Electric Tube
A couple of years I drew a quirky tube map to commemorate the completing of the circle on London’s Overground, affectionally known as the Ginger Line. The artwork has proven to be quite popular so I’ve produced a print run of an updated version of it. The new version retains the circles, loops and quirks of the original, but I took the opportunity to fix a few lines that weren’t quite right, and throw in a few more wiggles – have a look at that DLR!
Here’s what I wrote previously:
My starting principles for the diagram were concentric circles for the orbital sections of the Circle Line and the Overground network, and straight lines for the Central and Piccadilly Lines, with the latter two converging in the centre of the circles. I then squeezed everything else in. I realised that the Northern Line’s Bank branch passed the Circle Line three times so was going to need something special, so I added a sine wave for this section, and extended this north and south as much as possible.
The River Thames is on there – because any tube diagram doesn’t look correct without the river – and the diagram is topologically accurate – everything connects correctly, and features are in an approximately correct geographical position relative to their neighbours, but not to the diagram overall. Only stations that are designated intersections, or have connections with National Rail stations, are shown. I haven’t labelled anything. It’s art.
I was also thinking about physics when creating the diagram – specifically Feynman diagrams, bubble chamber traces, particle physics collisions, magnetic flow lines and electrical circuit diagrams (as was Beck himself). Hence why I’ve called it the Electric Tube.
The work was also inspired by the likes of Fransicso Dans (more) and Project Mapping, as well as of course the famous Official Tube Map.
The limited edition prints can be bought from my online shop.
