Like so many of museum web sites, ours (www.spcrr.org) needs updating. We are currently working to not just update, but revise the format of our roster page.

With that in mind, what do you expect and or look for in a museum’s web based roster of rolling stock and other collection items? Why?

Who’s page(s) do you like.

Our debate has taken many directions. One member likes statistics about the cars, another wants all narrative and no statistics. We are trying to supply detail without driving away the more casual visitor. We currently have a single text based page with photos. We are considering a table with links to each car. Ideas include ultimately placing restoration reports and multiple photo essays attached to the roster…

Thoughts?

I enjoy finding information about rolling stock and misc RR equipment. What I appreciate is a short blurb under a thumbnail with a hyper-link to bigger write-ups and more photos. A bunch of multi choice scroll down windows is just annoying to me. A side panel with major areas of information is always an enjoyable way to cruise through a web site. Thanks for asking!!!!!

I'd focus the home page on bringing visitors to your site, and link to more technical information for the choir. The restoration work is likely to interest more people who have a respect for craftsmanship in general, while roster stuff probably is just for railfans, so maybe multiple layers of increasing depth of information? You don't need to market to us - we will show up anyhow, complain about all those tourists getting in our photos, and leave without buying a ticket. Use your bandwidth wisely to increase visitation and revenue in the nonrailfan population, and limit the technogeek content acordingly. I'd be tempted to focus the railfan technical stuff on selling my line of castings to try for the best of both worlds.

dave

Personally, I like Mid-Continent's best, with descriptions of the locos and cars, their history, and brief info about the railroad they were from, along with thumbnails of photos both historic and current, of the piece of equipment. Example: http://www.midcontinent.org/collectn/woodpas/mpn2.html.
My least favorite is probably IRM's, due to the lack of non-technical info about the equipment. Example: http://www.irm.org/cgi-bin/rsearch.cgi?coaches=Chicago+Great+Western=4061
A good combination of the two though, is PSRM's:
http://www.sdrm.org/roster/passenger/index.html
http://www.sdrm.org/roster/passenger/co-14/index.html

More and more, I am becoming a big fan of content management systems. There are a huge number of free ones out there that are extremely easy to set up and maintain. The best thing about them is that you can create multiple user accounts and multiple people can help maintain them through a simple Web interface.

Here's my favorite site for free, open source CMS's:

http://www.opensourcecms.com/index.php

Look particularly at the Wiki and image gallery categories. If you know PHP or someone who does, you can modify an existing CMS system to suit your exact needs.

My query on the Connecticut Trolley Museum several threads below is a perfect example of how such a roster should be in place. Someone mentioned "Wildwood 36"; I went looking for more info on it at the CTM website and Hick's and found nothing. I theoretically should be able to click on a museum's website somewhere and find a roster giving me at least enough to understand 1) what it is and 2) why they have it. I, for example, may know all about BTC 6119 in Baltimore, but there should be something for someone who finds out for the first time that there's a Peter Witt in Baltimore.

Different people want different things in a roster. Some want the kind of engine or motor under the hood, some want ownership past, some want the paint scheme it's in, and some want the current operating/display status/condition. At the very least, there should be "justification" for the item being there--unless, of course, the reason is "awaiting scrapping" or "inertia/abandonment".

In the case of a massive place like the B&O Museum, the RR Museum of Pa., or the Illinois Ry. Museum, such a roster is a massive undertaking--but also much more necessary than at a tiny place. Besides which, doesn't a place with a large collection owe us the sense of knowing what they have and what shape it's in?

I am not being partial at all, but in all honesty I think Mid Continents is one of the best sites I have seen. I really think they have done an outstanding job of showing the "equipment roster" of just about all the equipment on the property. Usually with a little info included. There is plenty of info for general tourism and upcoming events which is more up front and easy to find or see. The "shop updates" are usually disappointingly outdated and not my cup of tea, but overall I think it is a good example to look too. I applaud them for it.

I won't pick on any one website that I don't like, but I have tried looking up general info on certain pieces of equipment at other places around the country and am amazed at how little info is available. Some muesums have so much to offer, but you would never guess it from there web sites. Seriously, check out Mid Continents web site, it is pretty good, especially the "equipment roster" part of it. Cheers, John.

http://www.midcontinent.org/collectn/collect.html

Yes, yes and YES again!

On the first page identify yourself, provide the hooks that will entice the visitor, if you have special things to promote (events, some special concept) put it toward the top of the page [don't hide it where it has to be scrolled to].

Have picture that shows the visiting public enjoying your site. I like one photo that Orange Empire used years ago in a print brochure -- it showed a family group at a picnic table with a street car in the background going by the park/lawn area.

Have your hours/days of operation on the first page; provide a link to a map or detail "how to get to us" directions. Have an easy to find link to your membership information.

Then you can link on to other pages that tell about the collection and activities.

Do the website just like you would do an exhibit. The first panel (or page in this case) should provide all the important information to someone who will not read any more.

The initial question on this thread should really be posed on another site. Perhaps one having nothing to do with railfanning or rail-related interests, but one that appeals to travelers, or a tourist blog, or something. For example, I laughed out loud when I read, "there should be something for someone who finds out for the first time that there's a Peter Witt in Baltimore."

I can't think of two people outside our museum community who give a rat's bleep what a Peter Witt is or even who he was. My neighbors are not going to race out and ask their friends, "Did you know there is a Peter Witt in Baltimore?" They might want to know what a typical day riding one was like or who the famous people that rode it were, or even personal history about Pete himself, if it is even that interesting.

Randy,

Personally I like the one I found a few years ago as I was getting ready to rewrite our Roster & History booklet. Unfortunately I cannot find the site again (IIRC it was White River something, but I could be thinking of another site). The main page had general information about the group with upcoming events near the top or in a side bar. There was a link bar across the top and the left side. The top bar was for the big jumps (home, museum info, equipment, contact, history, etc...) The left bar was for more local jumps (i.e.: under Museum info: location, hours, museum map, directions, etc...) Top bar stayed the same on all pages and the left bar stayed the same unless you moved outside that group of pages.

Their roster pages were set up as follows:

-Main equipment page with listing the types of equipment, Locomotive, Passenger, Freight, Maintenance of Way, Structures, and Other. There may have an example thumbnail next to the link. Actually this may have been on the left bar, with a default drop into the Locomotive or Structure page

-On the group pages there were a set of thumbnails on the page with the piece's name (LIRR XXX, Santa Fe XXXX, etc...) just below the image, both of which were the link to that pieces info page. (just a note for these types of pages, please place a note at the top that says `click the photos for more information' or text since link indicators display differently on different computers)

-On the piece page there were a set of photos across the top (maybe 2-3x thumbnail size that were links to full sized photos) of that piece in it's current condition from at least 2 opposite sides and some had detail shots and historical shots of that piece. Below the photo was a grid (spread sheet style) with data information for the rivet counters, ie: make, model, yr built, engine (model, HP, Cylinder count, piston size, displacement, etc..), serial #, build #, length, width, height, weight, ownership (from birth to current with reporting marks), brake model, bearing size etc... There was a chart standardized for each equipment groups, so if you wanted to compare information between cars you knew where to look. If the info was unknown there was a -- in the box or if it didn't apply then there was a N/A (not applicable).

Below the chart was the info about the piece, info started basic and progressed to the technical near the end. So once the info started to go over the head of the reader they could stop and not feel insulted.

Something I have seen on sites that annoys me is when they put expected completion dates and forget to change or remove them after the date has passed. It is OK , IMHO, to say that the piece is currently in the process of restoration, maybe with a few updates as milestones are passes, but until you are almost finished please don't put an ETA (more then 1 year).

Also please keep you backgrounds simple, especially where covered by text, nothing worse (IMHO) then having to search for the text because of the background. Please keep the background solid when possible and give the text as much contrast as possible in relation to the background.

Just some observations,

Rich C

I would settle for completeness!

Most of the time when I look at a museum website's roster, I find it lists less than half of the equipment I know a museum has. I'm talking about full size stuff, not speeders or work equipment, which I also find hardly anyone ever lists in their roster.

I've heard things like "Well it's unrestored", "Well it's not publicly accessable", "Well it's a piece of work equipment not an Artifact", "Well it's in private ownership but just stored here". Riiiight.... don't see any of that. If someone's interested, my experience is the piece of equipment WILL be shown to them, and roster-readers are the type to restore, so show them unrestored stuff. Private artifacts need a reason to be at the museum (such as display) to avoid UBIT.

Content Management Systems are a lot easier than they sound. We've already talked about several of them - blogs, wikis, forums. You're using one now. They just make it easy to write content without dealing with all the technical HTML-type stuff you pay webmasters for.

on organizing the information, you need to present the most basic info "above the fold", and then provide the ability for the reader to deep-drill as much as he wants to (or your staff has time to write). Both narrative and statistics are important - one without the other is garbage obviously, as I'm sure you've seen plenty of both on various museum sites. It's important that the center truck is un-powered -- but also important how this made the car cheaper, but made it an operating hassle as it could not tow a second dead car home.

Randy,

i have visited the site many times. As a tiny minority who is interested in horse cars; I hope you will add yours, of course with some pictures.

The Society's first car I think SPC 47 is only represented by a drawing, how about some pictures?

That truck building gallery on creating a new freight car truck is first rate how about a link to it?

And don't forget some progress reports on the car barn when construction starts!

Ted Miles

While the CTM website doesn't have a roster, the Preserved Electric Cars site - I'm guessing that's what "Hick's" refers to :) - definitely has the car listed. The issue there is search criteria, and this is a different situation. The problem is that the car isn't "Wildwood 36" or "Wildwood Railway 36", it's Five Mile Beach Electric 36. Going to the PNAERC site and searching on the CTM collection without any sort criteria will show you the car listed under its number, but if you look for it under Wildwood you won't find it. You also won't find Chicago Aurora & Elgin cars if you search for "Great Third Rail" and you won't find New York subway cars if you search on "A Train." There's always going to be an issue with locating what people are thinking of but can't "put their finger on" the correct nomenclature for.

Five Mile Beach Electric 36 on the PNAERC site

Not to toot my own horn, but as the Webmaster of the Reading Company Technical & Historical Society's website (http://www.readingrailroad.org), I've tried to implement many of the suggestions made in this thread. The biggest obstacle I run in to is getting timely info/progress reports on a regular basis for our collection. I am in the midst of overhauling the site, but I think you can get a pretty good idea content-wise what's going on.

--main thumbnail equipment page sorted by type with "current" operating status/condition (http://www.readingrailroad.org/roster/roster_thumbs.html)
--individual profile pages with historical background info, how we acquired each piece, archival photos, restoration photos, specifications, last time the page was updated, etc.
--partial surviving equipment page (http://www.readingrailroad.org/surviving/rdg_surv_equip.html)
--individual profile pages, featuring all of the preserved RDG steam engines (links found on surviving equipment page)

I guess you have to ask what the purpose of the web site is? Is it to get people to come to your museum or something else? Have there been complaints about the lack of a roster? I know that at CTM's site we do not have a roster posted as others have already pointed out. We used to,but not anymore. We keep track of hits to the site and what pages are looked at. We found very little activity to the roster. Last year we had close to 400,000 hits to the site. We had hits from every continent. More than 50% ( closer to 75%) of the hits are to the restoration pages. Our goal with the site is to generate interest in our museum which we hope will generate visitors and income. So, does having not having a roster online taking up space deter visitors to the site? I think the numbers speak for themselves. I believe that having an actively maintained site with freshly posted images and items of interest does much more than a roster ever will.