Metre-gauge railways ( US : meter-gauge railways ) are narrow-gauge railways with track gauge of 1,000 mm ( 3 ft 3 + 3 ⁄ 8 in ) or 1 metre .
8-563: Ballycastle Railway was a 3 ft ( 914 mm ) narrow gauge railway line which ran from Ballycastle to Ballymoney , both in County Antrim , Northern Ireland . Ballycastle Railway opened in October 1880 and ran 17 miles (27 km) from Ballymoney, on the Belfast and Northern Counties Railway (BNCR), later Northern Counties Committee (NCC), main line to Derry , to Ballycastle . It
16-646: A track gauge of 3 ft ( 914 mm ) or 1 yard . This gauge is a narrow gauge and is generally found throughout North , Central , and South America . In Ireland , many secondary and industrial lines were built to 3 ft gauge, and it is the dominant gauge on the Isle of Man , where it is known as the Manx Standard Gauge . Modern 3 ft gauge railways are most commonly found in isolated mountainous areas, on small islands, or in large-scale amusement parks and theme parks (see table below). This gauge
24-466: Is also popular in model railroading (particularly in G scale ), and model prototypes of these railways have been made by several model train brands around the world, such as Accucraft Trains (US), Aristo-Craft Trains (US), Bachmann Industries (Hong Kong) , Delton Locomotive Works (US), LGB (Germany) , and PIKO (Germany) . The Ferrocarril de Sóller and the Tranvía de Sóller are located on Majorca in
32-507: The Balearic Islands . The other railways of the Majorca rail network were also 3 ft ( 914 mm ) gauge, but with expansion and reconstruction of the network in the early 2000s, they were converted to 1,000 mm ( 3 ft 3 + 3 ⁄ 8 in ) metre gauge . Metre gauge Metre gauge is used in around 95,000 kilometres (59,000 mi) of tracks around
40-851: The Ballymena and Larne Railway in 1933. The Ballycastle Railway closed in July 1950. Under the terms of the Transport Act 1947 the London, Midland and Scottish Railway , the NCC's parent company, was nationalised by the British Government on 1 January 1948. The NCC (and the Ballycastle Railway) was thus briefly owned by the British Transport Commission . This was only a temporary measure and in 1949
48-683: The NCC was transferred to the Ulster Transport Authority (UTA) – owned by the Government of Northern Ireland. The UTA soon embarked on a major programme of railway closures, notably including much of the Belfast and County Down Railway . The Ballycastle Railway was one of the casualties; the UTA closed the line to all services on 3 July 1950. 55°12′18″N 6°14′49″W / 55.205°N 6.247°W / 55.205; -6.247 3 ft gauge railways Three foot gauge railways have
56-661: The world. It was used by several European colonial powers including France, Britain and Germany in their colonies. In Europe, large metre-gauge networks remain in use in Switzerland, Spain and many European towns with urban trams , but most metre-gauge local railways in France , Germany and Belgium closed down in the mid-20th century, although some still remain. With the revival of urban rail transport, metre-gauge light metros were built in some cities. The slightly-wider 1,009 mm ( 3 ft 3 + 23 ⁄ 32 in ) gauge
64-503: Was never a very profitable enterprise and closed down for a period in 1924, until rescued by the NCC, which took it over completely. Services mainly consisted of three return journeys each day, taking between 50 minutes and an hour. At the start there were three Black Hawthorn 0-6-0ST engines and two Kitson 4-4-2T engines arrived in 1908. Initially carriages were of the compartment type painted two shades of brown, until largely displaced by LMS -designed corridor carriages transferred from
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