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U.S. Department of Transportation U.S. Department of Transportation Icon United States Department of Transportation United States Department of Transportation

National Transportation Atlas Database Summer 2020 Update

Friday, July 10, 2020

Friday, July 10, 2020 - The Summer 2020 update to the National Transportation Atlas Database (NTAD) was released today with eight updated datasets.

 

NTAD is a Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) compilation of geospatial datasets representing the nation’s transportation infrastructure, containing roadways, railways, waterways, and airports.

 

The updates in this release include: rail data (North American Rail Lines and North American Rail Nodes); Highway Performance Monitoring System (HPMS) data from 2018; National Transit Map data; Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) Boundaries; Alternative Fueling Stations; Marine Highways; and National Parks.

 

 

Two datasets updated in today’s release provide an example of how NTAD can be used. The NTAD layer of alternative fuels from the Department of Energy (DOE) database may be combined with the layer of national parks from the National Park Service to show publicly accessible Direct Current (DC) fast charging electric vehicle stations located near popular national parks.

 

The 3,795 DC fast charging stations in the U.S. add 60 to 80 miles of range per 20 minutes of charging, making a full charge possible in under an hour, and enabling long distance driving. Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, and Utah, states with some of the most visited National Parks, have 280 of the DC fast charging stations. As many as 10 national parks can be accessed through what’s known as the Grand Circle route shown on the map.

 

NTAD is available for download in comma separated values (CSV), Keyhole Markup Language (KML), and shapefile formats through the BTS Geospatial Data Catalog. Additionally, Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standard Web Feature Services (WFS) (including Web Mapping Services (WMS)) are available for all NTAD datasets. Also available are optimized services that allow for fast rendering of full NTAD datasets, and vector tile services for 13 of the largest NTAD datasets. These full NTAD datasets and their respective faster services are designated by service names ending in “DS” for each layer, and the vector tiles service names ending in “VT”.

 

BTS now uses a dynamic NTAD publication cycle, making updated data available throughout the year when they become available from their respective government agencies. Follow @TransportStats on Twitter for announcements of additional dataset releases throughout the year. Contacts:  Press: Dave Smallen: (202) 366-5568. For technical information and questions: Dominic Menegus: (202) 366-8717, or email ntad@dot.gov.