Submitted by Alan, who says:

Still love reading your blog after all these years. The NTA has just released a new map for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area mass transit system. There are currently three light rail lines under construction (red, green, and purple), partly running underground, and due to be completed by 2026. A metro is planned for launch around 2040.

I felt that while the official map is not bad, it does not have a clear hierarchy between the two modes. It also lacked coherence with strange and inconsistent angles. On the plus side, the official map respects geography more than mine, and shows all the station names.

So I decided to knock together something of my own in Visio (yes, I know). The remit was to create a metro-focused map with 60 degree angles to create a triangular theme. The light rail lines are inserted around the metro layout. The theme comes at the expense of geographical fidelity.

Apologies that it is only in Hebrew at this point in time. The solid blobs are metro and underground light rail stations. The large hollow blobs are light rail stations that interchange with metro or rail. I decided not to label all the other light rail stations.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Transit Maps says:

Alan’s done a pretty good job of self-analysing his own diagram above, and I agree on most of his points. I find his diagram superior to the official map in most respects: it may be more geographically correct, but it lacks visual punch and clarity. The lines just sort of wander across the canvas, and there’s no real differentiation between the light rail lines and the Metro itself.

Alan’s 30/60 degree lines give coherence to the network and have a pleasing angularity to them that suits the Hebrew script used for the labels. The triangular shape made by the circumferential M3 is a particularly nice design element. Breaking the M1 and M3 up into separate lines to show their service patterns works well: it’s especially good at showing that the service to the airport will operate as two-station branch line. Perhaps an airport icon like the official map employs could be useful?

Alan highlights what he sees as a major flaw of his own diagram: that the light rail lines only have labels for a few stations. However, as the focus of the diagram is to be “Metro-centric” (in Alan’s own words), I think this is forgivable. There’s enough information to work out how the two networks interchange with each other, and the Metro is given good emphasis over the light rail.

Our final word: A lovely diagram, with some great compositional work and simplification. Nice work, Alan!