Need help understanding the DLR Routes

[mdtauk]

I am a designer working on a mobile application to display TfL data and status information called London Travel, for Windows Phone 7.

I am a huge fan of London Transport signage, typography and graphic design, and so I am enjoying the work I am doing right now.

Our most requested feature is line diagrams for the various routes and services. Licensing these from TfL is too expensive for us to consider, so following guidance from TfL, I have begun designing my own routes for all the services.

I have been asked to not use TFL logos or fonts, and to make sure they don't resemble the official ones, so I have developed my own style for them, and have been working hard on them, but I have hit some snags.

I am working on Light and Dark variations of each, and my lack of experience with the DLR in particular leads me here to seek help from you who know much more than I do.

There seems to be only one version of the DLR route diagram, and it contains about 6 routes I can define. Platform vertical diagrams I have no experience with, so could someone help me separate the routes into logical clear subroutes. Overground has 4 routes (one map for each route), Tramlink 3 (which I have made into two diagrams), so how do I do the same with the DLR, and what are some of the quirks I need to know?

Here are examples of the diagrams I am making...

[harlesden]

I would have thought the bullseye symbol (originally a London Transport symbol) is now a TfL logo.
The double arrow symbol is presumably owned by Network Rail.
I'm not even sure that using LU line colours is permitted

[Deleted]

You'd be better off not including the Roundel (in any colours!) as that is indeed protected by TfL.

The arrows of indecision should be fine, as is used on just about everything and anything to do with National Rail.

Any chance of an iOS version? It looks great so far.

As to the DLR, it appears there are several routes. Tower Gateway to Beckton, Bank to Woolwich Arsenal, Bank to Lewisham, Stratford to Lewisham, Stratford International to Beckton and Stratford International to Woolwich Arsenal. That's basically how the routes work, with lots of crossover points inbetween. I would break the routes down based on something simple, like termini. Individual maps for each route.

[Oracle]

I agree...steer clear of the roundel even though it is being used in a generic way. Can you not come up with a tube car symbol similar to the universal bus and tram ones?

[mdtauk]

The data TfL provides, include roundels you are supposed to use, so I think those are ok, but I have sent samples to TfL and if there are any issues, they will get back to me.

Talking about the DLR, I am unsure of the best way to handle the crossover points. With the Overground routes, where it crosses over I have indicated that, but with so many routes on the DLR, the way I have handled it previously, is not ideal.

Example of Overground Crossover...

[Deleted]

I suppose that solution would work for the DLR too.

[mdtauk]

The problem is, there would be like 4 or 5 lines of text below, and there must be a better way to do it.

Is it possible to group some of these routes together into single route maps, and if so, which routes are more logical to group together.

The full vertical and horizontal DLR diagrams are to dense to use on a small screen, but doing each of the individual 6 routes, may not make sense.

I need to group some of these together, but which would make sense together.

[Deleted]

Not really - there are only really 3 destinations available at each place if you're lucky. What you could do is SSL line map style and only show the interchange lines at the first and last places where interchange is possible, where all run over the same tracks.

Tower Gateway DLR
Bank DLR Lewisham and Woolwich Arsenal
Shadwell DLR Lewisham, Woolwich Arsenal, Beckton, Tower Gateway, Bank
Westferry DLR Lewisham, Woolwich Arsenal, Beckton, Tower Gateway, Bank
Poplar DLR Stratford, Lewisham, Woolwich Arsenal, Beckton
West India Quay DLR Bank and Stratford
Canning Town DLR Tower Gateway, Bank, Stratford International, Woolwich Arsenal
Stratford DLR Lewisham, Stratford International, Beckton, Woolwich Arsenal
Beckton DLR Stratford International, Tower Gateway
Woolwich Arsenal DLR Stratford International, Bank

Then you can take out the destinations on the specific line. It would probably work best to split each line separately.

Oh and I caught a typo on one of the maps - it's Stansted, not Stanstead.

[mdtauk]

Thanks for that correction. It gets tricky working on so many of these, with only google and flickr images, and my own photos to go on.

[Deleted]

It sounds like quite a long task, I must say. Good luck with the project!

[rincew1nd]

I must say that your images posted feel modern, in a similar way to the London Midland livery. I like your idea of having a line of each colour next to each station to indicate interchanges with that line, although it does rely on you knowing the colours of other lines in your system.

As for different routes in the same line interchanging, this is difficult. Is this perhaps why the Hammersmith Branch of the Metropolitan Line became the Hammersmith & City Line?

Perhaps the DLR has come sufficiently far that it is now a network with its own lines, shown in railway (=) style rather than just one big combine?

[mdtauk]

Well I always saw the DLR as equivalent to the Overground network, but I have only had experience with the Underground and Overground services, not the trams or the DLR.

From the photos I have found online, it seems the DLR diagrams are usually displayed as one complete diagram. What happens with the vertical platform diagrams, are these ever separated into separate routes.

[Deleted]

This is out in our territory, and we often have to give advice to our visitors to get around the DLR.

Nov 30, 2010 12:28:09 GMT @cj said:

As to the DLR, it appears there are several routes. Tower Gateway to Beckton, Bank to Woolwich Arsenal, Bank to Lewisham, Stratford to Lewisham, Stratford International to Beckton and Stratford International to Woolwich Arsenal.

This is correct for the basic service. However the DLR does switch things around to suit. The only information given is the final destination of the next train, so when an unusual one appears it does depend on you knowing your geography and the various stations along the routes.

The Stratford to Lewisham route nowadays turns round almost all the time at Canary Wharf, where you have to change to continue on south. I understand there are a few trains that continue on to Lewisham in rush hours but in daily usage I can't recall seeing one recently.

The Beckton line is regularly augmented at weekends by a shuttle train between Canning Town and Prince Regent, to serve the Excel exhibition centre. Likewise the Woolwich line has extra rush hour shuttles between Woolwich and Blackwall. It remains to be seen if these are absorbed when the line from Canning Town to Stratford opens soon.

At weekends, if one or another of the main legs of the system is closed, other combinations are put together. Thus if the line west from Canary Wharf to Tower Gateway and Bank is closed for the weekend, you get Beckton to Lewisham, or Woolwich to Lewisham trains. Although there is publicity about the actual closure, these rearrangements always come as undocumented surprises.

Good luck with the App!

[Deleted]

I'd say screw the way the diagrams are done on the actual thing, it's too crammed. Do it the same way you did the Overground maps. You'll need quite a few - the nature of the services mean you'd either have to do all split or all on one.

Tower Gateway to Beckton
Bank to Lewisham
Bank to Woolwich Arsenal
Stratford to Lewisham
Stratford International to Woolwich Arsenal
Stratford International to Beckton

Obviously, the Stratford International to Canning Town part opening next year. The list of places you'd need to put on the map for interchange between lines is above - there's no need to show interchange at every station along the way or it'll be a very messy map!

EDIT: Diana seems to have posted before I did.

[mdtauk]

Ok so I was right, there are 6 routes.

Now I know I can combine the *Bank - Lewisham* & *Stratford - Lewisham* routes into one diagram easily.

Are there any other combinations I can make which would make sense?

Also I have set things up so I generally have two lines for station names, and two lines of accompanying text. Some of those crossover interchanges would break that layout, so I would like to avoid that or find an alternative way to represent that.


Oh and we will include a help button which will display the coloured strip, along with the service name, and the other icons, with their explanations.

The DLR is a bit different to the underground lines and overground routes, with things like trains changing at canary wharf and so forth. Rather than stick with the 6 routes, I thought it may make sense to try to take into account some of the quirks that you all may have experienced.

I think its safe to say there will be some aficionados here who may have some good suggestions.

[Deleted]

Nov 30, 2010 22:07:01 GMT @mdtauk said:

Are there any other combinations I can make which would make sense?

Also I have set things up so I generally have two lines for station names, and two lines of accompanying text. Some of those crossover interchanges would break that layout, so I would like to avoid that or find an alternative way to represent that.

The two Stratford International routes would too make sense.

[norbitonflyer]

Nov 30, 2010 22:07:01 GMT @mdtauk said:

Ok so I was right, there are 6 routes.

Now I know I can combine the *Bank - Lewisham* & *Stratford - Lewisham* routes into one diagram easily.

Are there any other combinations I can make which would make sense?

Also I have set things up so I generally have two lines for station names, and two lines of accompanying text. Some of those crossover interchanges would break that layout, so I would like to avoid that or find an alternative way to represent that.


Oh and we will include a help button which will display the coloured strip, along with the service name, and the other icons, with their explanations.

The DLR is a bit different to the underground lines and overground routes, with things like trains changing at canary wharf and so forth. Rather than stick with the 6 routes, I thought it may make sense to try to take into account some of the quirks that you all may have experienced.

I think its safe to say there will be some aficionados here who may have some good suggestions.

Most of the quirks are simply short workings of one or other of the six you have listed. (although Stratford - Lewisham might be better considered a peak hour extension of the regular Stratford- Canary Wharf service). Covering the one-off splicing of part routes which happens because of engineering work (such as Woolwich-Poplar-Lewisham is a bit ambitious - like trying to show the odd Wimbleware which gets to Baker Street.

The only station to serve four routes is Canning Town.

Colour coding might help. (Indeed the original 11-car system used colours to differentiate Startford and Tower Gateway trains) Remember that until 1949 the routes now shown on the Tube Map as orange, yellow, pink, purple and green were all shown as undifferentiated green.
Given the degree of shared track, route numbers might be helpful. For ease of memorisation, routes sharing sections should have consecutive numbers, or some other easily memorable mnemonic like multiples of 3

1. Stratford - Lewisham
2. Bank - Lewisham
3. Bank - Woolwich
4. TG-Beckton
5. Stratford Int - Beckton
6. Stratford Int - Woolwich

Thus:
the isle of Dogs and Lewisham route is routes 1 and 2
routes 2,3,4 serve Westferry to Shadwell,
Bank is routes 2 and 3
Poplar to Canning town section is routes 3 and 4
beckton branch is routes 4 and 5
woolwich branch is routes 3 and 6
The Canning town - Stratford Unintenional branch is routes 5 and 6

[mdtauk]

I wont lie, I am finding it all a bit more confusing now

It seems some of the trains will not stop at, or will bypass locations due to engineering, peak/off peak etc. So it may be necessary to place some text warning about this, or maybe a catch all message "Please check the destination displayed on the trains when travelling, as changes can occur at certain times"

As for combining the routes, you believe I can combine the two Stratford International, as well as the two Lewisham routes. This would work well, as it leaves us with 4 diagrams, and 3 maximum interchange route details.

As for different colours for lines, I think I will stick to the one colour, where as with Tramlink I did the two diagrams in the normal green and lighter green.

[mdtauk]

Ok here is the *Bank - Lewisham* and *Lewisham - Stratford* routes in one diagram. Is there anything that seems like its missing?

[Deleted]

That looks like it's going to work great. But, Stratford International isn't on the Lewisham via Poplar line - it has it's own routes via Canning Town.

[Chris M]

Shadwell could do with a note that you can change there for DLR trains to Tower Gateway, but other than that I agree with Charlie.

[norbitonflyer]

Why show connections at Bank to the Woolwich and Beckton routes? If you're coming into Bank you should have changed several stops further back, at Westferry, and if you're going out from Bank you wouldn't get on a Lewisham train in the first place.

And you can't normally get to Beckton from Bank anyway, the Beckton trains go from TG.

In order to minimise the number of maps, whilst avoiding multiple maps being necessary for any given styarting point, I think you need the folloiwing subroutes:
1. the one you've done, usable by passengers starting anywhere between Stratford and Lewisham, except Poplar.
2. Tower/Bank to Lewisham/Beckton/Woolwich, for use by passengers starting Westferry or west thereof,
3. Beckton-Stratford Unintentional/Tower Gateway, for use by pasangers starting on the beckton route
4. Woolwich-Stratford Unintentional/bank, for use by passengers starting on the Woolwich branch
5. Stratford Int - Woolwich/Beckton, for use north of Canning Town
6. specials for the three places where routes cross: Canning Town, Stratford and Poplar. Either the Poplar one, or No 2 above, could also be used at East India and Blackwall.

If a tidy way could be shown for all the through-running possibilities at Canning Town, nos 2,3,4, 5 and the canning town special could all be combined in one diagram, but it would be a bit busy.

[uzairjubilee]

Looks great so far! Apart from that I would just reiterate the slight mistake of Stratford International being on the same line as Lewisham - Stratford.

I was just wondering why you have put 'DLR trains to Beckton and Woolwich Arsenal'? It's impossible to get a direct train from Stratford to Beckton and Woolwich Arsenal ;D

Also just to suggest;

Move the 'DLR trains to...' from Bank to Westferry,
At Shadwell, put down 'DLR trains to Tower Gateway'

[mdtauk]

So there is a Lewisham via Poplar line? Are there actual lines defined. Is that the 6 routes, or is this something different?

Perhaps you could all come up with say 4 maps with combinations of the different lines/routes which actually make sense to the service.

[Deleted]

Nov 30, 2010 12:28:09 GMT @cj said:

Any chance of an iOS version? It looks great so far.

Ditto an Android version?

[uzairjubilee]

Dec 1, 2010 17:41:00 GMT @mdtauk said:

So there is a Lewisham via Poplar line? Are there actual lines defined. Is that the 6 routes, or is this something different?

Perhaps you could all come up with say 4 maps with combinations of the different lines/routes which actually make sense to the service.

Simple routes I can come up with:

1) Bank to Lewisham (at peak times, no stopping at West India Quay from Bank)

2) Bank to Woolwich Arsenal via Poplar

3) Tower Gateway to Beckton via Poplar

4) Stratford to Lewisham (as mentioned by someone previously, many trains on this route terminate at Canary Wharf)

5) Woolwich Arsenal to Stratford International via Canning Town

5) Beckton to Stratford International via Canning Town (joins the above route at Canning Town)

[Deleted]

Dec 1, 2010 17:41:00 GMT @mdtauk said:

So there is a Lewisham via Poplar line? Are there actual lines defined. Is that the 6 routes, or is this something different?

Perhaps you could all come up with say 4 maps with combinations of the different lines/routes which actually make sense to the service.

Stratford to Lewisham goes via Poplar.

www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/dlr-route-map.pdf

[mdtauk]

And these are routes that will make sense to users. And when it comes to interchanges, I should not judge them from the route diagrams.

A few of you have mentioned that Westferry and Shadwell is where I should include interchange information, despite the official diagram not using a circle interchange marker at Westferry.

Is there any rhyme or reason to why trains would terminate at Canary Wharf, or is it just on a whim?

[uzairjubilee]

The reason the official DLR map does not include interchange at Westferry for services to Beckton/Stratford/Woolwich Arsenal is probably because the map includes every route, whereas this right here is an individual route.

And if I knew what you mean by rhyme and whim, I might be able to answer ;D

[Deleted]

Dec 1, 2010 17:54:32 GMT @mdtauk said:

A few of you have mentioned that Westferry and Shadwell is where I should include interchange information, despite the official diagram not using a circle interchange marker at Westferry.

Westferry is actually a very poor place to interchange, as you have always had to go down a long flight of stairs, right out of the station, across two roads, and back up another long flight of stairs, to make the change.

Fortunately, you may feel, a large sum has been spent recently on a new stairway at the east end of the station, avoiding crossing the road. However, instead of providing a link between the two parallel sets of stairs just beneath the tracks, you still have to go all the way down several flights, to ground level. Furthermore this new entrance is at the east end of the station, whereas the trains still stop down at the west end. You may feel this is inconsequential but on the two times I have tried the new stairs (which I thought were going to be useful for this) the "connection" was just closing its doors as I puffed out onto the platform, even though I had raced along. So no, I shan't be changing there again, and I suggest it's not designed for this at all.