Talk:Merchant Navy (United Kingdom)/Archive 2

Reorganization

There are a few remaining comments below about reorganizing Merchant Marine/Merchant Navy content. Let's see if we can get a consensus:

1. Pick a new page, maybe Merchant shipping to be the holder of information not specific to a single country.
2. Move the sections "Merchant ships," "Life at sea," and "Notable mariners" to that page.
3. Create a page Merchant Navy in Great Britain or British Merchant Navy and move specific information there
4. Add a section to Merchant shipping to hold a set of small cameos to various nations' merchant fleets -- much smaller than the current USMM section.
5. Change the redirect from Merchant Marine to Merchant shipping
6. Change the redirect from Merchant Navy to Merchant shipping

I think it's fair to say that we Yanks are a bit hesitant to charge ahead on this at risk of causing undue vexation to our cousins across the Atlantic. Haus42 14:27, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Merchant Shipping

Following a little from user Paul Bird's comments above and a little from my own googling I think the term really is Merchant Shipping or Merchant Shipping Fleets.

To file this under Merchant Marine or Merchant Navy is dropping anchor in a culturally specific port :) I think the generic stuff should have a generic heading, with Merchant Marine / Merchant Navy spinoffs. Hakluyt bean 21:33, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

While I can live with the current setup, I dp think you're onto something. 'Merchant Fleet' is the most generic term. Adding shipping (at least in my mind) brings to mind the transfer of cargo. While it's unlikely that the Staten Island Ferry will surge to Iraq, it is manned by Merchant Mariners. It seems like that boat would fit more squarely into 'Merchant Fleet' than 'Merchant Shipping Fleet'. Haus42 12:42, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Now that the merged article has been around a little while...

I'm not sure it exactly does what it should. If we want to make Merchant Navy the main article dealing with the subject on a global level, it should not also be the Great Britain-specific page. Make another page "Merchant Navy in Great Britain" or something to that effect. From the U.S. POV, if I type in Merchant marine I don't think I should be automatically sent to a page primarily dealing with the Merchant Navy of Great Britain. Personally, I think both Merchant Navy and Merchant marine are both too localized. I like "Ship transport" or "Shipping (water)" or "Merchant shipping" as nationally non-specific. On the IMO's website, it refers to the industry simply as "Shipping". Unfortunately and unavoidedly due to the decline of the shipping industry in these two countries, it seems both the U.S. and U.K. pages are dominated by the history, anyway. I think the main articles should reflect the current state of the international industry. -- Pesco 05:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I moved some material up from United States Merchant Marine, created a meaningful Merchant ship page, and did a fair amount of sewing with main and detail templates. The result is probably very choppy and has a strange tone, but it seems like a step in the right direction. It seems like some material should now be moved out of the "British Merchant Navy" section. Perhaps some should go into other sections on this page, perhaps some to British Merchant Navy page. If anyone has strong feelings about these changes, I'm very curious. Cheers. Haus42 04:49, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Ship types

Regarding this change: I'm not entirely sure that a discussion of ship types should be on this page. That said, I think if it should be on this page, then spicing it up with some pictures and expanded explanatory text is probably in order. Any feelings? Haus42 14:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Archive most of this page

As on United States Merchant Marine, I think most of the issues brought up on this page have been dealt with, and it might be productive to archive them. Any feelings? Haus42 01:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I created the archive as per Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page. I think the topics still on this page are open. Cheers. Haus42 13:26, 27 March 2007 (UTC)