Useful Notes Cleanup

I'm looking through the useful notes pages on individual railroads (on the Railroad Index they're listed under Real Life), and I'm confused as to why some of them are needed. While certainly informative, they feel out of place on a website about works of media, and would be better suited to a wiki about railroads. Some actually do list works of fiction that include the specific railway, but most do not. Useful Notes/Amtrak, for instance, is just a list of Amtrak stations. It's written really well, but there's I don't get why it's here. Same with Los Angeles Metro Rail -not a single work of fiction is mentioned on this page, which goes into really specific detail about seemingly minor things like the prices of passes and fares.

Long Island Rail Road -This one does mention some works of fiction that feature the railroad (namely The Great Gatsby and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), but briefly so.The T -does at least have three media works listed...one of which is a zero-context example. I just don't understand why a media website should have an article listing each line and station of the railway in detail. Even if you were writing a story revolving around the railway, there's nothing here that you wouldn't get from Wikipedia or the railroad's official website.

Don't forget UsefulNotes.Toronto Subway

I agree that there should be a mass culling of useful notes on specific railway systems.

Within that index is this: UsefulNotes.World Subways, filled with links to subway systems around the world that don't have any fiction connected to them

Edited by Nen_desharu on Jan 28th 2024 at 12:10:55 PM

I agree the railway thing is odd. I think most of those pages can safely be cut if they don't include appearances in fiction.

Would anyone mind if I cut The Emu War? It's a stub that relies on a joke that's not really funny anymore (YMMV on how funny it was to begin with) and hasn't been edited in months.

I actually heavily expanded and clarified on it in response.

I noticed that SEVERAL country Useful Nots pothole to tropes like Crapsack World and People's Republic of Tyranny, which are NRLEP.

Edited by Rainbo6 on May 7th 2024 at 7:59:43 AM

Which means those links and potholes should be removed.

I've had a look at the School Systems pages - the Australian one at least I feel needs to be kept for a couple of reasons: 1) there are a number of unique aspects which set the Australian school system apart from the US, Canadian and (to a lesser extent) UK counterparts. To give three quick examples off the top of my head, uniforms are the norm rather than the exception, admissions to aussie universities are far simpler (among other things, extracurriculars do not boost your chances of getting in) and the school year generally lines up with the calendar year. There's more, but those are the ones which immediately spring to mind. 2) there are many, many Aussie TV shows, books etc (among others) which are set at school or involve a school/university setting in some capacity - Feeling Sorry for Celia, Betrayal of Bindy Mc Kenzie (books), Neighbours, Home and Away, Summer Heights High and its spinoffs (TV series)...I could go on. Basically it is in the media quite a bit.

The Australian school systems page definitely needs one hell of a cleanup and I'm happy to do that (we do not need a thorough outline of how each states high school certificate works even if they're referred to by name in the media for instance). I've got a draft I've been working on offline and I can stick it up in my sandbox to get formatting etc worked out beforehand. Thoughts?