Horse's A*s

Rome made the roads and the roads grew ruts in them. Ruts created by the standard roman war chariot had a width of 4 feet 8 1/2 inches. The Roman chariots were designed to fit the wheels in such a way that two horses could pull the chariots and wagons abreast to each other and the wheels don't sit directly in the horse’s hoof prints. As Europe grew it continued to use the old roads with the old ruts and to keep their wagons from breaking they were designed to fit the old roman ruts. So a 4 foot 8 1/2 inch axle. When rail lines were developed in Europe they were made to match the original axle size of the wagons, as the tools to make this size wagon already existed and it was only a matter of changing the wheel itself to make a basic rail car. When trolleys and simple rail came to the US, it was originally designed by experienced European craftsmen, so it too was designed with the standard 4 foot 8 1/2 inch axle. As the US rail system grew it passed through mountains which had tunnels cut through them to fit the trains that ran on the rails as they passed and turned. So that brings us to the Solid Rocket Boosters and the Space Shuttle. The Solid Rocket Boosters were designed by a company called Thiokol and built in a factory in Utah, then shipped by rail to Florida. This meant the Solid Rocket Boosters’ width had to be planned to fit through these tunnels that the rails passed through the mountains, which were designed to match the European rail line standards, which were based on carts that had to match the old Roman roads, which were rutted by chariots that were designed to fit the width of a horse’s a*s and that is the connection between the width of an old Roman horse’s a*s and the US Space program.