Rachel’s Team Pick: Subways

This is a thing that exists on the internet and is elegant in its simplicity: major subway maps worldwide formatted to the same scale. If, like me, you find staring at subway maps or even thinking about them bizarrely soothing and a genuine human comfort in this sick sad world, you may enjoy it.

 

THIS IS SEOUL.

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Rachel

Originally from Boston, MA, Rachel now lives in the Midwest. Topics dear to her heart include bisexuality, The X-Files and tacos. Her favorite Ciara video is probably "Ride," but if you're only going to watch one, she recommends "Like A Boy." You can follow her on twitter and instagram.

Rachel has written 1141 articles for us.

45 Comments

    • I thoroughly enjoy both of these links. I am a nerdy music-lover who commits entire subway lines to memory just for the hell of it.

  4. I love subways! I know Paris’ RATP like the back of my hand and am very proud of this fact.

  5. Wow, look at Moscow. Those communists sure did organize the crap out of everything :D. Stockholm looks like vericose veins.

    • The Moscow metro is EXCELLENT. It makes so much sense! It’s so easy to navigate! Plus, (some of) the stations are beautiful.

    • hahaha E-line is the armpit of the MBTA. either that or the Orange Line in its entirety.

      • At least the orange line is a third rail. Man, i lived on the green line (b) for four years and always ended up walking instead. it was faster.

        • yep, that’s my life right now. the up side is that i get a ton of exercise, [narrowly] avoiding the freshman 15.

    • I’m glad real-life trains don’t have creepy Thomas the Tank Engine faces, if so, the Heath St./E train would be crying, because everyone hates it.

  7. these are all great. i like to think of them as dancing stick figures, or spiders.

    my favorites are the little baby ones, like Brussels.

  8. i spent an entire afternoon a couple months ago reading about all the subway systems on wikipedia…shit is interesting.

  10. too bad LA doesn’t have a decent subway. Earthquakes are no excuse, just look at Tokyo.

    • At least you get to qualify the “doesn’t have a subway” with decent. Our excuse is hills.

      • What city is that? If you can rails in San Francisco (you can!) then they can work anywhere with hills.

    • Yes, but do you know why you have a subway at all? George Takei.

      This makes me happy.

  11. i love subway maps so so much
    one of the things i miss most about living in toronto is the subway :(

  12. I lived off that line in Seoul. The blue line specifically. I lived in Uijonbu which is an incorporated city of Seoul.It would be on one of the long arms coming off the map from the north. Just that much closer to the border with North Korea. I miss the subway there, so efficient, so clean.

    • totally! though sometimes I wish the metro gods chose more interesting colours too, there’s never really any purple line, or pink line. or sparkley line.

      (are they building a purple/silver line to dulles? what is going on? I feel like I would never use it but I’m excited for the map to be more colourful)

      • They are supposedly expanding a new silver line to the airport and I think Tyson’s Corner sometime within the next 262 years. Silver is code for grey. I am with you — where is the glitter line? The polka dot line? How ’bout the gold line that is literally gold?!

  17. Also relevant. I have a few of these, myself.
    http://spacing.ca/store/buttons/

    When I’m on the subway and thinking about the possibility of the tunnels caving in on me, I play a game to calm down. It’s called, “What’s the colour of the walls of the next subway station?” I know pretty much all of the ones on the Bloor-Danforth line from Kipling to Bloor-Yonge.

  19. This is awesome, I love subways and I love maps. I always thought NYC had a really big subway system but some of those others are MUCH bigger!

  22. My girlfriend got me a book of all the subway systems in the world for christmas. it was the best present ever.

  23. This is awesome. I’d like to see the Berlin U-Bahn instead of the S-bahn. Regardless, I live for public transportation.

  25. Glasvegas! The clockwork orange! A sad omission, even though it only goes in a circle. In my subway carriage yesterday there was a man casually wearing trainers, a tshirt and a kilt and sporran, and another guy with a full beard and a twirled moustache. That’s quality subway time.

  27. Ooh ooh Seoul! That hole in the middle of the flying spaghetti monster is a mountain, and I live on it.

  28. Amsterdam’s looks exactly like a drunk person falling over, which is perfect.

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