On June 8, 1996, MARTA added a new branch of the North-South Line, with stations at Buckhead, Medical Center, and Dunwoody.[1] To distinguish the two lines, the line to Dunwoody assumed the North-South Rail Line name,[3][4] while the line to Doraville became the Northeast-South Rail Line[5] (sometimes known as the Northeast Line for short).[3] However, both the North-South Line and the Northeast Line continued to be colored on maps in orange as a single North-South Rail Line[3][6] until December 2006, when the North-South Line began to be colored as red, and the Northeast Line as orange.[7]
In October 2009, MARTA introduced a color-coded system of naming rail lines, with the Northeast Line being renamed to the Yellow Line, and the color orange falling out of use.[8][9] The Yellow Line name would remain in use until February 2010, when, due to the "Yellow Line" name being controversial among the large Asian-American community along the line, it was renamed to the Gold Line.
Now known as the Gold Line, it shares trackage with its counterpart, the Red Line, between the Airport and just north of the Lindbergh Center.
Future
On March 25, 2024, Andre Dickens, the mayor of Atlanta, announced plans for four new infill stations on the MARTA rail network, with one of them, Murphy Crossing, being a station on the Red and Gold Lines' shared section. Murphy Crossing will be on the west side of the Atlanta Beltline.[10] On April 11, Dickens announced that another one of the four proposed stations will also be shared by the Red and Gold Lines: namely, Armour Yards, located near the similarly-named Armour Yard.[11]
Line description
The Gold Line runs above ground, at grade and below ground in various portions of its route. It begins at the northeastern terminus, Doraville station in Doraville. The nonrevenue tracks extend northeastward from the station north of I-285. It then goes southwestward paralleling Peachtree Road in DeKalb County. Upon entering Atlanta in Buckhead, it crosses over the Red Line in the median of GA 400 before joining the Red Line, going southwest paralleling I-85. It turns south through Midtown and enters downtown Atlanta, where it meets the Blue and Green Lines at Five Points station. Leaving downtown, the Gold Line continues south, paralleling Lee Street and Main Street into East Point and College Park before reaching its terminus at the Airport station.
Naming controversy
When the color-based name change was proposed, it was the Yellow Line at first. However, in February 2010, the name was revised to Gold in order to address a concern among the Asian-American residents along the rail corridor.[12] The section of the Gold Line that is not shared by the Red Line has a significant number of Asian-American residents, to whom the term "yellow" is considered racist.[12] Despite the color name change, interestingly many MARTA system maps denoted the Gold Line with the yellow color still until 2017.
