All posts filed under: Historical Maps

Historical Map: LNER Northumberland and Durham Quad Royal Poster, 1934

October 11, 2013
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Painted by prolific transport poster artist Montague B. Black, this lovely poster shows the services of the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) in England’s north east in 1934. The view stretches from Middlesborough all the up the Northumberland coast to the Scottish Borders and beyond. Each city is painted in imprecise but evocative detail, as is Hadrian’s Wall, shown stretching from Carlisle to Newcastle across the centre of the map. The late afternoon colour […]

Historical Map: Rapid Transit for San Francisco: Monorail Alternative, 1952

October 7, 2013
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Well, thank goodness this never eventuated. Can you imagine an elevated monorail running down the length of Market Street? From a 1952 San Francisco Public Utilities Commission report entitled Rapid Transit for San Francisco: Monorail, Elevated, Subway? A Report of Possibilities. Source: Eric Fischer/Flickr

Historical Map: Tramways and Trolleybus Routes of Shanghai, 1939

October 3, 2013
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At first glance, this appears to be a basic map outlining tram and trolleybus routes within Shanghai’s International Settlement, dated December 1939. It’s only when you read the legend that you start to realise the greater historical context of this map. The statement that accompanies the dotted route lines in the legend simply states “No service in operation at present due to circumstances beyond the company’s control” – an massive understatement of the volatile situation in Shanghai […]

Historical Map: San Diego “Park Line” Bus Route Map, June 1978

October 1, 2013
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Looks like tightly-spaced Avant Garde was totally in vogue in 1978 (see also this Portland, Oregon bus map). This is a charmingly naive little map, complete with scratchy pen and ink drawings of points of interest, a lovely ornate north pointer (another 1970s typeface with some great swashes!) and an adorable little green hand pointing at the downtown inset. It even clearly shows all relevant street names and interchanges with other routes. What’s not to […]

Historical Map: TriMet Bus System Map, Portland, Oregon, 1978

September 27, 2013
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Not much use for route planning: this map was really made just to show how the routes that ran into the city centre were grouped into geographic regions and denoted by a colour and an icon. While stops along the transit mall are now marked with boring old letters, back then these cheery and oh-so-1970s symbols guided you to the bus stop you needed. Also very 1970s: the tightly-kerned Avant Garde typeface. Source: TriMet’s “How […]

Historical Map: Boston Rapid Transit Map, early 1980s

September 25, 2013
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Submitted by “Some Assembly Required” who says: I’ve been enjoying your site for some time and recently remembered that I have an old MBTA system map in my basement. It came into my possession via a roommate over 20 years ago; I’m not sure how that person came to have it, but it probably wasn’t entirely legal. It’s a piece of metal (some sort of tin?) so I believe it was removed from a station. […]

Submission – Historical Map: Bus Network, Beijing, China, c. 1950

September 24, 2013
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A very rudimentary and crudely printed bus map from Beijing in the early 1950s. Identifying landmarks seem to consist solely of the city’s ancient inner and outer fortified walls (which were about to be mostly torn down by this time) and what looks like the outline of the Temple of Heaven towards the bottom of the map. The original forum post (see source below) says that some of the routes shown here are still numbered […]

Historical Map: Street Railways, City of Washington, D.C., 1891

September 24, 2013
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As the first segment of the new DC Streetcar on H Street and Benning Road nears completion, here’s a look back at what existed a long, long time ago. As can be seen at this time, no fewer than ten streetcar companies operated in the District. By 1895, Congress authorised consolidation of the companies and the larger, more successful systems bought out the smaller ones. The map itself is very handsome, with the distinctive grid of […]

Historical Map: Tramways System of Perth, Australia, 1920

September 20, 2013
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An absolutely lovely official government map of Perth’s burgeoning tram network in 1920. The Western Australian state government had taken over the system from private operators just a few years prior to this. The alternating colours along the routes would seem to indicate fare segments, at a penny per segment. Five pence fare to Nedlands! The map is beautifully drawn, and has two cleverly integrated insets to show the longer routes out to Osborne Park […]

Historical Fantasy Map: The Gospel Temperance Railroad Map, 1908

September 20, 2013
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Starting from the city of “Decisionville” in the “State of Accountability”, our commuter must make up his mind (Decisionville, get it?) as to which line to take: the “Great Celestial Route” to salvation, the “Way That Seemeth Right” that totally isn’t, or the ominous “Great Destruction Route” leading – predictably – to “The City of Destruction”. Scenic detours can be had through charmingly named towns like Grumblemore, Lewd Castle, Crap Hollow and Treasondale. Perhaps a […]