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Imagine If NYC's Subway Map Had Rad Concentric Circles

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Poor Massimo Viignelli. His aesthetic-yet-inaccurate subway map from the 1970s was quickly replaced. Luckily, the new version designed by UK professor Maxwell Roberts has not been so quickly panned and dismissed; rather, folks are oohing and aahing all over his spiffy rendering of our haphazard, century-plus-old maze of underground transit. Channeling his passion for "schematic mapping" and wayfinding," he's designed circular maps for London, Berlin, Paris, Tokyo, Washington DC, and Chicago as well as the version for New York. (Above, a mere excerpt.) The gist is that clear, readable maps help passengers navigate complex systems aren't necessarily geographically spot-on. Do you agree?

Some more close-up shots...

And the whole shebang. Click for a pop-up image and a closer view.

· Tube Map Central by Max Roberts [official site]
· New NYC Subway Map Elegantly Inspired By Concentric Circles [Gothamist]]
· A Better New York Transit Map Through The Power of Circles [Co.Exist]
· More Cool Map Things [Curbed]