MBTA Updates Maps
So I am only in Boston a few weeks when the MBTA launches a brand new map.
From The Boston Globe
The map is updated to include key bus routes along with subway lines, commuter rail lines and the Silver Line (enhanced bus service). It is also updated to be more geographically accurate (which I love in transit maps). This is also the first time in more than 40 years some neighborhood maps have been updated. Those are the maps that, when you get off the subway, show the surrounding neighborhood. Check out this description of the old neighborhood map at Government Center (not exactly and out of the way corner of Boston) to demonstrate how important this improvement is:
The neighborhood map that was also replaced in Government Center had not changed since 1967, when the station was known primarily as Scollay Square. It showed, for example, the old elevated highway where the Rose Kennedy Greenway now sits, as well as a planned linear office building near Faneuil Hall that instead became the Holocaust Memorial.
I am a big fan of this development. Improvements like this are not on par with a new subway line, but do make a significant improvement in the daily image and usability of the system. I am pretty curious why map replacement systemwide is expected to take two years. That seems like a really long time. Also, you know what would really make the T more usable – late night subway service!
Sources: Universal Hub – Bostonist – Boston Globe