please empty your brain below

Maps aren't supposed to be about "clarity of vision". They're supposed to be about providing geographical information (or "clutter" as you insist on calling it).

Err, no: an OS map is about providing geographical information; an A-Z is about providing a schematic representation of how London's roads fit together (hence why roads are 10x wider on an A-Z than an OS map); and the Tube map is about providing a schematic representation of the Underground works (hence why it doesn't have roads on it at all, or need rivers on it).

The whole point of the Tube "map" is precisely that it *isn*t* a geographical map. It's there to plan your tube journey, not to show where you are. Therefore the river is unnecessary.

If I'm going to Canning Town from Westminster, why should I care that I'm going to cross the river 4 times? It's not like I'm going to need my passport at every crossing.

If we're going to show the Thames, then why not the Lea and the Wandle? Why not show the docks on the Isle of Dogs and North Woolwich? Why not show the M25? etc. etc. IT IS NOT A MAP.

Surely you missed a great pun about the Wapping great meander?

K - wait, you mean you don't need a passport to go south of the river?

The map in the Extended Circle leaflet has the river back. I can't remember how far east it goes, and it isn't online.

dg writes: It only goes as far as Aldgate East.

If anything, I would have thought that the river is *more* important to the East of London, where there are few river crossings and therefore it is far more important to ensure that you get off at the right station and not face the impenetrable barrier of Old Father Thames between you and your final destination. Without the river on the map, for example, people could think that it's possible to walk from Canary Wharf to the O2.

The tube map is there to help people get from A to B, and is not there to satify design purists.

Maybe we need to make sure the DLR team aren't so thoughtless as to build lots of stations next time they build an extension, lest they destroy the aesthetic beauty of the tube map?

Mark,

1. It's a tube map. It shows the tube lines, not how to get to places on foot.

2. It actually is possible to get to O2 from Canary Wharf on foot, but nobody is stupid enough to try it if they don't know the area well, so most people take the tube instead. In which case one woudln't give a crap what roads, docks, parks, churches, schools, bridges, tunnels or rivers it crosses.

3. I'm fed up of people saying the tube map is trying to satisfy design purists. What does that even mean? Good design is just a means to an end, which is to make it clear for people who are new to the tube get from A to B, without having to care about London's geography.

K, most major world cities include major rivers on their metro map, to enable to people to orient themselves better with what is, quite rightly, a geographically empty map. I'm sure you will find examples to prove me wrong, but taking a look at NYC, DC, Paris, Berlin... they all have rivers. The point of having the river is to provide some kind of geographical anchor to help give people some kind of point of reference.

I'll grant you your point 2, as yes, you can walk through the Greenwich tunnel, my point was more that there's no *direct* foot route, and when people are evaluating whether or not to make a journey, they may decide that a one stop hop can be better done by foot.

"Design purists" - absolutely agree that good design is a means to an end... my point was more that if you ask the vast majority of laypeople I would hazard that most don't find the inclusion of a river overly confusing, and so having what appears to be a fairly philosophical debate from a design theory perspective seems to me to be quite abstract and detatched from people's needs.

The river on the tube map is important to people because it's just like the beginning of their favourite soap.

Discuss.

Mark, you say that the tube map is rightly geographically empty, but you also say that people will use it to make decisions on whether to walk somewhere rather than take the tube. A stop is not a measure of distance - I think the longest distance between two stops is something like 4 miles, so nobody should be using the tube map to make those sorts of decisions.

I reiterate: If you're unfamiliar with a certain area, enough that you don't even know where the river is, what would possess you to try and walk there rather than hop on the tube?

Cry me a river.......

Design purists??

"When I'm working on a problem I never think about beauty.
I think only how to solve the problem.
But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong."
--R. Buckminster Fuller

Does that do it for you?

the whole "river" row detracts from one of the worst developments in the tube map which is the removal of the travel zones. I hope they do something to remedy that.

...and there will be massively London Overground network to add south of the river, just where the key normally is, not forgetting inserting Imperial Wharf the right side of the Thames from Clapham Junction!

Thank you H. Back to my conspiracy theory about all this. Although personally I would like to see both the river and the zones go.

The river was only removed in September, so surely it can't be that hard to put back in, can it?

Whether it should go back on the tube map, I'm not sure. The tube map doesn't actually need to show the Thames, as DG points out, but I think that it's more aesthetically pleasing for it to be on there.

Is Imperial Wharf on the North or South bank?

Perhaps instead of having the river as a wide blue band, an extremely thin dotted line would be a reasonable compromise...

Have you room to take on board an underpass related plea?
When are the BFI, Railtrack and the Saison Poetry Library going to get Sue Hubbards's terrific poem Eurydice restored in the Waterloo Underpass leading to the IMAX. Which thickheads painted it over and why, please?











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