Britain's 7 ft Gauge Railways

A brief history of the Britain's broad gauge railways, 1835 - 1892.


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Welcome! This magazine explores the development and eventual demise of Great Britain's broad gauge railways. They were the fastest and safest railways of their day, but eventually had to convert to "standard" gauge in the interests of uniformity. 

Vulcan 2-2-2T locomotive

Maps and Fact-Sheets

The fact-sheets record the dates lines opened, or were converted to/from broad gauge, as well as a summary of the number and type of broad gauge locomotives in service.

Maps of the Broad Gauge network

Fact-sheet for   1841  1846  1851  1856  1861  1866  1871  1876  1881  1886  1891

Glossary of terms

Bibliography

Articles

Introduction and overview

Early Locomotives

Construction

Early Stations

The First Standard Locomotives

Bristol & Exeter Railway (1)

Signalling

Gooch's Locomotives

The Broad Gauge in South Wales

The Broad Gauge to Birmingham

London Paddington Station

The South Devon Railway

Passenger Carriages

The Broad Gauge in Cornwall

Gauge Conversion in South Wales and the Midlands

Accidents on the Broad Gauge

Bristol & Exeter Railway (2)

Armstrong & Dean's Locomotives

Champions of the Broad Gauge

The Train Service

Broad Gauge in Restrospect

The Last Years

The End of the Broad Gauge

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