So the US also had multiple track gauges. The most popular were standard gauge and 3-foot narrow gauge. I live in Colorado, which in the late 19th Century saw an explosion of 3 foot narrow gauge. Most of that is gone, with the exception of some tourist railroads like the Durango & Silverton and the Cumbres & Toltec, which runs into New Mexico.steve-in-kville wrote: ↑Fri Jun 04, 2021 6:49 amI read somewhere that Europe had several track gauges. Here in the US, we have just two. In fact not far from where I live there once was a thriving narrow gauge railroad, long since gone.
There was also 2 foot narrow gauge in Maine, the most famous being the Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes. The Mount Gretna Narrow Gauge Railway in Pennsylvania was also 2 foot.
Then there are the broad gauges -- the Erie Railroad was originally 6 foot gauge, along with some other rail lines in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. All these lines were converted to standard gauge by 1880. The Baltimore Streetcar system was 5 ft 4 1⁄2 in. Pennsylvania used 5 ft 2 1⁄4 in for its streetcar lines. Many railroads in the Confederacy used a 5 foot track gauge, because the wider rail cars made it easier to transport cotton.
The Russians adopted the same 5 foot rail gauge to differentiate it from Western Europe as a security measure. As a response to Napoleon's invasion of Russia, the Czarist railways built their track at 5 foot in order to make it more difficult for another invasion. Considering that the Germans invaded the Soviet Union in World War II, it wasn't a crazy idea.
Even now, trains need to swap out their wheels at the borders of Belarus, Ukraine and the Baltics in order for trains to pass through. I've been through that -- workers jack up the entire train and swap out the wheels, an operation that takes a couple of hours. During that time, you're basically stuck in your train car, without your passport, while border control processes your entry. Also, old style toilets on European passenger cars "flushed" directly onto the tracks, so bathrooms were also locked.
