Submitted by Paul, who says:
A map from the Beamish Museum showing the Newcastle upon Tyne tram, trolleybus and bus network in 1949. The trams and trolleys are long gone, but the bus network is still recognisable. I used to take the number 1 through that janky Heaton route in the 2000s.
The choice of sections for the map lookup references seems very of its time too.
Transit Maps says:
A rather splendid map, with every element hand-drawn – including two charming illustrations of double-decker vehicles in the top corners. Interestingly, the main map seems to be presented at a slightly oblique angle almost as if the view was from an aeroplane high above the city. Distances along the north-south axis are somewhat compressed, and everything leans to the left a little. The bridges over the River Tyne are drawn in a way that reinforces this perspective, so the effect is quite convincing.
If you look closely at this copy of the map, you can see that someone has meticulously written in the locations of all the car barns in blue ink – I wonder who owned this map in the past?
And yes, it always amazes me how modern bus routes continue to travel over the exact same route their predecessors did so long ago!
Source: Beamish Museum
Re the map of Newcastle from Beamish – the comments added by hand in ink are actually motive power depots (sheds) on the main railway network. Gateshead was the main depot, which has long disappeared. Heaton is still around, and the car sheds at Gosforth are now part of the Tyne & Wear Metro system. The depots for Newcastle trolleybuses and ordinary buses were at Slatyford and Byker (now called Walkergate). I do not know where the trams were garaged.
One of the only benefits of buses is that you can change the network when appropriate. If the bus network is substantially unchanged over fifty years, that’s almost never a good sign. Cities change, and the transit network should evolve among with them.
For example, I live in the Boston area, and I work in Kendall Square, which is densely packed with software companies and biotech firms. Fifty years ago, it was a run down abandoned factory district. But MBTA doesn’t seem to have realized that people actually want to go there, because there are only three bus routes that go through that area. A Northwest/Southwest route that only runs at peak, and two terminating lines that come in from the Northwest.
It’s so bad that a private operator has come in to fill in these blatant service gaps. If it weren’t for the fixed infrastructure in the area (there’s a rapid transit station), the neighborhood would have stalled out in the 90s for inaccessibility.