London Banter - View Single Post

R.C. Payne · December 11th 07, 05:08 PM posted to uk.railway,uk.transport,uk.transport.london

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 11 Dec 2007, wrote:

On Dec 11, 8:31 am, PhilD wrote:
On Dec 10, 11:48 pm, "John Rowland"

wrote:
Is there a good reason for them to be different? Won't various signs
and
conduit friezes have to be replaced as a result of the colour change
which
could otherwise have been left alone?

My guess is that they wanted something sufficiently different to
indicate different services, but sufficiently similar to merge them
at a later date.

I think there's a case for keeping them seperate. The use of shades of
orange suggests they're part of the same network, but it would ensure
that noone would believe they can get a direct train from, say, New
Cross to Hampstead Heath.

I take your point. ISTR a map (drawn by J. Rowland?) which put the
Wimbleware service in a different shade of green to the rest of the
District to make it clear that there were no Richmond - Edgware Road
trains. You could do something similar with the Metropolitan. Moreover,
the current map suggests you can get a train from Clapham Junction to
Stratford via Willesden Junction; you cannot.

However, i think all of these limitations can be shown by layout,
without using colour - as recent maps have done for the Wimbleware, and
do for the Overground at Gospel Oak.

The current map [1] makes the Wimbleware service fairly clear, though I
can see a case for marking it out as a separate line, H&C style. One of
the problems with the Underground map is that it is well suited to tube
lines, where services are really very distinct from one another, but it
is less good for subsurface and overground services where there is not a
one line to one track type of segregation. I also don't like the
wheelchair symbol. I don't object to the idea of showing stair free
stations, and I can't think of a better idea for how to do it, but that
doesn't stop me from not liking it.

[1] http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/images/...d-tube-map.gif

Robin