Reeb stability and the Gromov-Hausdorff limits of leaves in compact foliations

Abstract

We show that the Gromov-Hausdorff limit of a sequence of leaves in a compact foliation is a covering space of the limiting leaf which is no larger than this leaf's holonomy cover. We also show that convergence to such a limit is smooth instead of merely Gromov-Hausdorff. Corollaries include Reeb's local stability theorem, part of Epstein's local structure theorem for foliations by compact leaves, and a continuity theorem of Alvarez and Candel. Several examples are discussed.