All roads were built by Rome

An entry essay written by Arthur Liu for the Men of Letters entrance exam.

We all know the infamous saying “all roads lead to Rome” but many of us do not know why. It originated from a medieval proverb referring to ‘Millarium Aureum’; a golden milestone located in the center of Rome erected by Caesar Augustus. In modern times the same saying has been revitalized in films and literature without bringing forward the context. However, what isn’t known, is that to this very day all roads are built by the Roman Empire.
U.S. space shuttle booster rockets are built in Utah. The booster rockets measured 4 feet 8 inches in width. This number seems odd but the truth behind it is the engineers would have preferred to make them larger, however the rockets had to be shipped from the factory to the launch site. They were shipped by train with tracks that lead through a tunnel and the rockets had to fit through said tunnel, which is only slightly larger than the width of the tracks.
The U.S. standard railroad gauge, the distance between rails, is 4 feet and 8.5 inches. It seems like an odd number, why use this gauge? The English expatriates designing the U.S. Railroads designed it from the railroads in England. You might ask why they used this gauge in England and the answer is quite simple; the people who first build the rail in England were the first people who built the roads all over Europe.
The roads throughout Europe were created by using the same jibs and tools that had been used for building wagons, which used the wheel spacing. When they tried to use any other spacing the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in Europe and that because of the spacing of the wheel ruts.
The ruts on the road had been there since ancient times when the Roman war chariots formed them they marched. Everyone else had to match the ruts or potentially destroy their wagon’s wheels during the journey.
Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses.
The next time you are handed a specification, procedure or process and wonder “What horses’ ass came up with this?” you may be exactly right. Bureaucracies live forever.