After posting a photo of a vintage Cleveland RTA rapid transit map, I was curious as to what the current map looked like. Oh dear. Maybe I shouldn’t have looked. Have we been there? No. What we like: Sadly, the best thing about this map is the nicely retro-styled RTA agency logo. As for the rest… What we don’t like: Multiple angles for route lines instead of the standard 45-degrees looks messy and poorly thought […]
Here’s an interesting comparison of three different postcards of the Paris Métro system – one of which uses the official RATP artwork, and two more which definitely don’t. All three are of similar vintage (from at least 2007, as they all show the southern end of Line 14 at Olympiades station, which opened in that year). So they’re all basically showing the same thing, but take different approaches towards it. The first postcard uses the […]
Time to get away from North America and Europe and head further afield… about as far afield as you can go, actually! Here’s the system map for Auckland, New Zealand’s commuter rail system. This map, available from the MAXX website, seems to be based off the map they place above doors in the actual train carriages. This explains the horizontal format which skews the Southern Line out to the right of the map instead of […]
Apparently, these strip maps are fairly new. I’m all in favour of wayfinding elements that help people plan their journey, but there’s some parts of this that definitely make this feel like a first draft, rather than a finished piece. The overlapping terminus dots at Millbrae and Daly City look a little odd, and the giant silhouette of a BART train indicating direction of travel is almost totally unnecessary. The real problem, though, is the […]
Time for another entry in the Worst Map Contest, and this one, from Tulsa, Oklahoma, is right up there with the very worst. Have we been there? No, and on the evidence of this map, I’m not sure I want to. What we like: I will say that the labelling of the street grid along the edges is actually a very clever idea that frees up the centre of the map for the routes. What […]
Budapest boasts the second oldest underground metro line in the world: its Line 1 (Yellow Line) dates from 1896 and was added the the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2002. Only the London Underground predates it. Wikipedia also claims (without attribution, unfortunately) that Budapest’s comprehensive tram service has the busiest “traditional city tram line” in the world where tram lines 4 and 6 combine, with the world’s longest passenger trams (54-metre long Siemens Combino units) […]
One of the best things about this blog is finding people out there who — like me — aren’t always satisfied with the status quo and want to improve on the transit maps that are out there. Take these maps of the EmX* bus rapid transit system in Eugene/Springfield, Oregon. The first one is the current system map issued by the Lane Transit District. While it’s functional enough, it’s certainly not very exciting. I always […]
By all accounts, the Utah Transit Authority’s rail system is a modern and successful one. However, this is something you’d never guess from their system map, which is one of the most cobbled-together, unprofessionally done maps I’ve ever seen. Have we been there? Yes, but I’ve never caught the train there. What we like: The required information is there to be found if you can bear to look at the map long enough. What we […]
One type of map we haven’t covered yet here at Transit Maps is the night services map, often considered a very poor relation to the main map. However, there are some excellent examples out there, especially this black and yellow beauty from the city of Zurich in Switzerland. Have we been there? No. What we like: Graphically very striking with its black and yellow colour scheme. Good differentiation between bus and train services accomplished by […]
Just as I post about the in-car maps on Portland, Oregon’s MAX trains, I notice that TriMet has just released a new version (pardon the bad cell phone photo; I was getting off the train as I snapped it!). The new map has two important changes from the previous one: JELD-WEN Field is correctly named (instead of the old PGE Park – showing exactly why commercial names on transit maps are a Bad Idea), and […]
