Motto: “Call me Ishmael.”

Never mind my ranting below.
If you are a member of the Institution, vote!

If you are curious, here are my two pence on the matter (seatbelts, please):

Permanent way? You mean railway track?

Long time ago, when I started to look for a job in the UK, I found that there weren’t many advertisements for “railway track design engineer”.
Oddly enough, there were a lot of openings for “permanent way design engineer”, but the job description was referring to what I was looking for, and I thought I am very good at – railway track design.
So, I applied for a few of those “permanent way” jobs, I had an interview and an offer, and I ended up becoming a Permanent Way Engineer.
I knew about the railway track in the UK from a very good book published by one “Permanent Way Institution” but before this job search, it didn’t click for me the connection between “railway track” and “permanent way”, despite the two chapters the British Railway Track book had on the 1971 meaning of the term:

For about 5 years my role was of “permanent way engineer”.
In the last 13 years, most of the documentation we produced were called “Permanent Way – General Arrangement”, “Permanent Way – Form A” and so on.
The standard I use the most has a section called “Permanent Way Mathematics”. I have strong opinions about some of those “fence to fence” calculations, but I don’t mind the name.

12 years ago, I started this blog and I called it “P(ermanent)wayBlog”. I thought at the time this would be more appropriate name than railwaytrackblog.com.
And also then I joined the Institution, and I became an active member. I wrote a few articles in its Journal, and I got involved in the regional activities the organisation had.
From the very beginning I admired the spirit of the Institution, well represented by its Latin motto now a bit forgotten.

Truth is elastic. The Institution of 42

From time to time, more often in the last 5-6 years, I was told that there is a difference between “railway track” and “permanent way”. The latter goes now “fence to fence” and covers the entire “railway infrastructure”, including the very narrow now term “railway track”. OK!

Lately I hear that so many people don’t really understand what “permanent way” is (perhaps we should focus on education, starting with clear definition of terms?), and the institution that holds this name for more than 140 years is looking to change it to something more explicit, appropriate and inclusive, in the desire to attract a wider audience, after years of trying to convince everyone that “permanent way” surely includes that wider range of railway disciplines now we say “permanent way” does not sound like including.
Even “railway infrastructure” added as subtitle is not inclusive enough today.
Let’s call it the “Institution of 42” then!

But what’s a name? A name, a brand, doesn’t need to be explicit!

Imagine a drink invented when PWI was established, and called “The delicious carbonated soft drink flavoured with kola nut, vanilla, cinnamon, citrus oils and other flavourings”.
This name is explicit but for sure it would have been very confusing to consumers.
But once well established, everyone knew what Pepsi is. Its distinct flavour and taste are not dependent on how explicit the name is.
What would you think if, in the desire to be more explicit and clearer to consumers, now PepsiCo would change the name of the drink from “Pepsi” to “The delicious carbonated soft drink you buy when you can’t find DrPepper”?
In 1999 PepsiCo acquired a large fleet of Soviet warships. Even then it didn’t change its name. [Russian accent] “PiepsiskEI”?!

But surely this logic of branding doesn’t work for the names of institutions or official bodies.
These must be explicit and clear.
For example, the Prime Minister’s Office in the UK is a very clear name of a very important official institution of government.
Imagine if people would call this office by the name of the street it resides?
“Downing Street”! How odd would that be?!
Or even worse, the house number: “No 10”?!
Nobody would comprehend how No 10 refers to the highest office of the country!
I recently had a test on the Life in the UK. And only then I found out that a very important role in the UK Government is the “Chancellor of the Exchequer”. This is a very clear and explicit name, and at first glance, without prior knowledge, everyone knows what the person with this role does in His Majesty Government.
“Exchequer” is a term that comes from the French “échiquier”, and it refers internationally to the game of chess, or to the chessboard.
But the UK Chancellor is not the best chess player of the realm. Not even the best at checkers. Chequers?!
Isn’t this confusing?
Shouldn’t the office change the name to something all the people, the whole country and world would better understand?!
Does it need to?

A similar meaning dilemma is, in my opinion, with the term “Permanent Way”.
For the English-speaking people close enough to the Railway, the term has (had?) a clear enough meaning, even if for others the connection to railway is not obvious.
Yes, perhaps it sounds odd, old, obsolete even.

Perhaps some of us are tired of explaining what “permanent way” means or what we want NOW to mean.

Yes, the truth is elastic, I know.

But this name is a BRAND with 140 years of history.
It sounded odd to me 12 years ago. But that feeling disappeared very quickly and now I feel very much attached to it.
Now we want to include in the institution our colleagues from OLE and/or any other railway related disciplines?! So what?!
They will all be joining an Institution with a well-established name and 140 years of reputation and history, never far from the disciplines we want now to bring together.
Let’s be consequent to that latter (or original if you want) “fence to fence” definition of the term “Permanent Way”!
And to the subtitle “Institution for Railway Infrastructure Engineering” we currently have.
Why isn’t that explicit and inclusive enough?

What about me?

And, confused about this name debate, I wonder if my blog name is still relevant?!
When I called it pwayblog I had the intention to write only about what I understand to be “railway track”.
What now?
In this permanent way void of meaning, is the name pwayblog still meaningful?
You, dear reader, have any doubts what this blog is about, ranting aside (or included)?
Should I change its name to railwaytrackblog.com?
Or, better, rantingaboutrailwaytrackonly?
Sometimes, annoyed by this debate, I even wonder if it wouldn’t be better to change the blog author name from the not very meaningful “Constantin” to something more explicit …
“Railway track guru”?
Modesty aside, is ” PwayGenius” better? Oh, no, pway again …
Would “Annoying, narcissistic, and opinionated guy who thinks he knows rail stuff” be explicit enough and include everything I am today?

No, I will not ask you to vote on this.

Vote!

But if you are a member of the PWI, please vote. No matter your opinion on the name change, express it, at least with a vote.

Constantin. FPWI. Not FRail EI.