5 ft 3 in gauge railways


Railways with track gauge of are broad-gauge railways, currently in use in Australia, Brazil and Ireland.

History

;600 BCE:The Diolkos across the Isthmus of Corinth in Greece – a grooved paved trackway – was constructed with an average gauge of.
; 1840: The Grand Duchy of Baden State Railway was constructed to gauge, converted to in 1854–1855.
; 1843: The Board of Trade of the United Kingdom recommended the use of in Ireland, after investigating a dispute caused by diverse gauges in Ireland.
; 1846: The Regulating the Gauge of Railways Act 1846 made this gauge mandatory throughout all of Ireland.
; 1847: The Swiss Northern Railway was opened, converted to standard gauge in 1854.
; 1854: The first Australian line was opened, the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway Company.
; 1858: The first Brazilian railway was opened, the Companhia de Estrada de Ferro Dom Pedro II.
; 1863: The Canterbury Provincial Railways in New Zealand was built in until gauge conversion to in 1876

Nomenclature

Similar gauges

The Pennsylvania trolley gauges of and are similar to Irish gauge, but incompatible. There is also gauge, which is similar as well. See: Track gauge in Ireland.

Locomotives

One of the supposed advantages of the broader Irish gauge, compared to, is that the greater space between the wheels allows for bigger cylinders. In practice, Ireland does not have any heavily-loaded or steeply-graded lines that would require especially powerful locomotives. The most powerful steam locomotives on systems of this gauge were:
By comparison a non-articulated standard gauge locomotive in the same country was: