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 […]
I’ll just leave this here for now… more details real soon!
Big news out of Germany, where Karlsruhe’s KVV becomes one of the first European transit agencies to adopt a fully curvilinear diagram instead of the almost ubiquitous octolinear “Beck-style” diagram. The new map is shown here, with the old map for comparison beneath it. The old one is a solid, well-executed map, very much in the usual German style of transit map design – although perhaps a little too indistinguishable from many other very similar […]
It’s always fun to do a “before and after” comparison, and here’s a fantastic example of how a well-drawn diagrammatic map can offer enhanced system legibility over a more geographically-based map. The old map (top), dating from October 2014, is pretty terrible work. Towns and cities are in the right geographical location, but are simply joined by straight lines, which creates a difficult-to-read “spider web” of interconnecting and overlapping routes. Rail lines are shown as both purple […]
Pursuant to the last post, here’s a little GIF I screen grabbed from the STM video of the old map versus the new one. Farewell, iconic 37-degree tilt! Also of note: the type is much, much smaller and – strangely, given how much they tout the awesomeness of mixed-case type in the wayfinding system – is still set in all-caps. I’ll reserve my judgement until I see the whole map, however.
Submitted by Kristofer Kåring, who says: Stockholm Transit (SL) has made official a new railway/metro/tram map. News article (in Swedish) about it here. I think the new gray design is more appealing, and I like that they don’t stretch short branches any longer (like T14 to Fruängen and T17 to Skarpnäck), but the extra bends on T10 are ugly. Transit Maps says: The new map (the second of the two images above) is certainly very striking […]
Restoring the vintage transit maps that I'm now selling in my store is a laborious, time-intensive task, but I think that it's definitely worth it in the end. The major task is getting rid of blemishes: age spots, ink smears, tears, creases, dirt, dust, and even hair or other fibres that are between the print and the scanning surface. Here's how I go about things!
It must be the season for redesigning transit maps. Hot on the heels of NJ Transit’s disappointing new system map comes a new map for the Go Transit network that serves Toronto and Southern Ontario. And unlike that NJ Transit map, this one takes the opportunity to create something new, contemporary and exciting – and totally runs with it. Especially when it’s compared to their previous map, which was nothing short of terrible. The old […]
