Submission – Official Map: MARC Commuter Rail, Maryland, late 2017

January 20, 2018
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Submitted by Lukas, who says:

Hi, wanted to send you the new official map of Maryland’s MARC commuter rail system, as seen on the Maryland MTA website. I think it is a great improvement over the old system map. The map very visibly derives its thick lines and transfer station dots from the Washington DC Metro map, which I think it manages to pull off well. However, there are a few things I want to criticize about it, one being that the Union Station dots only partially fall within the shaded District of Columbia. Another is that, at first glance, New Carrollton, Silver Spring, and Riverdale all look like they are the same station. Finally, the Baltimore Metro and LRT lines are shown in full, but the DC Metro lines are only referenced as small Metro logos next to stations. Presumably, this is because MTA operates the Baltimore rapid transit system but not Washington’s. What do you think of the map?

Transit Maps says:

Well, it’s certainly a vast improvement over the previous official map (June 2014, 1 star), though perhaps not quite as good as the late Peter Dovak’s excellent unofficial version (July 2015, 4 stars). 

As Lukas says, the treatment of the Silver Spring, Riverdale and New Carrollton stations is unfortunate – they’re on three different lines with some distance between them in real life, so to imply they’re adjacent to each other is disingenuous to say the least. Even staggering Riverdale to sit a little lower than the other two stations would break them up a bit better.

I’m not really enamoured of the diagonal labels for the stations, but at least it’s handled consistently and probably helps in creating that WMATA Metro Map feeling that Lukas mentions. However, I think the map could definitely lose some of the smaller locality labels scattered around. Annapolis, for instance, is some 20 miles by road to the nearest MARC station, while Reston and McLean are in Virginia and not really relevant to this Maryland-based network.

The legend is comprehensive and easy to read, and I especially appreciate the indication of when each line runs – weekday peak service only on the Camden and Brunswick lines!

Our rating: Bright, chunky and cheerful. Definitely a huge step up in quality from the previous map! Three stars.

UPDATE: It’s just been pointed out to me that Harpers Ferry on the Brunswick Line should be located on the opposite bank of the Potomac, which is a pretty big error. Hoping that gets fixed soon!

Source: MTA website (PDF link)

Historical Map: Subways in Tokyo, 1975

January 20, 2018
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From a tourist’s map to rail transportation in and around Tokyo in 1975. This side shows the then seven subway lines of the Teito Rapid Transit Authority (now the Tokyo Metro) and the three Toei lines, as well as some connecting JR and private rail lines. The reverse side shows the extensive rail network of the greater metropolitan area, but that’s a post for another time.

The map itself is really a bit of a mess, with lines wiggling around all over the place without much effort taken to use the schematic form to simplify the topology of the network. However, it is notable for using index numbers for all the stations, starting at “1″ on the westernmost (leftmost) station – Shibuya – on the oldest line (the Ginza line) and numbering consecutively all the way along the line. Once that line has been competed, the numbering returns to the left of the map and continues at the next number (19) on the Maranouchi Line… and so on, up to station number 152, Highashi-Ojima at the eastern end of the Toei Shinjuku line. 

These numbers are referenced in the legend to the left of the map, although the stations are ordered alphabetically rather than by index number, which makes cross-referencing a little trickier than it could be.

Also curious is the decision for the legend show which lines call at each station by the use of colour alone, which doesn’t really work for colour-deficient users of the map. Almost all of the line colours shift to very similar blues or yellows in my colour-blindness simulations in Photoshop. Admittedly, not as much thought was given to this sort of accessibility back in the 1970s.

Finally, we have to admire the handsome line illustration of the 7000-series Metro trainset (still in use today!) at the top of the map, complete with the old TRTA logo on the front door. Nice!

Source: David Rumsey Map Collection

New Official Map: Denver RTD Rail and Flatiron Flyer Map, 2018

January 19, 2018
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I’ve had quite a few calls to review this map over the last day or so, with people calling it “interesting”, “quite something” and just plain “bad”. It certainly continues the somewhat haphazard evolution of the system map over the last couple of years as more lines have opened, that’s for sure. Visually, it has quite a bit in common with the last iteration I reviewed a year ago, though the most obvious change is the expansion of the downtown section to include a detailed street grid. 

In principle, I don’t mind the concept behind this at all – this is the most complex part of the map, especially with all the added bus routes now shown – but it’s just not particularly elegant. I find myself wondering if there was a way that this central part could be represented as a circle (or magnifying glass, if you will), with the C, E and W lines circumscribing an arc around the western edge. Perhaps the zones could then be represented as concentric rings expanding out from that centre rather than the somewhat awkward shapes they currently make. I haven’t sketched this out at all, but this seems like it could be a good starting concept to me.

However, I do quite like the representation of the different parts of Union Station – the historic facade and main train hall, leading to the bus  and light rail concourses – which neatly conveys the arrangement of the different services and implies that there’s a bit of a walk from one to the other.

Not so good is the lack of directional arrows on the California/Stout one-way couplet. The bus routes get them but the light rail doesn’t? And the representation of all the different Flatiron Flyer routes (seven, count them!) as one branching dark blue route line is pretty desultory. There’s not even any markers at the various termini to indicate the start and end points of the routes: the reader has to cross reference the legend and attempt to find those stops on the map themselves. The acute angle that the W Line forms as it heads west to Golden isn’t very attractive: a softer curve here would help a lot.

Our rating: Not as bad as some are saying, but definitely not as good as it could be. I think the concept is sound, but it needs a little polishing to make it really work. Three stars.

Source: Denver RTD website

Historical Map: Adelaide Metropolitan Rail Transport System, c. 1978

January 15, 2018
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Sent my way on Twitter by Cameron Coy, this diagram of rail services radiating out from central Adelaide in South Australia isn’t anything special… except for the wonderfully and unashamedly late 1970s typography, with ITC Souvenir Bold deployed in all its curvaceous, tightly letter-spaced glory. I particularly like its use for the main Adelaide station, where the letterforms across the large station circle (intentionally?) evoke the famous London Underground roundel.

It’s interesting to note all the stations with coordinated bus service (that is, buses with services timed to coincide with the arrival and departure of trains); those within zones 1 to 5 even allow for a system transfer with a 40-cent transfer ticket – the two coach icons make this clear quite nicely. The blobby blue icon for station parking, however, might just surpass the Washington Metro’s old “boxy Volvo” as the ugliest parking icon ever.

A note on some station names. One wonders who thought abbreviating the word “Race” in “Cheltenham Race Course” as “Rce.” – thus saving no space whatsoever – was a good idea. And on the northern line out to Virginia lie the two charmingly named stations, “21.64 km” and “29.73 km”, denoting their distance from Adelaide and nothing more.

Our rating: Not an amazing map, but I love how redolent of the era it was made it is. Groovy! Three stars.

Source: Reddit

Official Map: Rail Services of Greater Buenos Aires, Argentina by Sebastian Gagin

January 9, 2018
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I stumbled across this beautiful piece a while ago while trawling Behance – an integrated diagram of rail services in and around Buenos Aires. The author says that the project was developed for the city’s Secretary of Transport, so I have to assume that this is official, though I haven’t found it in use anywhere else yet.

The diagram shows both the Subte subway lines (in their familiar colours) and the commuter rail lines that radiate out from the city with wonderfully languid, graceful curves. The city boundary is clearly denoted by a white background, which does a nice job of drawing the reader’s eye to the (more important) centre of the map.

A few minor problems: the small size and light colour of the orange Premetro station labels make them difficult to read, and some of the commuter rail service patterns are hard to make out – especially on the various branches of the “RO” Roca lines to the bottom right of the diagram, some of which seem to loop back on each other without a clear terminus.

This is one of a series of three maps: the other two show the central city zone as a diagram and as a geographical map. However, I feel that this is the most successful of them, striking a good balance between simplicity and information.

Our rating: Visually striking and altogether rather wonderful. Four stars.

Source: Behance

Submission – Unofficial Map: Radial São Paulo Metro Map by Nicholas Fernandes

December 22, 2017
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Submitted by Nicholas, who says:

Hi Cam!

Like many here, I’m a longtime fan, transit map lover, and amateur mapmaker. I am originally from São Paulo, and as you already know, not only do we lack a system comprehensive enough to meet passenger demand, but we also lack a map that is well designed and aesthetically pleasing. With more than 12 million inhabitants, São Paulo is the largest city in the Americas and daily, more than 8 million people ride on the 340 km of combined subway and suburban rail lines that cross the metropolis. To better serve the needs of the population, several expansion projects are underway, with 3 new lines being built and 3 existing lines being extended.

These projects, once completed, will alter the layout of the transit network in the city and will need to be reflected on the map that is seen and used each day by millions of passengers – something today’s design cannot accommodate so effortlessly.

These changes provide an opportunity to seriously revaluate and rethink the current design, as well as to propose a new vision for the future – a vision that goes beyond just designing a good looking and functional map, but one that also aims to change how Paulistanos view their city and they move about it.

With this in mind, I finally followed through a long desire of mine to redesign the system’s map.

Although I can’t say I am too much of a fan of the recent wave of using concentric circles and radial lines to redesign several of the world’s major transit networks, I found that this approach works surprisingly well for São Paulo. This represents a radical departure from the actual design and breaks the restrictions imposed by the “standard” 45 and 90 degree angles currently in use, allowing elements (namely station names) to be better distributed and preserving a sense of geography near the center. Some distortion was inevitable however, given the length of the suburban rail lines that extend east and west.

My biggest concern though is the size of my map. I’m not so certain it could be easily implemented on the rolling stock, but I think it has potential to be used on stations, or maybe even in an app, where size is not an issue.

It would be great to get your feedback (and dare I ask, a rating) on this as this is really the first transit map for a real-world system that I put together. I’ve worked on some smaller projects, but nothing as involved as this before.

Transit Maps says:

Like Nick, I’m not always an immediate fan of radial transit maps – I believe that the shape of the city should guide the design, not the other way around. The conceit works perfectly for some cities (like Amsterdam, for example), but other circular designs are shoehorned onto cities that such an approach really doesn’t work for. 

While I’m not overly familiar with São Paulo, a quick look on Google Maps shows that it does have quite a circular structure, with ring roads readily apparent. So I think that a circular approach is definitely worth trying here, and the result is rather nice indeed. it’s certainly more aesthetically appealing than the official map (last reviewed back in 2012, but still very similar today). I really appreciate the effort taken to future-proof the map with the addition of lines currently under construction, and the comprehensive legend does a great job of explaining everything on the map.

I will say that I’ll never agree with labelling stations in the same colour as their corresponding route line – it always creates a visual imbalance between the dark, strong colours and the light, recessive ones. Here (as always), the Yellow Line is the one that suffers the most.

While we’re on the subject of colours, Nick uses three small circles to denote services available at stations: blue for elevators, green for bike parking and red for car parking. This is problematic for colour-blind users, as the red and green dots look almost identical for them. Nick might consider using three different shapes to properly differentiate these simple icons – a diamond for elevators, a circle for bikes and a square for cars, perhaps?

Our rating: A compelling reinvention of a complex network map. There’s a lot to like here! Three-and-a-half stars.

Submission – Unofficial Map of Rail Services in Dublin, Ireland by Simon Allen

December 22, 2017
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Submitted by Simon, who says:

With the new map for the Luas tram system in Dublin being so uninspiring, I decided to try create an integrated map for Dublin’s Dart, Luas and commuter rail.  It’s a pretty indulgent map – in that I treat the Luas (tram) lines perhaps too similarly to the heavy rail lines, and the system isn’t quite complex enough to warrant a Vignelli style approach (neither do I apply his principles as rigidly as a die hard fan might!)

Even so, it’s nice to see Dublin’s transport network looking all-grown-up. I’d love to hear what you and fellow enthusiasts think, so I can continue improving the map. 

Transit Maps says:

Let’s just start by saying that this is infinitely better than the tepid Luas map (reviewed here) – a bright, bold, confident diagram that positively jumps off the page. I particularly like the way that the Central Zone area completes a neat diamond shape when combined with the yellow commuter rail lines… lovely! 

The treatment of zones is actually excellent throughout: minimalistic, but easily understandable. It’s so clean, in fact, that the little jog in the outer zone edge to the left edge of the map actually looks a little too complex compared to the simplicity of the rest of the map, though I can see why it has to be that way if the two sets of lines are to end level with each other.

I don’t have a problem with the differentiation of the modes – the dark dots for tram stations versus white dots for heavy rail does the job nicely for me. Also, the indication of short walks at interchanges is a nice touch, and certainly better than the confusing way the Luas map attempts to show this.

The typeface – FF Kava Pro, by the look of things? – has a lovely calligraphic feel to it (and I love the ampersand!), though I think that it’s perhaps a little too condensed for good legibility. I’d also argue that the Park & Ride symbols are both too small and too light in colour to be useful.

Our rating: Really quite lovely, though I think the type legibility could be a deal breaker in a real world application. Three-and-a-half stars.

Submission – Historical Map: Lines of the Lincoln, Nebraska Street Railway, 1892

December 16, 2017
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Submitted by Ethan, who says:

Thought you might enjoy this hand-painted streetcar map of Lincoln, Nebraska from 1892 (Link to high-res PDF). I particularly enjoy the attempt at route colors and what appear to be marked stops.

Transit Maps says:

Oh, I definitely do enjoy this one, Ethan! From the blue background and white linework, it looks as if this may have originally been a blueprint drawing of the city that’s then been embellished by the artist with colours, the painted details in the parkland and cemetery, and the tiny red ink annotations of street numbers along the major blocks.

Regarding the route colouring, I’m not exactly sure what it’s trying to depict, as the colours can change from yellow to orange to red to green along the length of a single route. State of repair? Congestion of traffic? Maybe it’s purely artistic? Without a legend, it’s hard to tell. 

As for the “marked stops”, I think those are actually just short sections of double track along single track sections where two streetcars could safely pass each other. Such passing tracks may or may not have been in the same location as a stop: you can see that some of them span a couple of blocks or more.

Overall, this is a charming view of an early American streetcar network. I love it!

Source: History Nebraska (PDF link)

Official Map – Luas Light Rail Network, Dublin, Ireland

December 14, 2017
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On the 9th of December, 2017, the Green Line of Dublin’s Luas light rail system was extended north from St. Stephen’s Green to Broombridge, providing a connection with the Red Line in the city centre. Of course, such an addition means a new map, which is always fun.

Zone-based fare systems can be tricky to incorporate into transit maps, and Dublin’s taken an unusual approach, breaking the city up into large zone “blocks” that extend out to the limits of the map, where the labels for the zones are. Stations that can act as being in zone or the other depending on direction of travel are placed in the empty white area between the zones. This approach works fairly well, although the big gap between Zone Central and Red Zone 1 looks like an error at first glance. A little unfortunately, the gaps between the other zones are visually suggestive of major roads, perhaps creating a false impression of the geography of the city (which is nowhere as regular as this blocky grid might imply).

I’m not entirely sure what the smaller line name labels at some stations represent… they seem to indicate both an interchange with the other line (see Abbey Street on the Red Line) and also a short-turn terminus (see Sandyford on the Green Line). Without a legend, it’s all a bit of a mystery!

Finally, the junction on the Green Line where the section to/from Broombridge joins onto the one-way downtown loop is very poorly drawn, as there’s no way that a reader can easily trace the path of a southbound train from Dominick to Parnell. Some sort of wye needs to be indicated here to give the right flow to the routes.

Our rating: Functional enough, if a little idiosyncratic in execution. Unusual depiction of zones. Two-and-a-half stars.

Source: Luas website

Submission – Historical Map: Madrid Metro Map and Linear Diagram, 1945

December 6, 2017
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Submitted by Pablo Martin, who says:

This is the Madrid metro map from 1945, I found the diagram below really interesting, as I haven’t seen a similar one for any other network.

Transit Maps says:

Nice find, Pablo! The geographical map is fairly clumsy and unremarkable, but the diagram beneath is very interesting. It’s what I call a “linear diagram” – each route is shown as a straight line, with interchanges indicated by a vertical joining line or bar. It’s not entirely unique (see this more recent example from St. Petersburg), but it’s not a form that’s ever been very popular. It only really works for relatively simple networks with a few clearly defined interchanges… Madrid’s four short lines at the time made it a perfect candidate for such a diagram.