Here’s something that really shouldn’t work as well as it does, and yet it’s quite wonderful. I think part of the reason is that the isometric viewpoint is reminiscent of Barcelona’s actual positioning on the coast (although the real-world angle is quite a bit steeper than 30 degrees), and almost comes across as an aerial view of the city. The simple division of the map into ocean (blue), city (white) and coastal mountain range (green) also works nicely. This – combined with the the named rivers at opposite ends of the city – give a good sense of scale to the diagram, even if it’s not that geographically accurate. The distinctive station markers, sort of “reversed out” of the route line, are also quite nicely done.

Things aren’t perfect, though – my usual pet peeves of uncapitalised labels and labels set in the same colour as their route line rear their ugly heads once again. The uncapitalised labels could be excused as being a part of the distinctive look of the diagram, but it still hurts readability, especially with such a stylised typeface. (Or maybe this is one of those typefaces that eschew capital letters altogether?) The dotted line showing a future extension to join the two disparate parts of line 9 needs to have larger dots placed closer together as it’s very difficult to follow across the map at present. You could also argue that the isometric presentation forces the majority of the network to be crammed into about a third of the canvas, with a lot of empty ocean and mountain on either side, but the diagram is still quite clear even with that restriction.

Our final word: An interesting take on Barcelona’s Metro, and one that manages to be more than the sum of its parts – even with a few quirks and imperfections.

Source: Twitter