A close-up of the circles radiating out from Lower Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn. (Courtesy of Max Roberts)
A few weeks ago, I ran a brief post on Max Roberts’ circular subway map. With a focal point in the New York harbor, the map presents the subway system as a series of concentric circles. It’s a fun map that highlights connections between lines and is generally divorced from geographic reality.
This week, Roberts published a piece on The Guardian’s website about the philosophy of his design. Roberts speaks a bit self-deprecatingly about his efforts. “A circles-and-spokes approach offers no obvious benefit for this city,” he said of New York, “and without a clear centre defined by orbits, where should the spokes radiate from? I should not even have attempted this map, there are so many others on my list of things to do.”
Roberts wrote a bit more about his New York approach:
A point of radiation in New York Harbour gave me just enough space to fit everything into Lower Manhattan, a perfect semi-circle from the Manhattan Bridge all the way to Bay Ridge, and left me with enough space to make the rest of the map nice and balanced. DeKalb Avenue is always difficult, and eastern Queens needed some thinking, but that was it, the design almost crystallised in front of me.
The New York subway has been forced into an unprecedented level of organisation…There is geographical distortion, and a few awkward spots where the lines cannot decide whether they are orbital or radial and end up zigzagging. Some people may object to its aesthetics, and geographical purists will dislike it in the same way that they distrust all highly schematised designs, but the overall spaciousness and power is harder to dispute.
I’ve always argued that geographical maps and schematic maps have distinct roles to play, each serves a purpose, and so any transport undertaking that refuses to make both available is short-changing its customers. A good geographical map shows where the network is, a good schematic shows how the elements of a network relate together logically. An uncomfortable hybrid serves neither role effectively. Whatever the usability study outcomes, if a product is attractive and powerful for some people, so that they enjoy looking at it, that is half the battle won for the information designer.
Check out the rest of the piece. It’s a good, quick read. Meanwhile, after the jump, this weekend’s service advisories.
