Submission – Official Future Map: RTA of Southeast Michigan Regional Master Transit Plan

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Future Maps, Official Maps

Submitted by Mike Moran, who says:

Southeast Michigan’s local/regional transit plan, an ambitious 20-year, $4.6B plan to provide actual transit options to the greater Detroit area. Heavy reliance on BRT, plus a new regional rail line. One thing to note is the Woodward streetcar (nearing completion) is barely a blip at this scale.

As a side note, I’m currently in Portland for a conference (my first time here) and I love the transit system! I am extremely jealous of the system, and it has made navigating the city extremely easy for some of the more scattered events (and to get to all of the breweries).

Transit Maps says:

All the breweries, Mike? I’ve lived here for over nine years and I’ve still got so many more to explore!

But onto the map! I saw this myself this morning and was going to post about it anyway, but Mike kindly filled in the details behind the plan so that I didn’t have to. Thanks, Mike!

I love this map – it’s clean, simple, easy to understand and – most importantly – aspirational: qualities that are needed to encourage the citizens of greater Detroit to embrace the underlying transit plan. Make no mistake, it will be an uphill battle to convince enough people in this very auto-centric part of the world to vote for the additional sales tax that will provide a majority of the funding for this plan, but a map like this helps a lot. Benefits of the proposed network are outlined at every opportunity, concepts like BRT and cross-county bus services are explained clearly and concisely. A lovely minimalistic yet bold colour palette gives dynamic punch to the map, with each mode clearly visually differentiated from the others.

If I have any quibbles with the map, they’re very minor: the hard acute angles of the teal bus lines as they come into the airport seem a little at odds with the rest of the map, and the Canadian coastline perhaps seems a little lazy and indistinct compared to the Michigan side.

Our rating: Everything comes together to form a coherent, cogent argument for the plan, best summed up by the phrase “rapid, reliable, regional”. Four-and-a-half stars!

See also: this fantasy commuter rail map for southeast Michigan (May 2012, 5 stars)

Source: RTA of Southeast Michigan website

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