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Comment by llsf | Hacker News Reader

No skin in the game. Looking at the old one https://www.mta.info/map/36946 vs. the new one https://www.mta.info/map/5256, and not being a New Yorker, I would prefer the old map as it allows me to appreciate the distances and contextualize more.

But I can see a New Yorker preferring the new map to get just the subway lines and connections.

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I prefer the old map and I would argue it’s better. The old geographically accurate map is better for tourists, but the streamlined map is easier for locals to read.

IMO, locals don’t really look at transit maps since they have them memorized and only travel the same few lines regularly.

It’s tourists that are unfamiliar with the lines that need to read these maps. They also want to know the distance between stations.

So it becomes the question: who is the transit map made for?

New Yorkers actually agreed with you quite vocally the last time someone tried to introduce a schematic map.

I think they both deserve to exist, and need to. The one map is invaluable when I’m navigating somewhere specific by my own hand; the other map is critical to comprehend the system and how the different lines parallel and overlap.

Compare the subway map with a real map of New York and you'll find that it leads you to all kinds of wrong ideas about directions, distances and relative positions of things.

It's a diagram, not a map.

The old "map" isn't geographically accurate, either.

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