Now this I like!

Part of an overall identity project for MARTA that Andrew completed, here’s his stylish revision of the system map (I reviewed the official one way, way back in October 2011, giving it a pretty generous 3 stars).

The MARTA system isn’t that complex – essentially only having two intersecting trunk lines with a couple of branches – so simplifying it down and abstracting it like this works really well. The slightly muted colour palette (almost like the route line colours have been multiplied with the background grey) is quite lovely and subtle. There’s also some lovely bespoke icons for restrooms and the airport, and the legend is both comprehensive and attractive.

A couple of quibbles – the spacing of stations on the Green/Blue lines east of the main Five Points interchange could be better – Georgia State is pushed right up close to the Five Points label (the station dots are much closer to the Yellow Line than the Dome/Arena dots are to the Red Line on the other side), The way the labels drop down after the Green Line ends also creates a visual gap between Edgewood and East Lake stations. The dots may be evenly and mathematically placed along this line, but sometimes things have to be tweaked and eyeballed until they look right. I’d probably also make all the labels just a little bit bigger – there’s plenty of room and it would suit the fat, chunky look of the route lines nicely.

Finally, I love the super simple, stylised highways that sit behind the map (including a good old literal “ring road”), but I do have to make a correction: Andrew has labelled them as U.S. Routes, when they’re actually Interstate Highways – that is, it’s not “U.S. 20”, but “I-20”, etc. And I know my Interstates from my U.S. Routes!

Our rating: Pretty yummy stuff! I’d definitely click through to Andrew’s site to check out the whole rebranding project – maps, signage, trains, buses, tickets, the works! Four stars!