Tuesday, October 16, 2012

A Subway Map of Maps That Use Subway Maps as a Metaphor



I thought of this concept a while back after noticing more and more subway-style maps being used to show other things. I finally got around to mocking it up. I still have more work to do on it but I thought I would post it before someone else comes up with the same idea. After finishing the first draft, I stumbled on the Cool Infographics page on Subway Maps which includes several more examples of concepts diagrammed as a subway map so I will have to add them in in the next version. Here are the links for all the subway-style maps I've found so far (the "stations" on my map)

Subways
Transit Map Directory - Too many to include (London, Paris, Tokyo, New York, etc.) and not the point

Railways
A Transit Map of Transit Maps, done by Mark Ovenden as a promo for his Transit Maps of the World Book. First discovered on Big Think 
Cameron Booth has done a number of subway-inspired maps including a map of Amtrak's train routes and France's railways.

Highways 
Cameron has also mapped a number of highways systems as subway maps including the US Interstate Highway System and Europe's major highways.

Buses
Stamen's "The City from the Valley" Project

Skyways
Pan Am Flight Routes - Thanks to Cameron Booth for finding this reference for me.
I'm still looking for this example.

Land
US National Parks - Also covered here
Wine regions in France: Discovered on the Strange Maps Blog with the DeLong Wine original here

Rivers
Mississippi River: Created by Daniel Huffman who has also mapped the Colorado, Columbia, Yukon, and St. Lawrence Rivers (among others) on his website
The River Thames has been mapped, quite seriously as a subway-style map to show river buses, river tour companies and the piers where they stop.  

People

Concepts
Web Trends by Information Architects

Please let me know if you know of a Subway-style map that I've left out.

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