Re: National guage standardisation - why 4'8.5"?

[Bruce Greening <norrail@optusnet.com.au>]

I once heard a story of why 4'8.5"

When railways first developed in the UK they used the then common width used by
'standard' horse drawn wagons. They used the width that fitted the groves worn
in roman roads by roman chariots.

The width of a roman chariot was governed by the distance apart the sharfts
needed to be to allow a horse to fit between the shafts.

We therefore have this standard gauge used world wide because it is the width
of a horses' arse!!!



Bradley Torr wrote:

> I just have a question that's bugging me - when PM Andrew Fisher started
> building the Trans-Australian Railway in 1912 (or whatever year it was),
> why did the Commonwealth Railways engineers choose 4'8.5" for the railway,
> and all subsequent CR projects, right up to the Melbourne to Adelaide
> standardisation in the 1990's?
>
> Out of the five mainland states, two had 3'6" (WA and QLD), two had 5'3"
> (VIC and SA) and only one had 4'8.5" (NSW).
>
> I would have chosen 5'3" had I been a CR engineer way back then. Why?
> Because two states already had it, and 5'3" from Port Augusta to Kalgoorlie
> would have been a logical extension of South Australia's system. It would
> have been possible to travel all the way from Orbost VIC to Kalgoorlie WA
> on the one guage as well. Also, it seems kinda unfair for a guage used only
> by New South Wales to be imposed on the rest of the nation.
>
> Regards
> BT
>

--
Bruce L. Greening

Norrail@optusnet.com.au
http://members.optusnet.com.au/~norrail