The closing chapter of the part The layout, as well as the chapter’s test are out in Ilya Birman’s Designing Transit Maps. This is the third part out of five in the book.
The book speaks of transit maps history, important principles of their design, and how they evolve together with their networks. The author talks about techniques: plotting the lines, denoting the stops, choosing the fonts, and composing the final poster.
Few designers have an occasion to design a subway map. But the principles and techniques discussed are applicable to any tasks of complex information display: org charts, family trees, control‑flow diagrams, fire escape plans, military operation plans, project timelines, architectural drawings. The book sharpens the reader’s eye and inculcates attention to detail.
Format
A transit map can be of any shape, but it is most likely to be displayed as a rectangular poster. The poster’s size and proportions are determined both by the map itself and by environmental constraints. If you design a map on an infinite canvas, and then crop out a rectangle around it, you’ll see that the map is “clueless” about its format. In the new chapter, Ilya Birman shows some techniques of fitting a map to a format.
Interactive test
After the chapter, there is an interactive test on the whole third part, The layout.
Sample chapter
The chapter ‘Bends’ is available for free. In the chapter Ilya Birman shows good and bad ways to bend the lines, introduces the bend visibility principle, talks about harmonizing the bends in line bundles.
Preorder
Preorder is available as before and you can start reading the book right now. If you choose to subscribe to the book before it’s fully published, you will get 2 extra months free. Your official subscription time hasn’t started ticking yet—we’ll start your subscription clock later. The book is being published in parts, and the readers still have their paid year plus 2 months as a gift.
Gift and special price
By the way, you can gift a subscription to any Bureau Gorbunov book to someone you know. When you give the book as a gift, you pay for the year of subscription and will not have any additional charges. The person will receive a congratulatory notification about your gift to them. When their subscription runs out, they will be able to use their bank card to renew the subscription for a reduced fee. Delight your friends, colleagues, and anybody who’s curious.
Also, a special price is available to Bureau Gorbunov Publishing subscribers. To use the special price, sign in using the address you used to subscribe to any of the other books.
Now is a good time to subscribe and gift the subscription to your friends.