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Ahead of Its Time | An Icon Goes Digital
The interactive subway diagram that was designed by Massimo Vignelli, Beatriz Cifuentes and Yoshiki Waterhouse for The Weekender Web site of the M.T.A. offers riders information — driven and updated by live data — on planned weekend work projects that will affect subway service. At any point, the diagram can be clicked, zoomed, panned or expanded to full screen. In this screen, the B and 5 lines are shaded to indicate a weekend service interruption. (Image via NYT)
In 1972, Massimo Vignelli designed a diagrammatic map for the New York City subway. It was a radical departure. He replaced the serpentine maze of geographically accurate train routes with simple, bold bands of color that turned at 45- and 90-degree angles. [...] Its abstract representation of the routes was elegant but flawed. To make the map function effectively, a few geographic liberties were taken, something that didn’t sit well with New Yorkers.
— tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com
1 Comment
The whole point of the map is that it worked in a media that had no "zoom" (the poster). If the online map were just a zoomable geographic map, you can resolve to the complexity of certain nodes just by pinching your fingers on your iPhone.