New North American Transportation Atlas Data Released on CD-ROM

Contact DOT 132-98 BTS Product Line 202-366-DATA Carol Brandt 202-366-6662

Wednesday, July 15, 1998 -- U.S. Secretary of Transportation Rodney E. Slater today announced the release of the department’s first atlas to provide information about transportation facilities in all three countries of North America.

The atlas is called the North American Transportation Atlas Data (NORTAD), and it is a CD-ROM produced by the department’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS).

"This atlas will help planners and researchers from all entities of transportation, " said Secretary Slater. "Producing it would have been impossible without help from other nations, especially active participation from the governments of Canada and Mexico."

According to BTS Deputy Director Robert A. Knisely, the NORTAD is a set of geographic data of transportation facilities for each country on the continent. These data include geospatial information for transportation modal networks and intermodal terminals, and related attribute information. Each dataset includes documentation that meets Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) metadata content standards. In addition, the metadata has been translated into French and Spanish.

The data includes geography and attribute files in a standard ASCII text format.

The CD-ROM supports research, analysis, and decision making across all modes of transportation. The data will be most useful at the national level, but will also have major implications at the international, regional, state, and local scale throughout the transportation community.

This CD-ROM provides transportation planners and researchers valuable geographic and attribute information for 20 datasets. These datasets include information about public use of airports, water ports, highway networks, railway networks, and state boundaries.

The NORTAD includes both DOS/Windows and UNIX compatible files on one CD-ROM. The data are designed for use within a Geographic Information System (GIS). To allow those without a GIS to view the data graphically, BTS is releasing a Windows NT/95-based data viewer on the CD-ROM. For those with a GIS, the data viewer will convert the geospatial data to a number of popular GIS formats. The data viewer is available through the Internet at http://www.bts.gov/gis/ntatlas/translation.html.

To order a copy of the CD-ROM, contact the Bureau of Transportation Statistics by phone on (202) 366-DATA, by FAX on (202) 366-3640, by email to orders@bts.gov, or by writing to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics at BTS/DOT, 400 Seventh Street, S.W., Washington, D.C. 20590. The data also may be accessed via the Internet at http://www.bts.gov/gis/ntatlas.