All posts tagged: commuter rail

Official Map: TransLink Bus and Rail Network, Brisbane and South East Queensland, Australia

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Official Maps

It’s just occurred to me that I haven’t posted a single map yet from my native land, Terra Australis… so let’s rectify that now with this map of Brisbane’s Translink commuter rail service, supporting Railbus service that complements that service, and busways – dedicated roadways for commuter bus service (BRT). The first thing to notice about this map is the vast area it covers: over 260km (160 miles) from north to south, and around 50km […]

Photo: Early MARTA Rail Map, c. 1974-1979

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Historical Maps, Photography

A photo from our good friend, Matt’ Johnson, showing a very early system map (circa 1974 to 1979) for the MARTA commuter rail system in Atlanta. Compare to the current map here. Click on the source link at the bottom of the post to read Matt’s comprehensive notes over on Flickr. I’ll just note that I really like the clean, uncluttered design; especially the subtle grey background with the underlying and unlabelled road network reversed […]

My Boston MBTA Map: Work in Progress 2

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My Transit Maps, Unofficial Maps

By the time you read this, I’ll be lazing around on a beach in Hawaii on a well-earned break – but thanks to the wonders of scheduled posts, I can still share this new teaser image of my ongoing Boston MBTA map redesign with you. This one shows the central part of Boston with my conceptual grid overlaid on top, so you can see how important elements relate to each other. Every design decision made […]

Official Map: Métro de Montréal, Québec, Canada, 2012

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Official Maps

Requested by pomme-poire-peche Montréal’s Metro map instantly stands out from the crowd  by virtue of its black background – a feature only rarely seen in transit maps. Although the idea of a subway serving Montréal was first tabled in the early 1900s, it wasn’t until 1966 that it finally opened. Have we been there? No. What we like: Graphically bold and clean. Black background and subdued colour for the waterways really allow the thick, colourful […]

Official Map: Boston MBTA Rapid Transit/Key Bus Routes Map, 2012

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I haven’t really looked at the Boston MBTA map since I was there for a few days in the middle of 2008, but I certainly don’t remember it looking as bad as this. I’ve always been mildly annoyed by the fact that not all the stations on the surface street sections of the Green Line are labelled, but my overall impression back then was of a solid, well-designed map. Just a few short years later, […]

Official Map: LVB, Leipzig, Germany, 2012

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In a way, this map of Leipzig reminds me quite a bit of Viteks Bariševs’ recently featured map of Riga: both feature an extensive tram/streetcar/bus network shown in a highly diagrammatic form. However, this highly detailed map goes one step further in that it also shows frequency of services. The thicker the route line, the more often it arrives, regardless of travel mode. This solution is so devastatingly simple, it’s a wonder it isn’t used […]

Unofficial Map: Paris RER Line B as the Eiffel Tower by Sonoko Hagiwara

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Unofficial Maps

Words cannot express just how much I love this cleverly thought of, deftly executed and incredibly cute rendering of Paris’ RER Line B as the Eiffel Tower. Hagiwara has drawn her inspiration from the official RER line diagram, with the bifurcation of the line becoming the “legs” of the tower. Almost seems like a clever advertisement for the RER, and only took her 20 minutes to execute! Source: Sonoko Hagiwara – link no longer active

Official Map: Sao Paulo Metropolitan Transport Network, 2012

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Unusually, this map from the Brazilian metropolis of Sao Paulo shows services offered by completely different transportation companies on the same map. To my mind, this type of integrated map needs to be used more often – travelers don’t necessarily care who offers the service, they just want to know if they can get from point A to point B. Have we been there? No. What we like: Comprehensive and all-encompassing. Great legend, even if […]

Unofficial Map: Integrated Transit Map of Kiev, Ukraine by Igor Skliarevsky

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Unofficial Maps

Yes, I know I said I wasn’t going to post until the New Year, but I couldn’t wait to show this exciting new map of transit in Kiev, Ukraine. This beautiful diagram was designed by Igor Skliarevsky in his own time, simply because he was frustrated with the limitations and design of the official map. As he says on his website (pardon the Google Translate from Ukrainian), “As a designer, I find it difficult to […]

Official Map: Copenhagen S-Tog Map, 2011

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Some transit maps are geographically based, others are diagrams. But what happens when you get a map with too much diagram? That’s what we have with Copenhagen’s S-Tog (S-Train) map: it looks gorgeous, but at what cost to usability? Have we been there? Yes, but I didn’t use the S-Tog system. I arrived and left by long-distance trains from/to Berlin, and caught a regional train out to Roskilde to visit the Viking Ship Museum ( […]