Submitted by James, who says:

My redesign of the DC metro system, with the purple line and silver lines in their completed states. I wanted to do a Vignelli-style map of the system in DC, which I believe complements the relative simplicity of the system well.

Regarding the abolition of the red line kink on the western arm: I think one bend to indicate the kink is still sufficient and recognizable.

Transit Maps says:

James is right when he says that the minimalism of a Vignelli-style map matches the relative simplicity of the system, and overall, this is a very competent and pleasing map. However, there’s a few problems with it that I can see.

First, while the subdued colour scheme looks nice, it does reduce the contrast between the route lines quite a bit. While this is probably okay for regular users, colour-blind readers are really going to struggle. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that James hasn’t provided an alternative way to distinguish between the lines on the map. To a colour-blind user, the Red and Green lines look almost identical – without a legend to the lines and something similar to the real map’s “RL” and “GL” bullets, working out which is which for a colour-deficient rider unfamiliar with the system is going to be very hard work indeed. Personally, I’d replace James’ fare information table (which would require a reprint of the map every time the fares went up, and is information probably best left to ticket vending machines anyway) with a properly colour-coded legend to the lines.

I also think that James could have pushed the minimalism of the map further to truly embrace Vignelli’s principles of unadorned diagrammatic map design. He’s straightened out the infamous kink in the western leg of the Red Line and shows the Silver Line as being laser-straight (which it isn’t), but he’s retained the little wiggle in the Green/Yellow lines at Columbia Heights. Vignelli would almost certainly have argued that the wiggle is inconsequential information in relation to how the nodes of the network fit together and would have excised it.

Similarly, the very uneven spacing of stations along the Purple Line is something that I believe Vignelli would have addressed, even if it meant moving Fort Totten further south and respacing other stations to facilitate it. Remember: this is a diagram, not a map! As much as possible, an even, harmonious distance between stops is desired. To that end, I’d even advocate removing county lines from the map to simplify things even further: the District Diamond and the Potomac are really enough to orient users. However, if James chooses to retain county lines, then he needs to add one for Loudoun County just before the Dulles Airport station on the Silver Line.

The diagonal label for Federal Center SW looks really out of place among all those lovely horizontal labels in the centre of the map, but I’d probably make all of the labels for the Purple Line between Silver Spring and College Park angled – a necessary evil! – instead of flipping the last two back to horizontal, which kind of upsets the reading flow. Labels should always be in the “expected” place to make things easy for the reader.

Don’t get me wrong, I really like this map! However, usability for all users is a key consideration in transit map design, and homages to a particular style can be tricky to pull off well – especially something as definitive as Massimo Vignelli’s minimalist design approach.