New York City's subway map, famous but illegible to tourists, has finally been redesigned. The new map is much like one briefly used in the 1970s, rejected then for making it too easy to get around. "Reviled by traditionalists," as the New York Times puts it.
The updated version blends elements of the Unimark design with a successor known to some as the Tauranac map, after John Tauranac, a well-regarded New York mapmaker. That design was led by the firm Michael Hertz Associates. The new map is already being displayed on digital monitors, and will be posted in subway cars and platforms over the next several weeks, the M.T.A. said
Harry Beck nailed this problem nearly a century ago, but every city has to come to terms with it in its own time.
