Month: January 2012

Official Map: Métro de Montréal, Québec, Canada, 2012

January 31, 2012
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Requested by pomme-poire-peche Montréal’s Metro map instantly stands out from the crowd  by virtue of its black background – a feature only rarely seen in transit maps. Although the idea of a subway serving Montréal was first tabled in the early 1900s, it wasn’t until 1966 that it finally opened. Have we been there? No. What we like: Graphically bold and clean. Black background and subdued colour for the waterways really allow the thick, colourful […]

Official Map: Singapore MRT/LRT System Map, 2012

January 29, 2012
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Singapore’s Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system only opened in 1987, but has expanded greatly since then and now boasts 90 stations and almost 150 kilometres of lines. It is supplemented by the LRT, which is not a true light rail system, but is more like an automated people mover that serves the high density apartment blocks prevalent in land-poor Singapore. In earlier versions of the map, I believe that the stylised “S” logo in the […]

Tutorial: Adobe Illustrator’s ‘Round Corners’ Effect and Transit Maps

January 28, 2012
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In my earlier post about drawing a transit map, I made mention of the fact that Adobe Illustrator’s “Round Corners” effect doesn’t work very well with multiple curves around a corner, such as parallel route lines changing direction together on a transit map. This part of my post elicited a very interesting comment from Chris Helenius in Finland that there are ways to get matching curves around a corner when using the Round Corners effect. […]

Official Map: Boston MBTA Rapid Transit/Key Bus Routes Map, 2012

January 23, 2012
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I haven’t really looked at the Boston MBTA map since I was there for a few days in the middle of 2008, but I certainly don’t remember it looking as bad as this. I’ve always been mildly annoyed by the fact that not all the stations on the surface street sections of the Green Line are labelled, but my overall impression back then was of a solid, well-designed map. Just a few short years later, […]

Fantasy Map: Chicago “L” Overlaid On New York City

January 21, 2012
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A bit of whimsy for you today from Reddit, brought to my attention by Twitter user @GordonWerner. The “L” has been flipped both horizontally and vertically, then rotated to fit Manhattan’s street grid, but the scaling is accurate. It looks like The Loop is placed in the area directly below Central Park. A few things from this: it’s actually kind of scary how well this fits; and it’s astounding just how dense the New York […]

Official Map: LVB, Leipzig, Germany, 2012

January 17, 2012
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In a way, this map of Leipzig reminds me quite a bit of Viteks Bariševs’ recently featured map of Riga: both feature an extensive tram/streetcar/bus network shown in a highly diagrammatic form. However, this highly detailed map goes one step further in that it also shows frequency of services. The thicker the route line, the more often it arrives, regardless of travel mode. This solution is so devastatingly simple, it’s a wonder it isn’t used […]

Unofficial Map: Unified Transit Map of Riga, Latvia by Viteks Bariševs

January 13, 2012
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Yesterday morning, I got an interesting email from Viteks Bariševs in response to my assertion that transit maps rarely show completely different transit modes (bus and rail, mainly) on the same map due to their differing natures. He is working on a totally unified transit map for Riga – and that includes showing a staggering 53 bus routes, 19 trolleybus routes and 9 tram routes – a monumental task! His map certainly looks impressive, showing […]

Unofficial Map: Paris RER Line B as the Eiffel Tower by Sonoko Hagiwara

January 12, 2012
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Words cannot express just how much I love this cleverly thought of, deftly executed and incredibly cute rendering of Paris’ RER Line B as the Eiffel Tower. Hagiwara has drawn her inspiration from the official RER line diagram, with the bifurcation of the line becoming the “legs” of the tower. Almost seems like a clever advertisement for the RER, and only took her 20 minutes to execute! Source: Sonoko Hagiwara – link no longer active

Official Map: Sao Paulo Metropolitan Transport Network, 2012

January 10, 2012
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Unusually, this map from the Brazilian metropolis of Sao Paulo shows services offered by completely different transportation companies on the same map. To my mind, this type of integrated map needs to be used more often – travelers don’t necessarily care who offers the service, they just want to know if they can get from point A to point B. Have we been there? No. What we like: Comprehensive and all-encompassing. Great legend, even if […]

Historical Map: Harry Beck’s 1961 Victoria Line Tube Map Proposal

January 8, 2012
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It seems I’m having a London Underground kind of week… When people ask me what my favourite version of the London Tube Map is, I always show them this. By 1961, Harry Beck was no longer responsible for producing the Tube map, it having been forcibly passed on to Harold Hutchison. However, more out of hope than anything else, he continued to produce new mockups of the map which he passed on to London Transport […]