Hello, I have an interest in maps and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). If you use a Delorme mapping product or Microsoft Streets & Trips then you use a form of GIS.
I recently discovered that US DOT puts out a Transportation Atlas in ESRI Shapefile format. This includes railroad information from the Federal Railroad Administration. I was able to use the free arcExplorer program from ESRI to generate maps of railroads around Montgomery County with names of control points and interlockings. The NTAD has two sets of railroad data with one set for small scale maps and one set for large scale maps. The detailed file set of railroad data for the whole country chokes arcExplorer and I need to use the files split by DOT region. The other set with less data points works okay. To make maps you need to download several files including US State boundaries. Symbols, colors, and the field used for the labels are selected by the user. The arcExplorer functions are pretty basic but useful enough. I made up a color-coded map showing railroads in the Montgomery Co Area in JPG format and currently looking for a good place to upload it for other festers. I am having fun figuring out the Montgomery County Railroads and frequencies they use. The split of Conrail resulted in CSX, NS, and ConRail SSA getting different lines and trackage rights on other lines. According to the NTAD information SEPTA owns the tracks on the R5 line going north to Lansdale and CSX owns another line from Ft Washington to Lansdale to Doylestown. North of Lansdale SEPTA owns the tracks through Telford but does not run commuter rail over it. CSX has trackage rights to the SEPTA line and uses the Lansdale Yard (North of Railroad Plaza and the Kugel Ball). The SEPTA R5 segment from Lansdale to Doylestown is via trackage rights on the CSX line. CSX has to use the NS owned "Harrisburg Line" to get to Ft Washington. It is also neat to create maps with only placenames, county boundaries with names, and state boundaries with names. Now when I travel to Dayton I can figure out where the hundreds of Ohio counties are! :) National Transportation Atlas Database 2006 http://www.bts.gov/publications/national_transportation_atlas_database/2006/ ESRI arcExplorer http://www.esri.com/software/arcexplorer/index.html National Atlas Mapmaker - A web-based map site that uses GIS. http://www.nationalatlas.gov/natlas/Natlasstart.asp My current plan is to overnight in Allentown tuesday night so I can get Sho Fly Pie and listen to some NS Allentown Yard communications. Most of the drive through NJ and PA is likely to be listening to railroads. Wednesday after getting the Philly Cheesesteak (witout) and visiting the Kugel Ball I may go into Philly on the R5 route. 73 Eric _______________________________________________ Swlfest mailing list [email protected] http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/swlfest To unsubscribe: Send an E-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], or visit the URL shown above. For more information on the Fest, visit: http://www.swlfest.com http://swlfest.blogspot.com
