;1795: One of the first railways to use gauge was the
Little Eaton Gangway in England, constructed as a horse-drawn
wagonway in 1795. Other gauge wagonways in
England and
Wales were also built in the early nineteenth century. ;1809: The
Silkstone Waggonway was opened, connecting the
Barnsley Canal to collieries including the
Huskar Pit. ;1860: The
Severn and Wye Railway introduces a steam locomotive on its gauge
plateway. ;1862: The Norwegian engineer
Carl Abraham Pihl constructed the first gauge railway in
Norway, the
Røros Line. ;1865: The
Queensland Railways were constructed. Its gauge was promoted by the Irish engineer
Abraham Fitzgibbon and consulting engineer
Charles Fox. ;1867: The construction of the railroad from the Castillo de Buitrón mine to the pier of San Juan del Puerto, Huelva, Spain, began. The width was . ;1868: In 1868
Charles Fox asked civil engineer
Edmund Wragge to survey a
railway in Costa Rica. ;1870: The was adopted by New Zealand to expedite the development of transport under
Julius Vogel's
Great Public Works Policy; see
The Vogel Era. ;1871: The Canadian
Toronto, Grey and Bruce Railway and the
Toronto and Nipissing Railway were opened, promoted by Pihl and Fitzgibbon and surveyed by Wragge as an engineer of Fox. The Canadian province of Prince Edward Island began building its network. ;1872: In January
Robert Fairlie advocated the use of gauge in his book
Railways Or No Railways: Narrow Gauge, Economy with Efficiency v. Broad Gauge, Costliness with Extravagance. : The first gauge railway opened in
Japan. It had been proposed by the British civil engineer
Edmund Morel based on his experience building railways in New Zealand. ;1873 : On 1 January, the
first gauge railway was opened in New Zealand, constructed by the
British firm
John Brogden and Sons. Earlier built and broad gauge railways were soon
converted to the narrower gauge. : The
Cape Colony adopted the gauge. After conducting several studies in southern Europe, the
Molteno Government selected the gauge as being the most economically suited for traversing steep mountain ranges. Beginning in 1873, under supervision of Railway engineer of the Colony William Brounger, the
Cape Government Railways rapidly expanded and the gauge became the standard for southern Africa. ;1876:
Natal also
converted its short long Durban network from standard gauge prior to commencing with construction of a network across the entire colony in 1876. Other new railways in Southern Africa, notably Mozambique, Bechuanaland, the Rhodesias, Nyasaland and Angola, were also constructed in gauge during that time. ;After 1876: In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century numerous gauge
tram systems were built in the
United Kingdom and the
Netherlands. Newfoundland began its Cape gauge network in 1881. ==Nomenclature==