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Government Specifications
The US Standard railroad gauge (distance between rails) is 4 feet, 8.5
inches. That's an
exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used?
Because that's the way they built them in England, and the first U.S.
railroads were
built by English expatriates.
Why did the English people build them like that? Because the first rail
lines in Europe
were designed and built by the same people who built the pre-railroad
tramways, and
that's the gauge they used.
Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who designed and
built the
tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons,
which used
that same wheel spacing.
Okay, why did the wagons use that odd wheel spacing? Well, when they tried
to use
any other spacing, the wagons were prone to breaking down on some of the
old, long
distance roads, because that's the spacing of the old wheel ruts.
So who built these old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe
were built
by Imperial Rome for the benefit of their legions. The roads have been used
ever since.
And the ruts? The initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of
destroying
their wagons, were first made by Roman war chariots. Since the chariots were
all made
to certain specifications for or by Imperial Rome, they were all alike in
the matter of
wheel spacing.
Thus, we have the answer to the original questions. The United States
standard railroad
gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification
(Military, as it were)
for an Imperial Roman Army war chariot.
But one "nagging" question still remains. Why did the design of the Roman
army war
chariots incorporate that specific wheelbase?
Answer: Because the chariots were designed to be just wide enough to
accommodate
the back ends of two war horses.
So, the next time you are handed some oddball specification and you assume
that some government
horse's ass was responsible for coming up with it, you may be exactly right!
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