Urban Planet is a daily roundup of blogs from around the world dealing specifically with urban environments. We’ll be on the lookout for websites outside the country that approach themes related to urban experiences and issues.
Given the complexity and contentiousness of subway network design, it is tempting to think that there might be a science behind network development. An article published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface looks at hundreds of subway systems worldwide and defines some key patterns that the systems share. The paper suggests that networks can be divided into a core and branches, with the core often lying beneath the city’s center and the branches extending outwards. Branches tend to be about twice as long as the width of the core and roughly 20 percent of the stations in the core link two or more lines. (Scientific American)
Image from Fat Panda Productions
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