OVERVIEW

The MBTA Rapid Transit layers represent the five subway, streetcar and bus lines in the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority’s rapid transit rail network and stations/stops. The five ‘T’ lines - Blue, Green, Orange, Red and Silver - are represented with linework in the layer MBTA_ARC. Stations are contained in a point feature class named MBTA_NODE. The layers were developed by the Central Transportation Planning Staff (CTPS). The MBTA Commuter Rail lines are included in the TRAINS layer. It should be noted that the Silver Line actually consists of buses, not trains, but the line is included in this layer because the MBTA includes it as part of its Subway system.

Original linework was acquired from 1:100,000 USGS Digital Line Graph transportation data, and updates and additions were made by CTPS staff. MassGIS performed further quality checking and updating of the station names and some adjustment of the features to ortho imagery. The Silver Line was added to the layer with the April 2004 update. As of the January 2006 update, all linework and points were provided by CTPS, replacing and arcs from the DLGs.

Older Arc/Info coverage versions had the points as a NODE feature class, but editing for the latest version was done using shapefiles, and the link between arcs and true nodes was lost. The name of the layer MBTA_NODE still uses "NODE" so that legacy MassGIS Data Viewer tables will continue to function properly.

The MBTA_ARC attribute table has the following items:

Item Name		Width/Type		Description
LINE		6 / C		BLUE, GREEN, ORANGE, RED, or SILVER
GRADE		1 / I		Grade status as follows: 1 = Above Ground, Private ROW 2 = Light Rail with Reservation in Street 3 = Light Rail/Bus in Street with Traffic or Tunnel 4 = Elevated 6 = Open Cut 7 = Underground Subway

 
The MBTA_NODE attribute table for transit station points has the following items:

Item Name		Width/Type		Description
STATION		40 / C		Name of T Station
LINE		12 / C		BLUE, GREEN, ORANGE, RED, or SILVER

In January, 2006, the Silver Line Waterfront and Airport lines and stops were added. To accommodate some new station names, the width of the STATION attribute was changed from 25 to 40. Additionally, four streetcar stops (Fordham Road, Greycliff Road, Mount Hood Road, and Summit Ave) on the 'B' branch of the Green Line were removed, and the name of one stop was changed (Brighton Ave. to Packards Corner).  The linework on the Green Line between North Station and Science Park was modified to represent the new underground configuration, and the Green Line North Station stop was moved to its current location. Also with the January 2006 update: MassGIS no longer distributes annotation feature classes; and the SOURCE field in the line layer was dropped, as all linework came from CTPS and no longer included DLG arcs.

This datalayer will be updated as needed by the Central Transportation Planning Staff.

Last Updated 1/10/2006
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