Break of gauge

railyard with a mixture of rail gauges

When railways have lines whose rails employ two or more different guages the break of gauge is the location where two lines meet.

While some railways cope with a change in gauge by unloading the cargo from the cars of one train, and reloading it one the cars of another train, of the other gauge, there are some more automated solutions. Some systems have a facility to rapidly substitute cars' bogies with alternate bogies of the alternate gauge.

Historically, rail gauges have varied around Europe, which has had economic and military consequences. During World War II, the Germans had difficulty supplying their troops in the Soviet Union because of the rail system. In Spain, a nonstandard gauge helped the regime of Francisco Franco to survive.