A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of 1,435 mm. The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge, international gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge in Europe, and SGR in East Africa. It is the most widely used track gauge around the world, with about 55% of the lines in the world using it.
A broad-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge broader than the 1,435 mm used by standard-gauge railways.
In rail transport, track gauge is the distance between the two rails of a railway track. All vehicles on a rail network must have wheelsets that are compatible with the track gauge. Since many different track gauges exist worldwide, gauge differences often present a barrier to wider operation on railway networks.
The Bristol and Gloucester Railway was a railway company opened in 1844 to run services between Bristol and Gloucester. It was built on the 7 ftBrunel gauge, but it was acquired in 1845 by the 4 ft 8+1⁄2 instandard gauge Midland Railway, which also acquired the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway at the same time.
The Kilmarnock and Troon Railway was an early railway line in Ayrshire, Scotland. It was constructed to bring coal from pits around Kilmarnock to coastal shipping at Troon Harbour, and passengers were carried.
The Vale of Neath Railway (VoNR) was a broad gauge railway company, that built a line from Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare to Neath, in Wales, mostly to transport the products of the Merthyr iron industries to ports on Swansea Bay.
The Carmarthen and Cardigan Railway was a 7 ft 1⁄4 in broad gauge railway line in Wales that was intended to connect Carmarthen on the South Wales Railway with Cardigan. In fact, it was unable to raise the necessary capital and was loss-making from the time of opening the first short section of its line in 1860, and it was in receivership for much of its life. It eventually reached Llandysul in 1864 but was not extended further during its independent existence.
In 1861 the Llynvi Valley Railway was opened in Glamorganshire, Wales, to convey mineral products to the Bristol Channel at Porthcawl. It adopted an earlier tramroad, the Duffryn Llynvi and Porthcawl Railway. The Llynvi and Ogmore Railway was opened in 1865, and the two companies amalgamated to form the Llynvi and Ogmore Railway in 1866. At first Porthcawl harbour was an important destination for onward transport, but this soon declined.
The South Devon Railway Company built and operated the railway from Exeter to Plymouth and Torquay in Devon, England. It was a 7 ft 1⁄4 in broad gauge railway built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
The South Wales Railway was a main line railway which opened in stages from 1850, connecting the Great Western Railway from Gloucester to South Wales. It was constructed on the broad gauge. An original aspiration was to reach Fishguard to engender an Irish ferry transit and transatlantic trade, but the latter did not materialise for many years, and never became an important sector of the business. Neyland was the western terminus of the line until 1906.
The Cheltenham and Great Western Union Railway was a railway company intended to link Cheltenham, Gloucester and Swindon, in England. It was authorised in 1836 but it found it very hard to raise money for the construction, and it opened only a part of its line, between Swindon and Cirencester, in 1841. It sold its business to the Great Western Railway, which quickly built the line through to Gloucester in 1845 and Cheltenham in 1847; part of that route was shared with other companies.
The Ballochney Railway was an early railway built near Airdrie, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. It was intended primarily to carry minerals from coal and ironstone pits, and stone quarries, in the area immediately north and east of Airdrie, to market, predominantly over the adjoining Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway. Passengers were carried later.
The Slamannan Railway was an early mineral railway between the north-eastern margin of Airdrie and Causewayend on the Union Canal, near Linlithgow, Scotland.
The Monkland and Kirkintilloch Railway was an early mineral railway running from a colliery at Monklands to the Forth and Clyde Canal at Kirkintilloch, Scotland. It was the first railway to use a rail ferry, the first public railway in Scotland, and the first in Scotland to use locomotive power successfully, and it had a great influence on the successful development of the Lanarkshire iron industry. It opened in 1826.
The Dundee and Arbroath Railway was an early railway in Scotland. It opened in 1838, and used the unusual track gauge of 5 ft 6 in (1,676 mm). In 1848 it changed to standard gauge and connected to the emerging Scottish railway network.
The Manchester and Bolton Railway was a railway in the historic county of Lancashire, England, connecting Salford to Bolton. It was built by the proprietors of the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal Navigation and Railway Company who had in 1831 converted from a canal company. The 10-mile (16 km) long railway was originally to have been built upon most of the line of the canal, but it was eventually built alongside the Salford and Bolton arms of the canal. The act of Parliament, the Manchester, Bolton and Bury Canal and Railway Act 1831, also allowed the construction of a connection to Bury, but technical constraints meant that it was never built.
The Plymouth and Dartmoor Railway (P&DR) was a 4 ft 6 in gauge railway built to improve the economy of moorland areas around Princetown in Devon, England. Independent carriers operated horse-drawn wagons and paid the company a toll. It opened in 1823, and a number of short branches were built in the next few years.
The Wilsontown, Morningside and Coltness Railway was a railway opened in 1845, primarily for mineral traffic, although a passenger service was run sporadically. The line ran from a junction with the Wishaw and Coltness Railway at Chapel, to Longridge, in South Central Scotland, and it was extended to Bathgate in 1850 after takeover by the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway. It was built to open up further coal deposits and to connect the Wilsontown Ironworks, although it did not actually reach Wilsontown. In common with the other "coal railways" with which it connected, it adopted the track gauge of 4 ft 6 in, often referred to as Scotch gauge.
The Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Dudley Railway was an English railway company promoted to connect those places by rail. It was authorised by Parliament in 1846. It became apparent that it would be advantageous to merge with the Great Western Railway. The rival London and North Western Railway went to great lengths to frustrate the amalgamation, but ultimately failed, and the merger took place in 1847.
The Great Western Railway was a railway company that was dominant in West Wales, in the United Kingdom.
