Home Subway Maps Map of the Day: A culinary subway ride

Map of the Day: A culinary subway ride

by Benjamin Kabak

New York City is a culinary capital of the world, and nothing underscores that better than the subway. Take the Q from the Russian enclave of Brighton Beach to the Greek-influenced Astoria. Journey on the 7 from Flushing’s Chinatown past some of the best Thai restaurants, taquerias and Indian joints around.

Today’s map of the day celebrates that rich tradition. From illustrators Rick Meyerowitz and Maira Kalman comes “The New York City Sub Culinary Map.” Originally created in 2004 for The New York, the pair’s map is on display through November 6 at the Pratt Gallery as part of the exhibit “You Are Here ? Mapping the Psychogeography of New York City.” I visited the gallery last weekend, and as you can guess, it’s heavy on the subway.

But first, back to Meyerowitz and Kalman. Rick explains the impetus behind this creative re-imagining of the subway map:

September 2003: I was on an A train headed downtown. I was absentmindedly staring at the subway map and thinking about lunch, when all the station names on the map suddenly rearranged themselves in my mind to become food-related names. “That’s interesting,” I thought. “What if I redid the subway map to make it a food map?”

It seemed a daunting prospect; so many places to rename! So I went to Maira Kalman, my brilliant partner in wordplay and funny names. “I love it but I don’t know if it’s doable,” I told her. Maira knocked the doubt right out of my head with characteristic subtlety: “You’re an idiot!” She told me. “It’s brilliant! We’re doing it, Mister, and we’re doing it right away.”

…We spent months doing nothing but choosing the funniest names and moving them around a pencil sketch of the map. We renamed all 468 stations and added sixteen for the Second Avenue line, which may never even be built. We renamed all the neighborhoods, parks, cemeteries and waterways – 650 names in all.

You can click on the image atop this post to see the larger version, but it’s tough to capture the creativity and originality without taking in the entire wall-sized map. The exhibit runs at the Pratt Gallery at 144 W. 14th St. between 6th and 7th Aves. through next Saturday. The gallery is open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, and it gets the SAS seal of approval. Check it out.

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As a bonus map of the day, check out Asma Ahmed Shikoh’s Van Wyck Boulevard. Also a part of the Pratt Gallery exhibit, Shikoh’s version of the subway map is hand-painted and in Urdu. He explains, “Painting the subway map and translating minute, tiresome details has been therapeutic for an estranged person who is trying to identify with a new city, its streets, its landmarks, its avenues. The subway map is an integral part of New York city life, a very familiar image, without which no one would have any sense of direction. I have chosen to make the translated subway map, a ‘painting’, so that its status of just being an object of functional value, can be elevated.”

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6 comments

Scott E October 30, 2010 - 2:36 pm

Interesting…they even included the full Second Avenue Line! (but not the extended 7)

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Jerrold October 31, 2010 - 7:30 pm

If they included the FULL Second Ave. Line, then they should have included the #7 extension, with not only the 11th Ave./34th St. station but also the 10th Ave./41st St. station.
Now THAT station may or may not ever materialize, but the same goes for every station along Second Ave. south of 72nd St. or north of 96th St.

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rhywun October 30, 2010 - 11:35 pm

Cute… but not exactly useful – except as art 🙂

A map showing what certain neighborhoods are most “known” for might have some practicality. Greek food in Astoria, Korean along 32nd Street, that kind of thing. Otherwise you have to live here for awhile before you learn that stuff.

Reminds me of an episode of Seinfeld that stuck in my head where they kept jumping out at Queensboro Plaza to grab a gyro. Years later I moved to NYC and found out they totally made that up, but I still like the way it captures – much like this map – a certain kind of “spirit” we New Yorkers have about food.

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SEAN October 31, 2010 - 11:06 am

New York & food, aren’t they one & the same?

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rhywun October 31, 2010 - 10:52 pm

Heh yup – people do seem a little more obsessed with food here than in other American cities. Even rubes like me who can barely cook and mostly stick to what we’re used to know where to find the perfect slice of pizza or the best deli sandwich, and we go out of our way to get it. Because we can.

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Chris G November 1, 2010 - 12:55 pm

N Train to my favorite restaurant in the entire city in Astoria.

Any real foodie know you need the trains to eat the best in this city.

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