Comments on: New York City subway maps

New York City subway maps

Lemkin — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 05:25:18 -0800

"The Metropolitan Transportation Authority on Wednesday revealed a revamped map of the city's subway system that takes its cues from a 1970s throwback that was cheered by design connoisseurs and reviled by many traditionalists. It is the first major overhaul of the subway map to be introduced by the authority in almost 50 years."

Terrific Wikipedia article on the history of the New York City subway map

By: Johnny Assay

Johnny Assay — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 05:40:26 -0800

All models are wrong, but some are useful. This seems useful.

By: jacquilynne

jacquilynne — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 06:07:28 -0800

It immediately seems more inviting and readable to me than the old version, though I have to admit, I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore other than, I guess, 'phone is out of battery' because transit apps that tell me exactly how to get where I am going and how much walking it will involve are so well-developed these days.

By: Lemkin

Lemkin — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 06:32:31 -0800

I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore The article seems to suggest that the new map is as much a branding effort as anything else.

By: timdiggerm

timdiggerm — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 06:38:52 -0800

As someone from the DC area who was initially completed flummoxed by the old map and the notion of express trains when I first visited NYC, this map is a big improvement. On the other hand, it's true, I mostly just use an app to figure out mass transit routes.

By: goatdog

goatdog — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 06:44:20 -0800

The new one looks like what Chicago has been using as long as I can remember. It's good!

By: epo

epo — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 07:06:46 -0800

A railway map is a diagram, an abstraction. It does not have to be geographically precise because it's function is to help you navigate the railway system. Harry Beck realised this back in the 30s when designing the London Underground map. This is a clear homage to that principle and to the map he produced.

By: timdiggerm

timdiggerm — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 07:10:27 -0800

Oh, also, here is the actual page with the map(s)

By: EmpressCallipygos

EmpressCallipygos — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 08:14:15 -0800

I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore other than, I guess, 'phone is out of battery' because transit apps that tell me exactly how to get where I am going and how much walking it will involve are so well-developed these days. * Raises hand * SCENARIO ONE - You're on the subway and have just learned that the train you're on is about to be rerouted because someone two trains ahead of you has pulled the emergency brake/is sick/broke some component/has cast a wizard spell/suddenly started imitating Voldemort/etc., and you can't get reception on your phone to figure out a workaround. SCENARIO TWO: You're on the subway but at the last minute you realize you forgot to plan in a side quest on your route, and you can't get reception on your phone to figure out whether you can switch trains at the next station to factor in that reroute or if it'd just be a pain in the ass. SCENARIO THREE: Google maps is telling you to get off the train at one station and then walk ten minutes, but you could SWEAR that there's a closer stop that would only be a five minute walk instead, even if you have to backtrack, and you can't get Google to acknowledge this. I have had all three of those scenarios happen to me just within the past year, and one of them was just within the past week.

By: Dr. Wu

Dr. Wu — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 08:28:33 -0800

I love the Unimark map and am happy to see that it's made a comeback. But, holy hell, THIS is what passes for a snappy lead sentence in the NYT these days?: When it comes to the New York City subway, what once was old is new again. Sheesh. Two clichés in one sentence! We had better openers in my high school newspaper. If, like me, you can stare at transit maps for hours on end, you may enjoy this terrific book, semi-recently updated.

By: RonButNotStupid

RonButNotStupid — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 08:35:56 -0800

By: Navelgazer

Navelgazer — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 09:03:06 -0800

This has been a tough nut to crtack for basically forever, and no map is going to be perfect, but I feel like this is about as good a job as they could have done on this. Bravo! (NB: This map will still be a document of lies on late nights and weekends.)

By: jacquilynne

jacquilynne — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 09:49:30 -0800

... you can't get reception on your phone to figure out a workaround. After the long term debacle that was adding cell service to the Toronto subway, I sort of assumed everyone else already had it. Maybe you want to know where you're going instead of just how to get there? Maps are really good at that. This sounds like it is supposed to be all deep and stuff but then I try to figure out what your point is and ... I got nothing.

By: Halloween Jack

Halloween Jack — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 10:54:55 -0800

The only place where I saw that 1970s London Tube-style map being used was in The Warriors, when the gang was using it to navigate from Coney Island to Van Cortlandt Park during the opening credits. I was surprised and a little dismayed to find, when I went to NYC in the early 90s, that they'd gone to the geographically-inaccurate map, but I got used to it, I guess.

By: slkinsey

slkinsey — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 11:23:52 -0800

For quite some years now my main NYC subway app has been KickMap, which more or less splits the difference between topographic and diagrammatic map styles.

By: slkinsey

slkinsey — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 11:39:57 -0800

I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore other than, I guess, 'phone is out of battery' Adding to the scenarios presented by EmpressCallipygos, it's often useful to know where the various transfer points are between subway lines and also between local and express trains on the same line. Trying to get from East 53rd to 145th and Broadway? Well, when you reach the Seventh Avenue station and transfer off the E, is the first train to arrive a D or a B? If it's a D, it's only three stops to 145th and St. Nicholas, and even though you have to walk three blocks west to get over to Broadway, that will be the fastest way to get there. If it's a B, you may want to transfer to the 1 at 59th Street—it's a local, but the 145th station is at Broadway. Or you could take the E to 42nd and then transfer to the uptown A, which is also only three stops to 145th and St. Nicholas. These choices might also be informed by information on delays, etc. In my experience, the map app on your smartphone isn't going to give you that kind of information very well.

By: jacquilynne

jacquilynne — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 12:09:08 -0800

Do the transit apps really not do that kind of thing for the New York subways? My bus app will give me all sorts of alternate routes to a destination and take into account delays, walking distances, etc. Like, the most common place I go on the bus other than work is the glass studio and right now, I have 6 alternative paths to get there using various combinations of buses, walking and trains. It knows which bus routes are late or cancelled, estimates my arrival time for each method and gifts me a handy bar graph to show time spent walking, waiting, or on transit.

By: EmpressCallipygos

EmpressCallipygos — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 12:23:44 -0800

Do the transit apps really not do that kind of thing for the New York subways? Not with as much flexibility, and often not once you've already started a trip. Also, sometimes the information on the app lags behind reality - sometimes I've tried the workaround of re-starting my route when I get to a transfer point to check something, and it gives me a route that actually assumes I'm starting LATER than I am. Here's a real-world example: Say I take the G to Hoyt-Schermerhorn and get off, waiting to transfer to either an A or a C. I know the A express is the quickest, but the subway notice board says that the C is arriving in only three minutes, while I'd need to wait a full eight minutes for an A. I pull up the app and reroute, trying to see what it suggests. But - the app assumes that I'm up on the street instead of down in the tunnel, and offers me either the A that's coming in 8 minutes or the C that's coming in 15 minutes, because it's assuming I'd need to walk three blocks to the turnstile and walk down to the platform FIRST. Also, when there's unscheduled track work, that information doesn't always filter down to the app right away. So I might rock up to the G train like my app is telling me to only to find a sign that the G had to be taken out of service the rest of the day and I should wait for a shuttle bus that will take me to the next available station....whenever it gets there.

By: limeonaire

limeonaire — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 12:30:48 -0800

Citymapper does a pretty good job, but there are definitely times when it's inaccurate or Google Maps is inaccurate. Anyway, this is pretty, but I'm not a big fan of maps that are pretty but gloss over the actual shape of things, actual distances, etc. I missed getting off at the correct stop the other day on either an F train or the JMZ line—neither of which I usually take if I can help it—and didn't realize just how long it was going to take me to correct that mistake, since the time between the last stop in Manhattan and the next stop in Brooklyn was huge. I feel like I've made that exact error on the same line at least a couple times. (Couldn't tell you for sure because I feel like I basically have to mentally disassociate and think about something else to bear the waste of time.) I felt like the existing map was fine? But maybe this will correct the apparent misconception some newcomers seem to have that we're like Boston or something and have a single, unified orange line, yellow line, etc. Whereas the reality is, you could even catch a train with the same name and it's not the same, like when an N train randomly takes you uptown like a Q train, without clear placards on the car you enter to denote any difference.

By: miles per flower

miles per flower — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 13:05:35 -0800

Lifelong New Yorker & subway enthusiast & dilettante design nerd reporting in with Complicated Feelings! There are always such tradeoffs in this kind of mapping assignment. Aesthetically I think it's gorgeous and groovy. Zooming in on the curves around Atlantic Av/Barclay Ctr is just lovely, and I admire the elegant problem-solving that went into showing how the lines curve and connect there while sticking to the self-imposed rules of the grid. The new map does an excellent job of showing how the lines connect to each other, but no job at all in showing how they relate to the world above. Because so many people now have very, very good neighborhood maps on the phones in their pockets, maybe that's not needed as much... or maybe at all? Mrs. per flower points out this map does something very well that google maps does poorly—explaining how the lines relate to each other. And that it was smart of the MTA to err on the side of something that google is bad at. I agree! And also it feels less useful to me. I know, I know, change is hard, and the map is not the territory, BUT: For me, the biggest losses are the removal of neighborhood names and major streets. Understanding East Broadway's relationship to Broadway, or how Bedford Avenue changes directions so many times..., or, like: St. Nicholas Avenue. Sometimes it's over the 1 line and sometimes it's over the C line and sometimes it's over the B and C lines, but it's never included in a station name or listed anywhere on the map. That's something that's relevant to a subway rider planning a trip and not captured on either a street map or a purely diagrammatic subway map. Seeing how major streets and old historical grids line up with the current subway lines has always helped me in my (don't say holistic, don't say holistic) holistic understanding of city geography. Same goes for neighborhood names, and not just for tourists looking for Chinatown or SoHo or Williamsburg or Greenwich Village, similarly unmentioned on the map or any station name). I think the old map, though such a mishmash of different fonts and angles, tried to thread this needle valiantly. A lot of my knowledge of the city is from that old subway map, not necessarily from staring at it but from years & years of glancing at it while moving quickly. That's just not available on the new map. (I'm also weirdly salty that Green-Wood Cemetery is gone but the High Line is included...? ) (I have no problem with the High Line, I just adore Green-Wood and have used its presence on the subway map as a wayfinding landmark for years.)

By: EmpressCallipygos

EmpressCallipygos — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 14:03:21 -0800

One particular thing I appreciate about the new map - it makes it WAY easier to spot the individual lines than it was on the older one, and that can be a real advantage when you're in a crowded train and there's about three people between you and the map and you're trying to figure out whether the train you're on will connect with another line. On the older map you were stuck squinting or leaning over someone's shoulder trying to spot the lines, but with this, it's like "okay, I'm on the 6, and.....yep, there's the N, there IS a transfer, yay."

By: kokaku

kokaku — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 14:24:07 -0800

to add to EC's points... SCENARIO FOUR: you're a former NYC resident who returns often, doesn't tend to use map apps to get around but still needs reminders sometimes about which lines go where because you often stay in unfamiliar neighborhoods with friends

By: doctornemo

doctornemo — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 14:46:10 -0800

Ah, New York: Karen Hedju, 57, a resident of Morningside Heights in Manhattan, was one of the first to lay eyes on the latest design. "Meh," Ms. Hedju said, as she squinted at the design on a color printout.

By: egypturnash

egypturnash — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 17:43:59 -0800

all subway maps must look like the London Tube map there are no exceptions it doesn't matter if the city fits really badly into a rectilinear grid it doesn't matter if the city has a dense enough collection of stops such that the geographical information of "you could just leave here and walk half a block and get there faster" is often very useful it doesn't matter how badly distances and times are distorted the London Tube map is the only allowable model

By: Bunglegirl

Bunglegirl — Fri, 04 Apr 2025 20:44:08 -0800

I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore Lots of times Google maps routing me by a certain line when I know there's other options that may be more convenient to me—maybe I want to walk on one end rather than transfer to two buses or take a commuter rail line that's faster but doesn't leave for another 30 minutes. I also like it for planning a future trip. Also maps are fun and cool to look at.

By: trig

trig — Sun, 06 Apr 2025 05:26:04 -0800

I am hard-pressed to imagine the circumstances in which I would need to read a subway map anymore other than, I guess, 'phone is out of battery' I find it helpful to have a big-picture understanding and big-picture view of a transport system. What all the options are, what neighborhoods are covered, what the main pathways into a neighborhood are, etc. From a given starting point, where are all the places I can get to easily and which are harder. There might be apps that are good at that but I haven't found them. This kind of map lets me see those things at a glance.