Author: Cameron Booth

Submission – Official Map: Stockholm Archipelago Ferry Network Diagram, 2021

June 30, 2021
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Submitted by Matias, who says: Waxholmsbolaget is a big ferry operator in Stockholm, connecting most of the small islands in the Stockholm archipelago. They have recently updated their line map to a very diagrammatic style. The idea is good, to make it easier to find the lines and where you are going, but it massively distorts the network and the omission of geographic features makes it very difficult to orient yourself. What do you think? […]

Official Map: Sydney Trains Bankstown Line Closure Bus Services Map… and a Better Unofficial Alternative

June 7, 2021
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Official Maps, Unofficial Maps
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Sydney’s Bankstown Line is closing for two weeks at the end of June as part of its conversion from standard heavy rail to a new and fancy high-frequency Metro line. Sydney Trains has produced the following map to help people navigate the many train replacement bus services needed to get riders around, and it’s… not great. While I understand that producing this type of map often involves a rapid turnaround with very little budget, this […]

Official Map: Klang Valley Integrated Transit System, Malaysia, 2021

May 28, 2021
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I recently came across this new diagram of rapid transit in the Greater Kuala Lumpur area, and thought it interesting enough to review. Previous official maps of this network have been very generic and slipshod, so it’s good to see an attempt to make a more distinctive and memorable diagram, though I don’t think it’s entirely successful. Overall, I think it does a decent job of depicting a sprawling network – the labelling of stations […]

Official Map: Melbourne Tram Network, 2021

May 26, 2021
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Here’s a review that’s definitely very overdue: the official Melbourne tram network diagram. Overall, it’s a very pleasantly stylised depiction of the network using 30-degree angles, though it probably takes diagrammatic expansion of the downtown area to extremes. The distance from Harbour Esplanade to Spring Street is just 2.5km (or 1.5 miles), but it takes up a huge portion of the map, shrinking Melbourne’s expansive suburbs substantially. I will say that the extra room for […]

Video: History of the MBTA’s Rapid Transit Map

May 21, 2021
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Miscellany, Official Maps
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I came across this on YouTube the other day, and thought it was definitely worth sharing. It’s quite long (clocking in at well over an hour if you include the Q&A session at the end), but there’s a lot of great insight into both the history of the MBTA map, and of Ken’s personal journey designing the map over the years. Of particular interest is how the whole redesign via a crowd-sourced contest a few […]

Submission – Historical Map: M6 Bus Route Sign, New York, c. 1975

May 13, 2021
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Historical Maps
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Submitted by Shaul Picker, who says: I have a Flickr and save these images from eBay listings and elsewhere. This is a sign from the former New York City Department of Traffic showing the M6 bus route, which was eliminated in 2010. Transit Maps says: What a great little map! While the M6 may have been eliminated in 2010, this map is much older, as evidenced by both the very 1970s typography, the use of […]

Submission – Unofficial Map of All Transmilenio Services, Bogotá, Colombia by Sergio Mejía

May 7, 2021
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Unofficial Maps
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Submitted by Sergio, who says: Hi Cameron! Some months ago I designed a map of my city Bogotá where it shows all of the services in the system in the shape of the map we know. As you know, there are a ton of services in Transmilenio, so a standard map wouldn’t work – thus each station having strip maps of the lines. However, I wanted to see how a full map would look. Of […]

Project: Diagram of Amtrak Rail Services, May 1971

April 27, 2021
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Historical Maps, My Transit Maps, Prints Available
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May 1, 2021 marks Amtrak’s 50th anniversary! On that day in 1971, most regional and long-distance trains in the United States either disappeared or became part of the new national rail carrier’s network (there were some exceptions to this rule, which we’ll get to later). While there are plenty of maps out there that show the general extent of Amtrak’s nascent system — including one that I made myself as part of an historical series […]

Submission – Fantasy Map: West Palm Beach LRT by Adam Susaneck

April 7, 2021
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Submitted by Adam, who says: Here’s my proposal for a low-floor LRT system in Downtown, West Palm Beach, FL (pop. ~110,000). It’s fun to think about as West Palm actually grew up as a fairly dense railroad town in the 1920s around the Seaboard and FEC stations. Wedged between two large lakes and the intercoastal waterway, the downtown is a fairly dense north-south oriented grid, with a mix of historic homes and apartment towers. The […]

Submission – Fantasy Future Map: North Atlantic Rail System by Nick Fabiani

March 31, 2021
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Fantasy Maps, Future Maps
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Submitted by Nick, who writes: Hi Cameron — hope you’re staying well these days. I’m pleased to submit two maps I made to capture the North Atlantic Rail System. The system is a proposed high-speed rail network to connect New England’s major hubs. In my map, I imagine it connecting to and interacting with the existing CT Rail, MBTA Commuter Rail, and Amtrak systems throughout the region. Taken in totality, you see a much more transitable […]