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understanding narrow gauge????
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Actually the concept of narrow gauge was that you would get almost the same capacity for substantially less cost in equipment and right of way construction. <br /> <br />You may have noticed that narrow gauge common carriers in the US are gone. <br /> <br />That's because the concpet was found to be wrong. It cost virtually the same amount to construct the grade and track in narrow gauge as standard and there wasn't very much savings at all in caror engine construction. Operating costs were virtually the same because you needed the same number of people to operate the trains and maintain the railroad. There was an added expense that every carload of goods had to be transferred from a narrow gauge car to a standard gauge car (or vice versa) if the shipment originated or terminated off the narrow gauge line. Since standard and narrow gauge cars weren't the same size that meant you had partially filled cars on one side of the move or the other. Very inefficient. <br /> <br />The longest lasting US narrow gauge railroad in the east was the East Broad Top. It was successful because it primarily hauled coal and it put the coal prep plant (that cleaned and sorted the coal) at the narrow-standard gauge interchange. Cleaning the coal requires it to be unloaded, cleaned and then reloaded into a car, so the EBT could unload it from the narrow gauge car into the plant, clean it and then reload it into the standard gague car with no loss of efficiency. <br /> <br />Dave H.
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