All posts tagged: Illinois

Unofficial Map: Chicago “El” in the Style of Frank Lloyd Wright by Maxwell Roberts

November 29, 2015
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Gift Guide, Unofficial Maps
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Words cannot express just how much I love this beautiful, beautiful map by Maxwell Roberts, whose work I’ve featured on the blog many times previously. I had the privilege of seeing this map “in the flesh” at the New York Transit Museum event I attended earlier this month, and it looks even more impressive as an actual print. The map is inspired by the work of the famous architect and designer, Frank Lloyd Wright – most […]

Lyft Launches “Friends With Transit” Campaign, Targets “Last-Mile” Riders

November 3, 2015
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Say what you like about Lyft (”awesome ride-sharing service” or “dangerously unregulated upstart taxi wannabe” seems to describe the polar opposites of opinion), but this is a pretty sweet ad campaign. From the delightfully double-edged campaign name, “Friends with Transit” – which can either echo “friends with benefits”, or simply be a statement that Lyft complements public transportation – to the trademark hot pink lines filling in the gaps left behind by rail transit in each city, […]

Submission – Chicago Table of ‘El’ements

September 21, 2015
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Submitted by long time contributor, Kara Fischer, who asks: Clever idea? Or useless eye-candy? Transit Maps says: Definitely just eye-candy, and really only made because of the terrible ‘El’ements pun in the title. It’s certainly not useful in any meaningful way and doesn’t bear anything but a superficial resemblance to the actual periodic table of elements.  Dmitri Mendeleev’s periodic table, by the way, is one of the most information-dense infographics ever, with both the rows and columns […]

Official Map: Chicago Regional Transportation Authority “Rail Connections” Map, 2015

August 25, 2015
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Submitted by Michael Whalen (amongst others), who says: I just stumbled upon this map showing all CTA/Metra/SouthShore train connections in Chicago. There’s a lot going on, but I like how its much more diagrammatic than the regular map. I see several things that they’ve done with this map that I know you will hate, but I thought I’d leave it here for your critique anyway. Transit Maps says: There may be a few small things […]

Historical Map: New North-South All-Express Service, Chicago, 1949

November 11, 2014
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From a brochure introducing the now-infamous A/B stopping pattern on Chicago’s “L”. A trial run of the (mostly) alternating stopping pattern—designed to speed up operations on lines where there was no extra passing track for express services—had been carried out on the Lake Street Line in April 1948 and had been deemed a success. The next two lines to receive A/B service were the Ravenswood Line and the North-South Route as seen here. The revision […]

Historical Map: Chicago Surface Lines (Streetcar) Transfer Ticket (date unknown)

October 29, 2014
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A tiny little map of Chicago with streetcar lines and the underlying street grid printed on the obverse of a transfer ticket. It seems to be mainly used for indicating the time and place that the transfer was issued, rather than for any attempt at navigation of the system. If I’m reading the clock face at the top of the ticket correctly, this transfer was issued at 3:35 (or 7:15) on July 2nd by a […]

Submission – Historical Map: Chicago CTA Rapid Transit Map, 1983

August 26, 2014
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Submitted by our resident repository of Chicago transit map knowledge, Dennis McClendon, who says: This map of Chicago’s rapid transit network originated in the 1970s (this one is from June 1983), and this style was used until routes received color names in 1993. Happily, by that time digital printing in fiberglass-embedded signs made full-color maps easier to place in graffiti-prone environments. These maps were silk-screened onto [blue] color blanks, and every color of ink added […]

Submission – Historical Map: Chicago Regional Transportation Authority, 1977

April 4, 2014
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Submitted by Dennis McClendon, who has previously submitted material related to transit mapping in Chicago that I’ve featured on the site. This map is a real beauty, and I definitely appreciate Dennis’ ability to talk about the technical aspects of cartography in the days before computers. We take computer-aided design almost completely for granted today – but map-making was a laborious, manually performed task back then, where a scalpel, a light box and rubylith film […]

Historical Map: The Plan of Chicago – Proposed Arrangement of Railroad Stations, 1909

January 10, 2014
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A plate from the hugely influential 1909 Plan of Chicago (also known as “the Burnham Plan” after its primary author, the renowned architect and urban planner Daniel Burnham) showing proposed amendments and additions to the railroads of the city. The thin red lines show main line railroads, which were going to be rerouted to two mega-stations to the south and west of the downtown area. To facilitate movement between these stations, an ambitious plan of subterranean […]