Realistic subway maps

Subway maps are usually meant as a visual guide to the system and not by any means an accurate map of the real city. What seems close on a tube map could very likely be a large distance in the real world.

While widely acknowledged as a design classic, the tube map of London bears very little geographical relationship to where the stations are. Rob Gardiner has created a page where the tube maps are overlayed with satellite photos of the city, providing a nice visualization of how the tubes actually are arranged.

Subway station in Prague.

Eddie Jabbour is a graphic designer obsessed with replacing the subway maps of New York city with smarter versions. Read more about his project in this New York Times article.

Tokyo subway map.

I think that schematic subway maps are essential to any traveler using the system, but it is always good to compare them with real maps for better orientation in a city.

Subway station in Amsterdam.

Did you ever wanted to bring a subway map in your pocket without ripping a page from your Lonely Planet? Now you can. Travel site Amadeus.net has put together a site with hundreds of metro maps. The coverage is impressive: All major American cities are there as well as subway systems in Europe, Australia, Africa, and Asia.