What if the NYC Subway map looked like the DC Metro’s?

Washington’s Metro subway map, with its thick lines and bullseye transfer stations, is iconic. What would New York’s subway map look like in Metro style? Chris Whong shows us.

Whong redrew the Manhattan and Bronx part of the map with the 45° angles, station symbols, and simplified diagrammatic design of the Metro map. The many lines take up a fair amount of space, which is one reason New York doesn’t actually make a map this way. But it’s actually quite readable.

In fact, New York has had diagrammatic maps in the past, particularly the famous Massimo Vignelli map New York used from 1972-1979, which confined lines to 45° and also eschewed a lot of other information like the street grid, which is part of the current NYC map.

Whong’s full map is below: