What name is given to the distance between the two rails of a railway track?
Track geometry south, the north rail of tangent track running east and west, the outer rail (the rail that is further away from the center) on curves, or the outside rails in multiple track territory. For Swiss railroad, the reference rail for tangent track is the center line between two rails, but it is the outside rail for curved track. Track gauge or rail gauge (also known as track gage in the United States) is the distance between the inner sides (gauge sides) of the heads of the two load bearing rails that make up a single railway line. Each country uses
Distance between two straight lines Distance between two straight lines The distance between two straight lines in the plane is the minimum distance between any two points lying on the lines. In case of intersecting lines, the distance between them is zero, because the minimum distance between them is zero (at the point of intersection); whereas in case of two parallel lines, it is the perpendicular distance from a point on one line to the other line. Because the lines are parallel, the perpendicular distance between them is a constant, so it does not matter which point is chosen to measure the distance. Given the