Question: What do you think of Sound Transit’s station icons? I find them ineffective and embarrassing. And, they want opinions for new icons for new stations! You can see the survey yourself here.

Answer: I talked about Sound Transit’s station icons in this review of the Link map that’s found in ST’s timetable book back in December 2012. Like you, I’m not particularly impressed by them. I think they’re overly detailed and they reproduce terribly at small sizes. They’re even kind of hard to make out on the strip maps on trains — becoming vague, blobby shapes — which is really not a good thing for an icon.

It’s kind of funny that in the questionnaire you reference above, Sound Transit uses Lance Wyman’s gorgeous Mexico City Metro icons as a point of reference, because they’re the absolute opposite of the Seattle icons — bold and simple, with each one being immediately visually distinctive from another. 

However, icons are here to stay, as they’re mandated by Washington state law. From RCW 81.112.190 – Requirements for Signage:

The signage [for any light-rail system in Washington state] must also use distinguishing symbols or pictograms developed by the authority as a means to identify stations and may identify points of interest along the corridor for persons who use languages that are not Roman-alphabet based.

Seeing as Seattle is stuck with icons, you might as well try and get the best ones you can. If you live in Seattle and have an opinion, then you should definitely take the survey.