of light rail in North America#Return on investment and cost-competitiveness for LRT vs. alternatives and Politics of light rail in North America#Canada

1. Politics of light rail in North America#Return on investment and cost-competitiveness for LRT vs. alternatives: This section is an entirely unreferenced opinion piece, a clear violation of our policy that the wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought.
2. Politics of light rail in North America#Canada: This section starts with an unreferenced personal opinion. The rest of the section is an uncontroversial account of the state of light rail in Canada, which could be referenced. But it is off-topic, as it is not about Politics at all. Further, other articles are already, and more appropriately covering the state of light rail in Canada.

If no one remedies the weaknesses of these sections, I will excise them. Geo Swan (talk) 11:26, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Now that you've trimmed out the unreferenced "fat" from this article, there's really not much left. I think this is one article that I'd support a Nomination for deletion for, though more likely one or two sentences could be saved, and the article itself transformed in to a redirect to Light rail in North America... --IJBall (talk) 05:14, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

I am not the world's foremost expert on deletion. And I suppose an argument could be made that this subject is prone to original research or something. (But see WP:LIKELYVIOLATION.) That being said, I find it doubtful that this article would be deleted because the pertinent question is not "is the article up to wikipedia standards right now?" but instead "is this topic a notable topic that could in the future be developed into a well-researched article"? I feel like there are sufficient notable bloviators about this topic that deletion would be an uphill battle. AgnosticAphid talk 01:33, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

• I am not sure what a "notable bloviator" is. But may I point out that discussion over whether to merge or redirect this POV fork back to main article were initiated over a year and a half ago, and no one has stepped forward to address the serious issues with the article. Yes, we don't normally delete articles on topics that could be considered inherently notable. However, sometimes articles on potentially notable topics are deleted, as a last resort. Haven't articles been deleted when competing parties simply can't agree, and, even with mediation, the article has been marred by highly disruptive edit-warring. That is not the case with this article. But we've waited a year and a half for anyone to step forward and address the serious problems with the article. No one has.

Redirection back to the main article preserves the history of the article. If anyone should come along later, with references that would allow the article to be rewritten in a way that complies with our policies and guidelines -- well no problem.

Policy recommends not deleting useful material, but, although the "Politics of light rail..." is a topic that holds merit, there isn't any real material here that isn't original research. Geo Swan (talk) 21:27, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Oh, I followed your link to WP:LIKELYVIOLATION -- c'mon, be fair. I said the article ALREADY violated WP:OR. It had been a huge mess of unreferenced personal opinion. Geo Swan (talk) 21:32, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Possibly deceitful use of bogus references

One of the references in Politics of light rail in North America#Return on investment and cost-competitiveness for LRT vs. alternatives cites a web-page of the Bureau of Labor Statistic [2], to support the following: "Approximately 18% of household expenditures are spent on vehicles and transit fares. Residents of cities with well-developed rail systems spend an average of $2,808 on vehicles and transit, compared with $3,332 in bus-only cities." When the cited page didn't even mention transit, I used the wayback machine to call up the page on the date it was claimed it was accessed [3]. Guess what, the snapshot of that page, from that day, didn't mention transit, either. Geo Swan (talk) 22:59, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

explanation

This article had a section entitled "Mexico". It was, IMO, off-topic, as it was merely a brief summary of the state of light rail in Mexico, and said absolutely nothing about politics. So I trimmed it with the edit summary "trim -- offtopic -- see talk". Geo Swan (talk) 23:56, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

{{merge}}

The result of the AFD was merge. As I stated both there, and here, I don't really think there is anything worth merging here. I'll wait, to give anyone who does think there is something worth merging to do that merge. But if no-one does that, in a reasonable period of time, I will simply change this to a redirect, without merging anything. Geo Swan (talk) 19:13, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

 Done Geo Swan (talk) 02:43, 29 June 2015 (UTC)