All posts filed under: Official Maps

Photo: A Washington DC Metro strip map that’s just bound to cause confusion…

March 16, 2014
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Here’s an example of an overly designed strip map that’s gone horribly wrong. This photo was taken by Bryan Rodda, who notes that the sign makes it appear that Foggy Bottom-GWU is the name of the main interchange station between the Silver, Blue and Orange Lines in the center of the photo. Anyone who knows the DC Metro system will know that the station in question is actually Rosslyn, but the map makes this horribly […]

New Official Map: Metro de Santiago, Chile, 2014

March 4, 2014
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Here’s a new map for Santiago’s extensive Metro system. I reviewed the previous one back in March of 2012, giving it a pretty generous 3 stars. In a way, this is really an evolution of the previous map, rather than a complete redesign – the routes still sit on top of a stylised street grid of the city, for example – but the execution is much more polished and stylish. The whole city has been […]

Official Map: Integrated Transit of Südtirol (Alto Adige), Italy

March 1, 2014
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Sent my way by a reader known only as “mmmaps”, here’s a map of the transit system of the northern autonomous Italian province of Südtirol (South Tyrol in English, or Alto Adige in Italian). The system is mainly made up of buses (dark blue), but there’s also a backbone of rail services between the major cities (shown in light blue) and aerial cable-cars as well. While the restrained colour palette (just blues and greys) looks quite […]

Official Map: Bus Network of Brownsville, Texas

February 18, 2014
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A strong entry into the Transit Maps Hall of Shame from Brownsville, Texas, with this map that depicts the Brownsville Urban System (or “BUS” — I see what they did there). Where to start with this awfulness? Probably with the graduated blue background that causes visual dissonance (that shimmering edge when colours clash horribly) with just about everything else on the map, especially the red street name labels! It also makes the underlying grey road network […]

Official Maps: Transportation at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics

February 11, 2014
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A few requests for these very topical maps, so here goes! The XXII Winter Games are now in full swing, but how do spectators get around? The Games are divided into two very distinct zones: the Olympic Park down by the Black Sea in Sochi itself for all the indoor sports; and the Mountain Zone, some 50 kilometres (31 miles) up into the Caucasus Mountains, where all the sports that actually require snow are held. […]

Official Map: Brussels Integrated Transit Map

February 5, 2014
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One of the most requested maps so far — thanks to thecitygeek, bjorkborg, Mladen Stilinovic and a couple of anonymous readers for sending this my way! According to my correspondents, Brussels has recently switched from a geographical transit map to this new diagrammatic map. As you can see by comparing the two images of the centre of the city above, a lot of streamlining and simplification has taken place. The first thing that strikes me is […]

Submission – Official Historical Map: MBTA Map in Chinese, c. 1985

January 30, 2014
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Submitted by Randy Wong, who says: The MBTA map in Chinese characters. These used to be posted at the Orange Line Chinatown T-stop, and also at a few of the other lines that intersected/were near Chinese speakers. There are lots of Chinese who live near Malden, Oak Grove, Chinatown, Forest Hills, Quincy, and Quincy Center T-stops, though I don’t recall which stops actually had Chinese T maps. Transit Maps says: Nice localisation of the classic […]

Submission – Official Map: Metro de Medellin, Colombia, 2014

January 30, 2014
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Submitted by Daniel Echeverri, who says: Medellin (Colombia) transit map. Downloaded from the official website of Metro de Medellin. It shows Metro Lines, Articulated Buses lines (Metroplus) and Aerial Tram lines (Metro Cable) Transit Maps says: Medellin’s transit system is fascinating because it’s one of the first places in the world to implement aerial gondolas as part of a mass transit system. Other cities may have gondolas and aerial trams, but they’re almost always deployed […]