A few weeks ago, i made a fairly rough strip map of almost all Bay Area passenger rail services using some pens and graph paper. I was wondering if you’d like to review it?
Transit Maps says:
A nice effort at a Bay Area-wide topological diagram, Fern! It certainly fits into the long, narrow proportions of your average strip map nicely. I particularly like the use of a “half-grid” for the local Muni Metro services. Of course, labelling everything on a compact diagram like this can be tricky, so it’d be interesting to see how well this concept stands up under that load.
Here’s a great mid-20th Century planning map showing proposed extensions to the Stockholm Metro in 1965. The blue lines show what was already built (or about to be built) at the time, while the different types of green lines show proposed additions at varying levels of planning: solid for planned, dashed for an extension without a full alignment study, and dotted for unstudied alternative extensions. It’s definitely interesting to compare this map to what has been built out in reality!
This transit map (in brochure form) covers the bus network in the area stretching from Canmore to Lake Louise in Alberta, about 80 km from end to end. There’s a lot of information to unpack in here, but here’s a few things we found particularly interesting or worth noting:
Public Transit Banff National Park
A lot of schematic maps try to simplify geometry in order to make the relation between routes and the lines more interesting to follow. This map, on the other hand, actually makes it more complicated, showing the Trans-Canada Highway doing a full 180 around Tunnel Mountain in order to fit the mountain on the page without an inset, while in reality it only does about 90 degrees before continuing on to Canmore.
It’s easy to miss just how far apart these towns really are, from looking at this map. Many commuter transit maps relax the scale a lot as they get into suburbs, but there’s about a 16:1 difference in scale in this map! Between the junction of the TCH and the Bow Valley Parkway (highway 1A) in the bottom left, and the Lake Louise Park and Ride, is close to 48 kilometers, while the part of Canmore depicted on this map is only about 3 km long in its entirety.
You’ll note that they recorded the actual distances between several locations on the map, to help get a sense of scale. It’s got to be a very difficult challenge to properly convey those distances without losing too much resolution.
Many of the locations on this map, especially on the seasonal routes, are tourist destinations, reflecting the tourist-heavy interest, particularly in the summer, in the area.
Different shapes of stop markers are used to indicate dropoff-only and pickup-only stops. This is neat, as marker shape doesn’t seem to be a common place to put variation, but it’s doesn’t add much visual busyness and it gives us fond feelings of Mini Metro. In some places (such as the Benchlands Trail overpass in Canmore) it can be difficult to tell if a marker is a circle or square, though.
It’s not clear what the hatching (don’t know the technical terms) on parts of the Moraine Lake and On-It services is for. This is commonly used to indicate future construction, but this makes no sense in context. We actually can’t figure it out for sure, but it looks like the Moraine Lake route is distinguishing between the incoming and outgoing routes, and trying to indicate that there isn’t through service, while on the On-It service it seems to be trying to distinguish between the trips which do and do not serve Canmore (see the schedule).
The Canmore local Roam route 5 service doesn’t appear on this map, probably in part because this map is by Parks Canada rather than the Bow Valley Regional Transit Commission, and partly for space reasons. (It’s worth noting that we couldn’t find a full-system map from the BVRTC for their Roam services.)
The map sets out full service and fare details of the various routes, including what you can bring with you on the bus, no doubt in part because of the tourist audience and in part because there is very little in the way of regularity to the fares and service dates.
The thinner lines in the inset area in Banff to let them fit in is a nice touch.
Stops served in both directions are inconsistently notated with either both arrows (in Lake Louise area) or none (elsewhere).
The area is beautiful and absolutely a destination worth visiting if you get the chance, although the crowds are getting pretty bad these days.
Transit Maps says:
First off, my apologies to Alexis — this map has been sitting in my queue for ages, and I really should have gotten to it earlier.
Yes, this map has some problems with variable scale and the draftsmanship is a little dodgy in places (there’s some very unconvincing curves around corners), but I’m going to give it full marks for getting this kind of information out there. As National Parks around the world get more and more popular, we need to find ways to cut down on the use of single-occupancy vehicles within the parks themselves. A brochure/map like this that makes public transportation in and around the park look easy and accessible is only to be commended.
Like Alexis, I particularly like the comprehensive table at the bottom left that clearly outlines all the fare and service details for all the routes — this is great information for potential riders to have. If anything, I’d like to see more emphasis given to the cost-effectiveness of buying multi-day passes for the Roam network ($12 for three days is a pretty good deal!), so that people can make educated decisions about their transportation choices.
The differing scales in the map could perhaps be dealt with by drawing break lines across the Trans-Canada Highway between the major areas, just to make it clear that the distances between them are larger than shown. The inclusion of distances as labels does mitigate the need for this a bit, though.
The inset of Banff almost feels unnecessary — it adds very little detail to the depiction of the town on the main map, and almost seems to have been included just to fill up an otherwise empty space.
The “pecked” lines (to use the official term, Alexis) really do just seem to be used to say that not every bus follows this route — it’s more obvious for the brown On-It route to Calgary, as not every bus stops at Canmore, so we have to assume it retains the same meaning for the Moraine Lake service.
I would have refrained from placing the TCH “Route 1” maple leaf directly over intersections — it makes it hard to follow routes through the intersection, especially coming out of Banff itself.
Our final word: A very serviceable map that does a good job of outlining transit options in and around Banff. A little more polish would really make it sing. Three stars.
This is the official system map for my hometown’s transit agency, Mataró Bus. It operates an 8-line bus system with frequencies up to 15 minutes, 365 days a year.
The map itself has undergone a small revamp in 2020, due to minor route changes for lines 3 and 4. Maps of individual lines are also available, as excerpts from the global map.
Mataró is a coastal town 30 km (20 mi) from Barcelona and has some 130,000 inhabitants, covering a total area of 22 sq km (8.7 sq mi). Some suburbs expand to the north (not shown on the map), but they lack regular public transport. The agency’s official ridership figure for 2019 was 4.5 million trips.
Transit Maps says:
A fairly standard bus map here, with routes overlaid on a simplified, ghosted-back street map, which has been rotated quite a bit clockwise to match the local perception of north as being away from the coast. It’s mainly notable for two things:
First, it illustrates the problem of having a lot of concurrent routes on a geographical map, as the routes become much, much wider than the street they’re meant to be travelling along. In places, there are six out of eight possible routes travelling along the same route.
Second, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a bus network where every route is some form of loop. While only lines 1 and 2 get named officially as “Circle Lines”, all the others aren’t far off. It’s almost certainly a by-product of getting buses along narrow city streets, but it sure looks odd on a map!
Our final word: Unremarkable and just about tolerable as a system overview map, but fortunately supported by clearer single maps on the agency website. 2 stars.
This is a redesign project of the Taipei Metro Map with aims to enhance the legibility.
I first tried to make something like this three years ago, when I was a college student. Back then, to pursue an excellent looking, I gave up a lot of detailed information and lower the font size, the result looks cool but yet not practical (the older version).
After three years, I think it’s time to do it again. I did some in-depth research this time regarding the fonts, colors, icons, and structure of lines, which resulted in a bilingual universal version and two extended versions. If you are interested in it, please take a look at the full project.
Transit Maps says:
There’s a lot to like about this reworking of the Taipei Metro map, especially the use of a very strong unifying grid and some lovely typographical choices. Clan Pro is both more visually interesting than Helvetica, and has a larger x-height for better legibility — I like it! The consistency in label placement certainly makes it easy to follow names along the route lines, though I’m not sure I agree with centring names above station dots on the diagonal part of the Yellow/Circle line as it causes the labels to cut across the line for some names.
The bullet for the western end of the Circle Line is placed too far away from its station, and isn’t consistent with the way other bullets are placed. I’m also curious as to whether this map has been future-proofed for the eventual final routing of the Circle Line (though I understand some of the alignment hasn’t been finalised yet).
My main concern with the map is the removal of the line letters from station codes. While it could be seen as redundant to label every station along a line with a letter prefix, I think it’s actually valuable to help colour-blind users to quickly follow a route line from end to end. While it’s possible to work things out by counting numbers and a bit of trial and error, that’s not a great user experience. Bear in mind that red and green look almost identical to a colour-blind person, so Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall station — where both the Red and Green lines change direction — could be particularly problematic.
A few more thoughts: A note that the Airport line continues on to Huanbei would be nice. Similarly, labels telling you where the HSR and TRA lines actually go would be welcome (the official map shares this problem). And while I can see why Memphis has removed this information, I do miss the little diagrams on the official map that explain the short-run service patterns on the Red, Green and Blue lines.
Our final word: Overall, a rather lovely reworking! It’s definitely worth your while to head over to Memphis’ project page to read about his design rationale.
The Melbourne suburban train network just after the City Loop opened in 1981. This is probably my favourite map of this particular network: it’s clean and graphically simple — black dots are all that are used to indicate parking, not a graphical vehicle icon or even a “P” in a circle. The colours are nice and bright and group the lines into operational groups quite neatly… an approach I prefer far more than the zone-based colours that Melbourne went to in the 1990s.
The vertical labels for Spencer Street and Parliament stations on the Loop are unfortunate and probably could have been avoided with a little more thought. The least successful element is probably the hollow dashed lines to indicate co-ordinated bus routes, which seem a little vague to be useful to the uninitiated. Regular commuters would probably get along just fine, however.
Here’s the official Koleje Dolnośląskie (Lower Silesia, PL) scheme with regional railway lines.
Transit Maps says:
A solid, workmanlike diagram of regional rail in the region around Wrocław, Poland. Nice thick, colourful route lines with good indication of stopping patterns for the various services. The legend is comprehensive and neatly organised at the bottom of the map.
The labelling is a little inconsistent, with lots of different angles and even some leader lines to squeeze stations into more crowded areas. The type is a little small and condensed overall, but not horrendously so. The border between Poland and the Czech Republic seems a little overly detailed in parts, especially over to the bottom left of the map where Germany gets added to the mix — I think this could all be simplified and generalised a bit more.
Our final word: Nothing amazing, but it does the job that it needs to with a minimum of fuss. 3 stars.
Hi! I am currently developing a metro scheme for Bucharest, and I would like to hear your comments on this. The tram and bus lines to the airport are also marked on the map, they will be displayed only on the poster version.
Transit Maps says:
This is a handsome diagram, distilling the Bucharest Metro down to its base elements only. In reality, the yellow M1 is nowhere near circular, so it’s a little risky to portray it as such. However, I think that Alexey has done a good job – putting Universitate station at the exact centre of the circle is a nice touch.
I would like to see some more diagrammatic treatment of the lines: the M3 could line up from Preciziei to Anghel Saligny, entering and exiting the circle at the same position. The southern ends of the M2 and future M5 could line up with each other, and so on. It might also be a good idea to separate the two parts of Dristor station to make it absolutely clear that the M1 doesn’t continue around the loop coming from Piata Muncii.
My biggest thought is regarding the black background. It’s very stylish, but it also reduces contrast with a lot of the other colours on the map. It’s especially problematic with the very thin tram and bus routes, and even the dashed future Metro lines. Some colours may have to be lightened a bit, or lines thickened slightly to make them stand out a bit more from the dark background.
Our final word: A stylish, compact diagram that could be worked up a little more to make it really stand out.
This is a map of the local train network of Ortenau (the German county next to Strasbourg in France) as it appears on the train itself. As you can see, it runs trains into France too.
While I very much appreciate the network (access to the Black Forest, Offenburg, etc., from France, where I live) the map has always annoyed me, but I can’t figure out exactly why. What are your thoughts?
Transit Maps says:
There are plenty of minor problems with this map that certainly add up to an “annoying” level, to use Neil’s words. The garish zone colours, uninspired typography, logos slapped on everywhere with white boxes behind them, the differently-sized and coloured station ticks (why?)… it’s all a bit of a slap-dash, random affair.
My biggest gripe, however, is that it doesn’t really give you any idea of how the network actually works. Can you catch a train from Offenburg directly to Ottenhöfen? Do different routes overlap to increase service frequency in a corridor? From what I can see from a quick look at the OSB website, there are seven routes in the network, with five using Offenburg as a terminus and with two more acting as connecting branch lines (Biberach to Oberharmersbach-Riersbach, and Achern to Ottenhöfen). It’s a relatively simple network to depict and showing it in full would really add to the utility of this map. There aren’t any OSB trains that run through Offenburg to a destination on the other side, so it’s not possible to get from Achern to Hausach on a single train, for example. (Of course, this being Germany, there’s almost certainly a Deutsche Bahn RE train that can do that, but those services seems to be outside the scope of this map.)
On a side note, I remember waiting for what seemed like ages for a train from Offenburg to Strasbourg back on a freezing cold day in early 2004. Brrrrrrr!
Our final word: Not particularly well executed, and not showing individual routes really limits its usefulness. 2 stars.
It’s been a while! I’m wondering whether you would be interested in taking a look at a diagram I have completed recently, showing all railway lines (except local or in-park people movers, such as the Disneyland monorail) around the Tokyo conurbation. I welcome any and all feedback!
Transit Maps says:
What an undertaking, Bernie! Mapping Tokyo’s subway lines alone is a huge challenge, let alone every darn rail in the whole metropolitan area, so I applaud the effort involved. The resulting map isn’t exactly compact (the PDF Bernie sent me is around 107 by 75 inches – even bigger than my own monstrous Highways of the United States of America map) but that’s probably beside the point. This is a map that’s best savoured in its digital form, zooming in and scrolling around to uncover all the details.
Stylistically, the map puts me in mind of both Zero per Zero and Jug Cerovic, but it’s also very much in line with Bernie’s earlier work as well. I think the piece holds together really well, with a lot of sweeping curves and concentric rings, though perhaps the outer parts of the map seem a little empty in comparison to the dense centre. Bernie’s goal was to unify all the disparate rail networks with a common design language, and I think he’s succeeded for the most part. Information about Toyko 2020 venues and soon-to-be-opened stations is also most welcome.
For me, where the piece really shines is in the insets to the right of the map, which present a wealth of additional information and insights about the network. A comprehensive overview of services to Narita Airport, a guide to through-running services, and a rather wonderful little map of Shinkansen services that would be a worthy stand-alone map. So much information packed into such a small space!
Our final word: It would make an enormous and unwieldy poster or printed map, but it’s wonderful to look at on a large monitor. This is a huge undertaking and obviously a labour of love, and that’s to be applauded. Four stars! You should definitely head over to Bernie’s project page to read more about his process and design decisions.
