Project: Interstate Highways as a Subway Diagram, 2020 Revision

November 21, 2020
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Ever since I first created it in 2009, my Interstates as Subway Map diagram has been one of my most popular and enduring designs. It’s consistently the best selling print in the Transit Maps store, and is something I’m incredibly proud of. However, the last major redesign of it was way back in 2011, and it’s definitely starting to show its age.

At the time, I really didn’t think I’d still be maintaining and updating it nine years down the road, so little thought was put into future-proofing the diagram – it simply reflected the network as it appeared in 2011. This meant that any addition to the Interstate system over the years has had to be shoehorned into a design that wasn’t really ever meant to accommodate it. I think I’ve done a pretty good job to keep the diagram up-to-date and looking good over the years, but I’ve decided that it’s time to completely re-evaluate and redraw the diagram from the top down.

So, without further ado, here’s the revised 2020 version of the diagram as a pannable, zoomable map (or click on this link to view it in a full browser window).

Prints for sale HERE

My goals with this version were as follows:

Future-proof the diagram as much as possible

I’ve definitely done my research this time around. Within reason, all known future expansions of the network have been taken into account and shown on the diagram as cased lines. For the first time, I-69 and all its branches in Texas (I-69C, I-69-E and I-69W) are shown in their entirety. All the little gaps in I-49 are accounted for, as is the future extension from Lafayette to New Orleans. Future I-11 is shown from Las Vegas down to Nogales, but the proposed section from Las Vegas up to I-80 is not – there are still too many alternatives on the table for it to be shown with any certainty. Other routes that are barely more than rumour (I-3, for example) are also omitted, though I’m confident that this new design can handle them if and when they become reality.

Make the design my own

The previous iterations of this diagram leaned heavily on the design language of the London Underground’s famous Tube Map – colours, station symbols, line thickness, corner curve radius and more. I’m far more confident in my own ability as a designer now, and feel that this is the time to leave that comfortable, easy solution behind and create something that’s unique and truly mine.

While the colours remain similar to visually link the different versions of the diagram, almost everything else has changed completely. Most notably, the diagram now uses Interstate – a typeface based on that used on road signs across the United States – as its primary font, a far more distinctive and appropriate choice than the previous and somewhat generic Myriad Pro Condensed. The large interchange circles and dumbbells have gone, replaced by a more elegant “one dot per route” marker at each station. This carries across to intermediate cities, which use a similar dot instead of a Tube Map-style “tick”.

Be more rigorous in my design approach

Let’s just say I’ve learned a lot about transit map design since 2011. My approach to this reworking was a lot more methodical, and my design rules were stricter and applied with far less exceptions to make things work. The diagram sits on a 96-point grid, which informs much of the spacing and alignment of the routes, as shown below.

Using this grid helped me to ensure that major highways never get too close to each other, and allows for a nice even rhythm across the entire diagram. Some areas that seemed too cramped in previous versions, like the southeastern states, definitely have more room to breathe now even with some additional future routes added to the mix. Using this grid also helped me work out some fun little design features, like the way that I-4 and I-16 form similar shapes reflected symmetrically along the axis of I-10 between them.

A lot of care was given to labelling this time around (so often an after-thought!) with route numbers always being placed as close as possible to the the relevant terminus dot for easy identification and cross referencing. While having some labels cut across route lines on a complex diagram like this is unavoidable, I’ve really tried to keep it to a minimum and I think there’s less than ten examples of it on the entire piece.

Finally, I think that the simplified outline of the United States on this version makes a more elegant and proportionately “correct” shape than before, which this animation of all three major versions of the map shows rather nicely.

As always, there are prints of this map for sale in the Transit Maps store.

What do you think of this new version? Leave your comments below, as well as any corrections or suggestions – I always value your thoughts on my work!

Historical Map: SEPTA Regional Rail Map, 1989

November 16, 2020
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Submitted by Shaul Picker, who says:

I found this map of the regional rail system in Philly from this 1989 SEPTA map to be interesting. I don’t know of any other map to use octagons. This map is notable for having “temporary” shuttle buses to Newtown and West Chester (service never returned), and for noting that service to Ivy Ridge on the R6 was “temporarily discontinued.” Service also never returned here. Note proposed stations at Claymont (which opened in 1991) and Baldwin (which never reopened) on the R2. This is one of the more aesthetically pleasing regional rail maps I have seen. You can see this and other SEPTA maps and timetables on my Flickr.

The first thing to notice here is just how much more understandable SEPTA Regional Rail service is on a diagram which doesn’t also have to show the subway and street-to-surface lines. This is a clean and simple diagram that uses some nice colour-coding to show the through-running of lines passing through the city center in the Center City Commuter Connection tunnel, which had only opened five years previously in 1984. The three stations highlighted by the unusual octagonal shapes were major components of this project.

The colour-coding is made slightly less effective by that fact that the trunk line from 30th Street all the way around to Glenside that is shared by many of the routes is represented a single grey line – it can sometimes be a little difficult to follow a route along its entire length because of this (the R2 is a good example). However, it’s a fairly simple network, so this isn’t an insurmountable problem.

The map is generally drawn well, though the R8 has to take a pretty unconvincing path from North Philadelphia up towards Chestnut Hill West, and the massively expanded central section means that the labelling gets perhaps a little too cramped towards the outer edges.

Finally, the scourge of “temporarily discontinued” rail services that never returned have rarely been laid out quite so clearly on a single map!

Want to help support the site? Head over to the Transit Maps print store and get yourself a beautiful original transit map design, or a lovingly restored reproduction vintage map from our extensive collection. All printed on high-quality 230gsm art paper with archival-quality inks.

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Source: Union Turnpike/Flickr

Unofficial Historical Map: Edinburgh Tramways, 1924 by Andy Arthur

November 5, 2020
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I came across this lovely piece this morning on Twitter, so here’s a review. This is Andy’s second stab at Edinburgh (see also this map showing an “idealised” 1940s network), and I think it’s clear to see that Andy has come along in leaps and bounds as a map designer since then.

One thing I always appreciate about Andy’s maps is how tactile they seem: they really do look like old printed maps and that’s rather lovely. It’s not just the added “folded paper” texture, but also his colour and design choices that all add up to make his pieces seem so convincingly real. This map has already fooled a few people on Twitter into thinking it’s a real 1920s relic, which is a testament to his work!

Design-wise, I love the rings of route numbers at major stops – an effective device that Andy has borrowed from a real 1924 Edinburgh tram map, but also made very much his own. Overall, the layout is nicely handled and Andy’s even made all-caps labels work well, especially considering the amount of information displayed on the map – trams, buses, main line railways, etc. And it’s not just these lines as they appeared in 1924, either: Andy’s turned this map into a full historical document and also added lines that opened after 1924 (in a nicely-recessive yellow), and lines that were planned but never actually constructed. It does require a fair bit of consulting the legend to work out exactly what some of the lines mean, as different colours and line types combine to show information, but it’s all worthwhile in the end, I think.

Our final word: Stylish and very convincing, this is a great little historical diagram that documents a period in history when tramways dominated Edinburgh’s transportation. Great work, Andy!

Source: Andy Arthur/Twitter

Submission – Tokyo Metro Rail Diagram by Sergio Mejia

November 2, 2020
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Submitted by Sergio, who says:

So I always wanted to design a diagram for Tokyo, but since it’s so complex I’d postponed it several times until one week that I had nothing to do I started tackling it from scratch, using pen and paper before moving to Affinity Designer. I chose to design a map that includes both Tokyo Metro and Toei Metro, as well as one of the main train lines and the Shinkansen services that arrive to the city. In the end I even put the Chuo Sobu Line from a recommendation a Japanese person made to my design.

Transit Maps says:

Like the London Underground and the New York Subway, making an unofficial map or diagram of Tokyo’s rail network is almost an obligatory rite of a passage for budding designers (perhaps even more so than the other two, because there’s no one “definitive version” of Tokyo’s map). Sergio’s is a particularly handsome effort, though perhaps with a few usability/design issues.

First off, I really like the way that Sergio has used the Toei Oedo Line as his main compositional element, forming a lovely distinctive symmetrical shape in the middle of the diagram that everything else relates to in much the same way that the London Underground diagram uses the Circle Line, which even forms a similar “thermos flask” shape. Most other Tokyo maps I see use the Yamanote Line for this purpose (which make sense as it encircles the city) but this can often make the central part of the map seem too cramped. It does mean that the Yamanote Line on Sergio’s map takes a slightly wobbly path (I’m not entirely convinced by the detour it takes around Shibuya), but I think it’s a decent trade-off. The spacing of stations throughout the map is even and harmonious, and the whole thing, title and legend included, feels like a well-designed, unified whole. On a complex diagram like this, labels cutting across route lines are hard to avoid, but I think Sergio has done a good job of making such labels look clean and deiberate.

I do think that the station codes are too small to be read easily, especially when they’re set in lighter colours (tiny yellow numbers on a white background!). These codes are a primary part of station identification in Tokyo, so reducing their importance so much on a map seems counter-productive. This problem also rolls over into line identification, because these tiny codes are currently the only link between the lines as named in the legend and the map itself. As always, this is especially problematic for colour-blind users.

Indicating that some of the lines offer through-running services to the Greater Tokyo area is a good idea in theory, but where do the lines actually go? An unlabelled dashed line doesn’t really tell anyone very much. As a comparison, the named Shinkansen destinations make those lines much more useful.

Our final word: A well-balanced and attractive diagram of a complex network, though the tiny station codes seem like they’ve been sacrificed for the sake of that aesthetic.

Submission – Unofficial Map: Bus Map of Boulder, Colorado by Stavros R.

October 29, 2020
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Submitted by Stavros, who says:

Hello, I just discovered your website, and I want to submit a bus transit map I made last year for the city of Boulder, CO. I hope you consider reviewing it on the blog and letting me know what I can change.

In an effort to improve quality of service, the City of Boulder has taken over and invested heavily in a few select bus routes. As a result, the city has a network of lines with BRT-like frequency on top of a network that is more focused on commuters. There are also a few seasonal high frequency routes catered for university students, and for people trying to visit public amenities like parks with minimal parking.

Transit Maps says:

I quite like this, Stavros – there’s a strong European quality to it with the large rounded-edge station rectangles and generous spacing between parallel route lines. Everything’s nice and evenly spaced and the labelling is generally good, though there’s a few too many diagonal labels for my liking. The spacing between the labels and their corresponding station symbol could be made a bit more consistent throughout: sometimes the label seems to be floating by themselves (see the stops on Lehigh down the bottom left of the map).

Normally, if you’re using the visual device of a route line passing above a station marker to mean “does not stop here”, it’s a good idea to call that out specifically in the legend, as it can be a little ambiguous (as it is visually stronger than the lines that pass beneath the marker, it can seem more important on first reading).

Similarly, when a route line passes through one of the larger station rectangles, I think it’s important to always keep it in the same relative position when it emerges on the other side. It’s harder for a user to trace a route line through a station if it keeps moving around visually. This is especially important if the line changes direction at the station!

After that, it’s just some minor things: the city boundary is a bit rough here and there, especially the slight off-kilter angle it takes next to the legend box down the bottom left. The route number boxes at terminating stops should really all be slightly separated from each other to improve legibility. The legend itself could have more consistent spacing between its headers and subsequent content.

Side note: The frequent service routes are called Hop, Skip, Jump, Bound, and Dash? Now that’s taking a theme and running with it (pun totally intended).

Historical Map: Proposed Mass Transit System, Milwaukee WI, 1948

October 27, 2020
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Milwaukee dreaming big in the last days of rail-based mass transit in that city. I can’t find many specifics about this plan, though I do know that the City was attempting to purchase the transit lines in Milwaukee from its private operators at the time, so this study may have something to do with that.

On this map, the thin black lines represent local services, probably a mix of diesel bus, “trackless trolley” and streetcar lines at this point in time. The thick black lines show the Speedrail lines to Waukesha and Hales Corner, the last remnants of a once-extensive electric interurban system. A series of horrific crashes on the Speedrail in 1949 and 1950 spelled the end of these interurban lines, and they closed permanently in 1951.

The green lines are noted as “express lines” in the legend, although the mode of transit to be employed is not noted here. Possibly trolleybuses or upgraded legacy streetcar lines?

Not shown is the North Shore Line that ran between Milwaukee and Chicago, probably because the City was not attempting to purchase that line.

Source: UWM Libraries

Submission: Pixies/Throwing Muses Subway Map by Brian

October 23, 2020
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Submitted by Brian, who says:

A few years back I made a quick sketch for my friend showing the relationships between Pixies and Throwing Muses and their associated bands. For her recent birthday I made this subway map version for her, because, of course I did. Who doesn’t want a subway map for their birthday?

Transit Maps says:

Any resemblance to my mid-1990s CD collection is entirely coincidental, I assure you!

I like this, Brian – the subway map design metaphor is appropriately employed for once, but you’ve also given a nice designery pop-art feel to the piece as well. I particularly like the interplay between the warm “Pixies” and cool “Throwing Muses” colours across the map, and the interconnected “engagement” rings for Kristen Hersh and Fred Abong are a really nice touch as well.

I’m off to listen to Surfer Rosa now, I think.

Official Map: New York MTA Real-Time Digital Subway Map, 2020

October 20, 2020
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The MTA released a beta version of a new online real-time subway map this morning, supposedly a fusion between the design sensibilities of the Vignelli diagram and the modern subway map’s geographical pragmatism. There’s certainly been a big PR push, with effusive articles being written about it and even a mini-documentary film by Gary Huswit of Helvetica fame. With all this hoopla, I had to go investigate myself… and I came away unimpressed.

First things first: the map is as slow as heck in Chrome on my iMac, and barely works at all in Safari, neither of which are particularly encouraging starts. It does run somewhat better on mobile, but we’ll have to see if the speed on desktop computers improves over the next few days, as it’s not really usable at present.

The main selling point of this map is that it has the clarity of a diagram but the fidelity of a geographical map – “The best of both worlds!” the articles happily proclaimed this morning – but the reality is more like “Jack of all trades; master of none.” As much as I try, I simply can’t see any real benefit to this approach.

A geographical base map is meant to give veracity to the data layers above it, grounding them in the real world. And this is true – for the station locations, which are fairly accurately placed. However, the paths the subway lines take between these points often bear no relation to the base map, or even reality. Let’s take a look at the services that travel across the Manhattan Bridge between Manhattan and Brooklyn – the B, D, N and Q. Because of the simplified paths drawn, the B and D completely miss the bridge – clearly shown on the base layer underneath it – and seem to cross the river in a new, previously undiscovered tunnel. And inexplicably, the N and Q don’t cross the river anywhere near the Manhattan Bridge, but continue all the way down to lower Manhattan and apparently share the same tunnel as the 4 and 5 to get to Brooklyn! The station order is correct – Canal Street to DeKalb Avenue – but the route taken on the map to get there is sheer insanity.

This kind of stuff appears randomly all over the map: some lines follow the roads that they’re aligned to in real life fairly faithfully, while others stair-step their way to their destination like a 90-degree-angle-only diagram. All of the lines down to Coney Island are treated differently and it’s a visual nightmare. In real life, it’s a straight shot from Brighton Beach to Coney Island/Stillwell Avenue – look what the diagram does:

Quite frankly, there’s really no reason for this map to be diagrammatic at all outside of Manhattan – which, owing to its famous grid forms a diagram naturally. Most of the lines out in the boroughs follow a road (either elevated or dug cut-and-cover), so why not just follow them accurately and honour the base map? It’d be a more consistent approach than the “sometimes but not always” approach that’s currently been taken.

Next, let’s consider the design language of the diagram, which has fairly obviously been cribbed straight from the modern iteration of the Vignelli diagram. However, because the diagram is placed on a sprawling geographical base map instead of being a compact schematic, all the elements render too small at all but the most zoomed-in levels. The route lines are thin, the station dots are too small and the itty-bitty letters that designate services at each station are almost completely impossible to read. And once you zoom in close enough to be able to see these properly, you lose the ability to read the whole map in order to work out connections. It’s really not great, usability-wise.

There’s technical problems too: parallel 45-degree curves don’t nest properly, some route lines appear slightly on top of others at certain zoom levels, some stations sit directly on changes of direction, corner radii are inconsistently applied (and missing altogether in many locations, despite a big deal being made about the “smooth curves” present in the map). This is stuff only a wonk like me notices, but it still leaves an unfavourable first impression.

That said, the way the map can display real-time train information and adapt on the fly to service changes is certainly very impressive, as is the way more or less information is displayed depending on the zoom level. I particularly like the way that the individual service lines roll up into single trunk lines at the most zoomed-out views. It seems to me that the technology behind the map is pretty solid and is the real “revolutionary” part of this service, but the presentation of it definitely needs some polishing and refinement, because this is pretty poor and inconsistent at the moment.

Source: MTA Live Subway Map

Historical Map: Tokyo Subway Map, 1963

October 17, 2020
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A scanned slide showing a section of a wall-mounted Tokyo Metro map at a station (possibly Tokyo, judging by the dirty finger marks concentrated there). The lines of the Tokyo Metro are rendered in thick, bold colours that match pretty well with the current designations – yellow/gold for the Ginza Line, red for the Marunouchi Line, and grey/silver for the Hibiya Line. The competing Toei Subway’s Asakusa Line is not rendered in its modern pink/rose colour, but as a thinner navy blue line: it’s simply labelled as “Tokyo Municipal Sub Way” on the legend (see this image that shows more of the map) as it was the only Toei line in operation at the time.

The map itself is pretty chaotic, with lines headed in just about every direction imaginable, but it has a kind of naive charm to it. In a way, the neat ring of the Yamanote Line (passing across the horizontal middle of this image) defines the shape of the map: because it’s rendered as a rounded rectangle, all the subway lines have to take erratic paths to fit!

It is interesting to note that the station names are set in Futura Bold inside a bold ring of the line’s colour – something that has become a major part of the wayfinding system for the subways in Tokyo today. Each line is designated a letter – “G” for Ginza, for example – that is always shown as Futura Bold inside a thick ring of that line’s colour. It’s definitely very interesting to see the start of that evolution here.

Source: University of Utah Digital Collections

Submission – Official Map: TranGo Route Map, Okanogan, Washington

October 6, 2020
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Submitted by Aaron, who says:

Worst map? High quality map I found while researching random rural transportation systems in the middle of nowhere across the country. I have to say, their website design is not much better either.

Transit Maps says:

It’s all so easy to look at this very basic map and say that it’s terrible, but we do need to be mindful that these small regional transit services operate on shoestring budgets with minimal staff and resources. Looking at the metadata of the PDF, I can see that it’s been produced in Microsoft Publisher (not really a first choice for transit map design!) and the name attached to the “Author” field is that of TranGo’s General Manager – it looks like they wear a lot of different hats within the organization if they’re the ones producing the timetable brochure and map!

One thing the map does do really well within its simple framework is differentiate between its routes by using shapes as well as colour – meaning that it’s actually quite accessible for colour-blind users, even if the method employed is a little unconventional.

I’d also argue that the simplicity doesn’t matter that much, as the geography of this part of Washington means that there’s really only one way to get from one town to another: Okanogan to Twisp? State Highway 20. Brewster to Okanogan? U.S. Highway 97. And so on. In a way, this little diagram is simply a quick way of showing which towns are directly connected by bus services and no more, and in that it generally succeeds. There is a more detailed interactive map available on TranGo’s website which shows full routes, bus stops and schedule information, so this map isn’t the be-all-and-end-all of map from the agency.

I will also say that the TranGo logo is quite nice, though perhaps it’s uncomfortably similar to the previous SFMTA logo (which itself was accused of plagiarism at the time it was introduced).

Our final word: No, it’s not great – but it does the job in the context it’s used in (an introductory brochure about transit in the area) and the constraints it was produced under.

Source: TranGo website