Tag: commuter rail

Using Emoji to Depict Train Delays

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Bloomberg (screenshot)

It’s a single animated map in a larger, infographic-rich Bloomberg CityLab article about how NJ Transit is the least reliable New York City area commuter rail service, but you can’t help but pay attention to a map that uses emoji to indicate how late a train is. Surprisingly effective, though I doubt transit agencies would be brave enough to adopt it for themselves. The Intercity Rail Map uses colours (green, yellow, red, black) to indicate lateness, but the icons indicate train number so you couldn’t swap them out for emoji, more’s the pity. [Maps Mania]

New York and Philadelphia Regional Rail Networks on One Map

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

NYC and Philadelphia regional rail networks
Evelyn Ivy (GitHub)

Here’s a rail network map that shows the commuter rail lines of both New York City and Philadelphia. It’s by Evelyn Ivy, who explains on Mastodon that it took six months of work to complete. “Showing five different commuter rail systems (#CTRail, #MetroNorth, #LIRR, #NJTransit, and #SEPTA), this map depicts everywhere a passenger can get to by train from NYC or Philadelphia without using Amtrak.” (The keys are Trenton and New Haven, where you can hop from one system to the next.)

Two Detailed Rail Maps

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Northeast Rail Map

A couple of supremely detailed rail maps to bring to your attention, both of which show every line and station of long-distance, regional and commuter rail networks. There’s one for California, which uses a Beck-like, diagrammatic design, and one for the Northeast Corridor (see above), which opts for geographic accuracy. Despite the differences there’s a lot of overlap on the two design teams. Creative Commons licensed, with printed posters available.