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[18] [19] The Colorado Railroad Museum established in 1959, operates a demonstration loop of narrow gauge track in Golden, Colorado. [20] Stereograph of Utah's American Fork Railroad in the 1880's. In Utah, three foot gauge narrow-gauge railroads sprang up immediately after the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10, 1869.
A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in) standard gauge. Most narrow-gauge railways are between 600 mm ( 1 ft 11 + 5 ⁄ 8 in ) and 1,067 mm ( 3 ft 6 in ).
Many narrow-gauge railways were built in the United States with track gauge 3 ft (914 mm). The most extensive and well known systems were the 3 ft (914 mm) gauge lines through the Rocky Mountain states of Colorado and New Mexico. Today a few lines survive as heritage railways and tourist attractions.
Terms such as broad gauge and narrow gauge do not have any fixed meaning beyond being materially wider or narrower than standard. In British practice, the space between the rails of a track is colloquially referred to as the "four-foot", and the space between two tracks the "six-foot", descriptions relating to the respective dimensions.
In 1886, the southern railroads agreed to coordinate changing gauge on all their tracks. After considerable debate and planning, most of the southern rail network was converted from 5 ft (1,524 mm) gauge to 4 ft 9 in (1,448 mm) gauge, then the standard of the Pennsylvania Railroad, over two days beginning on Monday, May 31, 1886.
The gauge is set by the positioning of the cast-in fixings, so it is not a simple task to re-gauge existing track; it also creates problems with spot replacement of sleepers. Many sleepers were made with the reduced track gauge but 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in) standard gauge versions have also been manufactured in more recent times. [27]
Measuring rail gauge. During the early days of rail, there was considerable variation in the gauge used by different systems, and in the UK during the railway building boom of the 1840s Brunel's broad gauge of 7 ft 1 ⁄ 4 in (2,140 mm) was in competition with what was referred to at the time as the 'narrow' gauge of 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in).
Located wholly within the province of Prince Edward Island, construction of the PEIR started in 1871, eventually financed by Canada.The line was initially built to 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge, under the supervision of Chief Engineer John Edward Boyd a native of Saint John, New Brunswick who first advocated the use of narrow gauge for the New Brunswick Railway in the 1860s, and was responsible ...