Why less accurate subway maps are more useful

A century-old design choice is why a glance at a subway map can tell you it’ll take three trains to get to the bar hangout. Modern metro maps are inspired by Underground drafter Harry Beck’s revolutionary 1930s London Tube map, which prioritized utility over geographic accuracy.

The metro map is not the metro

Beck realized that existing tube maps were more confusing than a Scottish Midlands accent, since they showed London’s geography in excessive detail—with a knot of twisting train lines overlaid on a jumble of city streets. He created a diagrammatic version that was less geographically accurate but represented Tube stops and line connections more intuitively:

• It featured only vertical, horizontal, or 45-degree-angle train lines, in bold contrasting colors, making them easier to navigate visually.
• Many city features, like street names that cluttered previous Tube maps, were removed to avoid distracting the viewer.
• The diagram ditched an accurate neighborhood scale in favor of zooming in on the busiest central areas with the most intersecting lines.

Cities worldwide continue to draw inspiration from Beck’s design to create metro maps that resemble electrical circuit diagrams.

For instance…New York’s recently revamped subway map boosts readability by featuring boldly colored, angular train lines on top of a simplistic depiction of the five boroughs.—SK