Historical Maps: Melbourne Tram Destination Posters by Vernon Jones, c. 1930s

June 30, 2018
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A handsome pair of posters promoting easy travel by tram to destinations around Melbourne, designed by artist Vernon Jones (1908–2002), perhaps better known for his illustration work documenting WWII. The dating on these is a little uncertain, with some sources placing the first edition as early as 1925. They were used for a number of years: a later edition of the “Zoo” poster revised the time from Collins Street to a perhaps more realistic 14 minutes.

Prints of these maps are now available in the Transit Maps store: Beaches | Zoo

Source: State Library of Victoria.
Beaches | Zoo

New Project: Unofficial Map – Metro de Medellin, Colombia

June 26, 2018
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While preparing today’s post about the current Medellin Metro map (2 stars), I kept looking at the map and asking myself if there were ways that I could improve upon it. Eventually, I had enough ideas to make a reworking worthwhile and set about the task.

I’ve chosen to show a “near-future” version of the system, with the “M” and “P” MetroCable lines completed, but without the Line 3 BRT, as I can’t find enough information on the names of proposed stations to include it properly. It’s worth noting that there is plenty of room to include it at a later date.

The typeface used is URW DIN, which echoes the use of DIN on the 2014 version of the map (the latest version uses an uncomfortable mixture of DIN and Myriad, which don’t really work that well together). All in all, this map represents about eight hours of work from initial concept to completion.

As always with a hypothetical redesign like this, I set myself some clear goals to achieve, these being:

  • A stronger sense of hierarchy. All the route lines on the official map are the same thickness, which makes it a little tricky to differentiate between modes. I chose to make the Metro lines (the backbone of the system) thicker, with the tram and BRT lines slightly thinner. Finally, the MetroCable lines – which act as feeders to the rest of the system – are thinner still, which is also a nice visual representation of the thin cables that the gondolas run on. The Metro gets square line letter bullets, while the tram gets a reversed square to indicate its role as a sort of “Pre-Metro”. The other modes get discs, with letters for the MetroCable and numbers for BRT.
  • All horizontal labels. Part of the messiness on the official map comes from the fact that some of its labels have to be angled to fit into the layout, which then shifts other stations out of place in order to accommodate them. Looking at maps of Medellin, I realised that the central part of the city is actually angled quite substantially away from a true north-south orientation. By using (and somewhat exaggerating) that angle throughout the map, I was able to arrange all the labels so that there were no clashes and no angled labels. It also gives the whole map a nice dynamic, I think. For those curious about the angles, the map is based on a 2:1 grid – for every two grid squares that Line A moves northwards, for example, it also moves one square eastwards. This equals a clockwise rotation of 26.565 degrees, which is a tiny bit less severe than a full 30 degrees, but gave me enough room to work with when staggering my labels.
  • Better indication of pedestrian transfers. The official map indicates stations where a walk between modes is required by enclosing them in a white lozenge with a dotted black outline. Unfortunately, it’s visually very similar to the standard transfer symbol (a white lozenge with a solid black outline), and is especially confusing at Industriales station, where the ambiguity of the symbol doesn’t really indicate that the pedestrian transfer is a lengthy walk between the Metro station on the east side of the river and the bus station for Lines 1 and 2 on the west. I’ve used an easier-to-understand thin black line connector between the separate parts of these transfer stations: the one at Industriales is correspondingly longer to indicate that lengthy hike.
  • Simplification. All the route lines are as straight as possible – no kinks in MetroCable and tram routes, and no random angles. Similarly, the station transfer symbols are presented in their simplest form. The central part of the map has been expanded for clarity and to allow ample room for labels (compare the label for Exposiciones station on both maps), while still adhering to a standard grid – the three north-south lines through the city centre are now evenly spaced, making for a more pleasing composition.
  • A properly designed legend. The legend on the official map is crammed into some left over space at the bottom of the map – I wanted to take the time to craft a legend that fitted into a properly allocated space, which also means the map stands alone without having its breathing room taken up by extra information.

I also had a bit of fun with the river, using my favourite “Harry Beck Tube Map river stripes effect” and allowing it to break the map’s border at the top and the bottom (to show that it doesn’t just end at the map’s edge). I also indicate the approximate shape of the extensive Parque Arví to the top left of the map – the one and only destination of MetroCable Line “L”. This is probably the element I’m least happy with in the whole map – while it’s a nice piece of information to include, I also feel that it perhaps draws a little too much attention to itself. Maybe it’ll grow on me?

As always, thought, comments and critiques are welcome. This one was a lot of fun to do: I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to achieve and it all came together with a minimum of fuss in a short amount of time.

Submission – Official Map: Metro de Medellin Map, 2018  

June 26, 2018
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Submitted by David Osorio, who says:

It shows Metro lines, BRT lines, Tramway and Aerial Cable Car lines.

Transit Maps says:

I last reviewed Medellin’s transit map back in 2014 (1.5 stars), but this new version is sufficiently different for me to re-evaluate it. The first things I notice are the route lines are much thicker and the labels are much bigger, changes which improve the map tremendously over the spindly previous version. 

However, some of the MetroCable lines still have strangely crooked paths: the kink in the “K” line remains unfathomable, as does the angled station marker at Acevedo. The new tram line also has two small and unnecessary kinks in it. And I really don’t understand why the “1” bus route is placed below the “2″ on the way out to the University of Medellin when it has to cross over it at Industriales. Speaking of which, the section from Industriales to Plaza Mayor remains very unconvincing.

The legend is more comprehensive than the old one and now offers English translations, but it does feel like it’s just been thrown into the available spaces at the bottom of the map, making that whole section feel very busy and cramped. One wonders what the map makers are going to do when Line 3 is complete and they need to add station labels to it.

Finally, while the idea of icons for each mode is nice, there’s very little visual difference between the icons used for Metro, tram and gondola, which makes them a little tricky to tell apart at first glance.

Our rating: Better than before, but still somewhat cramped and disorganized. Two stars. 

PS. Watch this space for a quick redesign of this map – I got inspired while preparing this post and quickly put together something quite different in its approach.

Submission – Unofficial Map: Metra Commuter Rail, Chicago by Rahul Raju

June 22, 2018
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Submitted by Rahul, who says:

Hey! Wanted your comment on my redesign of the Metra map. Been a fan of the blog for a while, and I started making maps a few months ago. I would appreciate any feedback and comments.

Transit Maps says:

I like this a lot, Rahul! Very clean, slick and easy to follow. Pleasingly, the fare zones are clean and subtle – I note with some dismay that the Chicago RTA’s “Train Connections” map has added multi-coloured fare zones (PDF link). They still make some odd shapes here and there, but it’s not problem in my eyes.

I think the inclusion of a defined Loop area is quite clever, as all the Metra terminal stations are placed in the correct positions relative to it (one small error here as “Millenium” station should be “Millennium”), though some people might think there should be more indication of integration between Metra and the “L” than the simple coloured disks that Rahul employs. Personally, I think his approach is fine – this map is unapologetically all about Metra, rather than being a full regional map like the RTA’s.

It might be nice to note that the two Prairie Crossing stations (on the NC and MN branches) are actually a short walk from each other, but from an operational point of view, I really don’t think it matters that much.

Finally, I love the way Rahul’s new Metra logo riffs off Chicago’s flag: a really nice little touch. Great work – I really, really like this one. Four stars!

Submission – Official Map: City Buses of Lichtenfels, Germany

June 22, 2018
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Submitted by Simon H., who says:

I stumbled upon this “gem” and I thought it should be brought to your attention, as this is probably one of the more atrocious specimens of the genre. Keep up the good work!

Transit Maps says:

Oh dear.

Submission – Future Map: Greater Dublin Train and Tram Services, c. 2040 by Kevin Carter

June 20, 2018
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Submitted by Kevin, who says:

A few months ago, the Government of Ireland announced Project Ireland 2040, a scheme covering many aspects of infrastructure and development for Ireland. One announcement was Metrolink. Metrolink is the previously planned Metro North from Dublin City Centre to the Airport plus a connection with the existing Luas Green line and its upgrade to Metro standard giving Dublin a continuous metro line from the Northern suburbs, through the city centre and all the way into the Southern suburbs.

When it was announced a lot of people were confused as to how this would work with the existing Luas Green line as the two seemed to be running along the same path. So I felt the need to explain it through a map.

But once I’d started I couldn’t stop and so I done all the planned lines that have bee planned for Dublin over the next 2 decades. including some elements that I added myself, link the DART Circle. A Circle line running around the city core using the Existing Phoenix Park tunnel and the planned DART Underground on the south side, opening the way to allow the current single line DART network to double into 2 lines. Plus the southern section of Metro Orbital connecting Tallaght, its planned terminus, with Sandyford, the terminus of Metrolink.

I chose to stick to the current branding of Transport for Ireland (Basically TfL for the whole country) using, their brand colours, curves from the logo and their brand typeface Univers and Univers Condensed.

Imperative for me was that this map HAS to function in 2 languages. Not just because its the law in Ireland that government issued communications be in Irish or Irish AND English but because I love Irish as a language and I enjoyed the etymological research i had to do to translate some of the place-names. For example the Orange line orbiting the West of the City was announced as being called Metro West. I changed this to Metro Orbital. Which gave me “An Cuarmheitreo”. Cuar being a prefix meaning circular.

I haven’t done a proofing of the spellings and theres sure to be a few errors, but that’s what other people are for. To find my mistakes 😛

Transit Maps says:

This is hugely impressive work, Kevin – not least for the way you’ve skillfully and cleanly incorporated the need for dual-language labels throughout the map. As the Irish language labels are often quite a bit longer than their English equivalents, this is no easy feat at all!

I also love the triangular station icon where three lines pass through: it neatly locates each coloured dot on its respective line with a minimum of fuss and creates a pleasingly compact symbol. The dashed lines to indicate short walks are welcome information, and you’ve done as good a job with the fare zone rings as can be expected.

I’m a little unsure as to why the one-way section of the Luas Green Line needs to be indicated as a cased line: I feel that directional arrows alone would be enough to indicate this. If there’s more meaning to the line treatment than this, then it should probably be explained in the legend, which is comprehensive and easy to understand. Your matrix of line names/colours is an unusual but effective way of denoting all the lines on the map, though perhaps it could be even better if it included some information about proposed service frequencies as well (I’m presuming that the light rail lines run more frequently than DART, for example?)

Overall, though, this is a lovely piece of speculative work – an inspirational vision for the future of rail transit in Dublin!

Submission – New Official Transit Map of Plauen, Germany by Moritz Köhler

June 19, 2018
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Submitted by Moritz, who says:

I’m an architecture student from Zurich who has also been a (public) transport and map geek for quite some time now. The town of Plauen in Germany has had a quite horrible map for its tram and bus system, so I created a new one privately, which I then offered to them for use. They indeed agreed to pay for it (which they haven’t done yet, but I’ll be on that …), so I sent the files to them and the map is used there now at the stations, in a by the transit agency slightly altered form – they just couldn’t help it to add some unnecessary icons and mix fonts, but to be honest, I’m not keen on discussing with them over that over hundres of kilometres of distance, so I’ll just let it be. However, as I’m a fan of your map reviews and the blog in general, I’d like to hear your opinion on my (original) work! (I’m doing this via mobile and don’t quite understand whether I can add documents to this text, so I’ll send you separately: the old map, which can somehow still be found on the operator’s website; the new one (which shows bus line B slightly different because they changed the route after I finished work); and a photo one of my relatives in Plauen took from the altered version hanging at a tram stop.) I used a 30-degree grid as it allowed me to make a visual hook (literally) out of the lines going to the south-east while avoiding unnecessary curves in the lines after they successively leave the hook. Also, it makes it possible to set the type at an angle at which it is still easily readable. I included the railway and night bus lines, which the original map doesn’t (for the night buses, they had an even worse separate map which also still can be found on their website). On the colours of the tram and bus lines I didn’t have any influence. The “lace” pattern at the edge of the map is derived from the station markers and seemed adequate to me because lace is the only thing this 60’000 inhabitants city is somehow renowned for (they replaced it by a boring simple edge, though). What do you think?

Transit Maps says:

As seen in the first image above, the previous version of Plauen’s transit map was a very dowdy, old fashioned – almost generic – diagram, with some odd angles and overpowering accessibility icons. It’s not hideous, but neither is it particularly memorable.

Moritz’s map, however, is definitely memorable – with swooping curves and a strong, dynamic, 30-degree axis that underpins the whole map. It perhaps simplifies things a little too much in some parts: while the stop order on the A/Ax bus route is the same on both versions, knowing that the bus takes a little one-way detour through Chrieschwitz is actually useful information to have.

The strict adherence to the 30-degree angles also causes a few spacing problems here and there, especially because all the main line railway lines are dead straight lines which can force some stations and their labels out of position somewhat. I’d personally prefer to have the six stops at the northern end of Line 5 evenly spaced, for example, even if that meant the rail lines had to bend a little bit more. The rail lines are subsidiary information on a local map like this, and shouldn’t really bend the more important parts of the map to their needs quite so much. It’s specially noticeable along the main horizontal axis of the map: the stops on Lines 1/3/N2 are spaced perfectly evenly, while the rail line forces the stops to the right of it on the A/Ax bus line into a very tight area. While this could be justified because there is a bit of a gap between Plauen and Chrieschwitz in real life, that’s not really a consideration in a diagrammatic map like this.

On balance, however, this is definitely a massive improvement over the previous map, and it looks like changes between Moritz’s original version and the final one seen in the photo above were fairly minimal – the addition of icons to more clearly indicate the stops which are not accessible, darker/black linework for the night bus lines instead of the soft grey that Moritz used, and some minor labelling edits (setting “Capitol” on one line instead of hyphenating it over two, for example). All of which are probably changes I agree with, so everyone’s a winner!

Submission – Unofficial Map of Rail Transit in Montreal by zjfishy

June 14, 2018
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Submitted by zjfishy, who says:

After my frustration with the new Metro and AMT maps for Montreal, I decided to make my own including both. I took some of the key features from the Metro map (like the dark background and chunky lines), but put a more modern and cleaner twist on it.  Room for edits once the REM and Blue line extension open, as well as the possible Magenta line, were considered and made for (what I consider) an OK finished-product-ish map. It’s my first map of quality, and also the first I made with Affinity Designer after switching from Inkscape. The worst feeling is noticing an error after you rotated the lines 30 degrees, so you have to rotate them back again to use the grid properly!

Transit Maps says:

There’s a lot to like in this map: the angles are very visually pleasing, as is the differentiation between the chunky Metro lines and the thinner commuter rail lines (which are colour-coded by their downtown terminus, a nice usability touch). Heck, even the simplified geography looks great, which is no easy task in a map of Montreal!

And then there’s the station labels, which are way, way, way too small to be legible. At a minimum, I think they need to be as big as the small text in the legend. An oft-quoted rule of thumb (which originated with the London Underground Map’s style guide, I think) states that the x-height of your labelling typeface should be the same as the thickness of your route lines (in this case, that means the thickness of the Metro lines), and that’s probably a good place to start. Labels are arguably one of the most important elements of a good transit map, so it’s important to get them right. Here, I think they really undermine some otherwise excellent work, so a rethink would be good.

Unofficial Map: Metro do Porto Redesign by Eduardo Barros

June 14, 2018
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Submitted by Eduardo, who says:

This is my redesign of the Porto map for my University course. Your review of the real one helped me!

Transit Maps says:

This is a nice reworking of the official map, Eduardo – converting it from a stylised geographical map into a proper schematic diagram (the official map hasn’t changed too much since I reviewed it way back in 2012). I will quietly note that you’ve lifted the typography, logo and iconography directly from the official map, which is probably fine for a student project, but definitely something you have to be cautious with for real work.

Apart from that, the diagram looks quite lovely. It’s definitely more compact than the sprawling official map, which has the added benefit of making the type correspondingly larger, so that’s a good thing. The main failing of your work in my eyes is having stations placed exactly on a point where the lines change direction. This is something I always try to avoid, as it never looks right to me. On your diagram, it’s especially obvious at Via Rapida (where the station dots are at an odd 22.5-degree angle) and at Heroismo, where the station dots are on a sharp point. I’d look at respacing all the stations from Senhora da Hora all the way around to Estadio do Dragao more evenly, taking care that no stations are placed where a line changes direction. Look out for this in other places as well!

Similarly, I prefer not to have branching lines change direction directly under a station:they should always travel parallel to the other lines for a little way before branching off to make the transition a little easier to follow. It’s especially jarring where the light blue “A” line branches off at Denhora da Hora, as there’s a hard acute angle there, right under the station dot. I prefer to use curves where lines change direction for a softer, easier to follow route, although I do respect the stylistic decision for hard angles as well.

One further note: I’d move the zone boundaries to the bottom of the information hierarchy: they sit above both the route lines and the station names at the moment… things look a bit messy where they overlap labels at Campanha and Estadio do Dragao, for example.

Overall, this is a nice reimagining of the official map, though there’s still room for a bit of tweaking here and there to tighten the design up a bit more. I’d also love to see a version of this where you make the design more obviously “yours” rather than relying on the design language of the official map. 

Historical Map – Bus and Streetcar Lines on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, c. 1935

June 7, 2018
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An unusual perspective here – looking down the length of the mile-long diagonal parkway to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (and its famous steps), with bus and streetcar routes highlighted in a lovely shade of apple green. Does a lot of work with just two printed colours – a reminder that limited palettes can sometimes be just as effective as full-colour. Really quite lovely.

Prints of this map are now available in the Transit Maps store.

Source: Free Library of Philadelphia