Okay, as promised in the previous post, here’s my version of the Queensland passenger rail network as a diagram.

As is usual for these redesigns, I’ve only spent a few hours on this – just to show that better design doesn’t necessarily need to take a lot of time. Everything is meant to be simple but clear. The rules – the same canvas size as the official map, and all of the information on the official map has to be shown for a true apples-to-apples comparison.

The main and obvious difference is the trunk line from Brisbane to Cairns, which I have straightened out so there’s only two changes of direction along the whole route. All the station names – including the RailBus stops at Hervey Bay and Airlie Beach – are on an evenly-spaced vertical grid, and all station labels are to the right of the route line. I made a conscious decision to start the first curve out of Brisbane north of Bundaberg, so that the Bundaberg Tilt Train service could be shown as a completely straight line. Then, the 45-degree angle of the trunk line through Rockhampton allows the Spirit of the Outback to head west a bit more elegantly than on the official map, on which it takes a hard 90-degree turn.

Despite the diagrammatic nature of the design, the shape of Queensland is actually more accurate apart from the east coast, which I’ve just simplified as much as possible to reduce distracting elements – we don’t need all those little capes and islands! Cape York Peninsula is in its correct place, the Gulf of Carpentaria is the right size and all the wiggles in the Queensland/NSW border are present and accounted for. I allowed myself the use of 22.5-degree angles for the coastline to reduce stair-stepping and make the coastline look a bit more natural. Generous curves at the corners and some path roughening also help to soften the geography up a bit.

As the main diagonal axis of the diagram follows the east coast from the top left to the bottom right, that’s also the way I’ve angled all of the diagonal station labels. This gives a nice flow to the diagram instead of having the labels run the other way and creating visual tension. I’m not opposed to using diagonal labels on a diagram, but I do believe in limiting the number of directions that they go to just one where possible. I do know that it would be very difficult to design a small diagram like this one with all-horizontal labels! As all the labels hang off the bottom of the horizontal route lines, I was able to come up with a consistent placement for the service names just above their respective route lines. This also allowed me to move the western end of the Inlander service at to a position that better approximates where Mount Isa actually is.

The background colors are simple – the other states and their labels are just tints of the Westlander gold, and the ocean is cyan with a touch of yellow added instead of magenta, which makes the blue look more tropical – but it’s so much better than the dull grey and floating Queensland of the official map.

For the icons, I’ve omitted the redundant “bus connection” symbol, as the interchange markers and thin grey lines are explained in the legend and do that work for the reader. I’ve used the excellent and dynamic Accessible Icon to indicate wheelchair accessibility, which has the added bonus of not being boxed in to a square background like the standard wheelchair icon. This gives it a distinctly different shape to the hearing loop icon, which – let’s be honest – does not reproduce well at small sizes. This way, the icons can be differentiated and understood a bit more easily – and having the legend actually on the map helps as well!

Speaking of the legend, I’ve used all that empty space in the Pacific Ocean to provide useful information about all of the train services – destinations, frequency and distance travelled – as well as explain the iconography of the diagram. In case you’re wondering: yes, distances on the remote and antiquated Gulflander service are still measured in miles, not kilometres! A survivor from another time indeed!

As always with these little redesign projects, your comments are welcome! What works? What doesn’t? Let me know what you think.