The Tube map has been redrawn to include the new direct services to and from central London on the Elizabeth line.
The interchange at Paddington has been simplified – reflecting the fact that trains from the £20bn line’s western branch can now run through to Abbey Wood without passengers having to change above ground from the mainline station.
The “Lizzie line” – which is shown as a white line with two purple borders - has also been simplified east of Liverpool Street station. Trains to and from Shenfield now run through to Paddington.
Rather than one line coming east out of Liverpool Street mainline station (to Shenfield) and the other from the new subterranean Elizabeth line station (to Abbey Wood), a single line is now shown – before branching off east of Whitechapel to Shenfield and Abbey Wood.
A very small number of Elizabeth line services on the western and eastern branches will continue to terminate or depart from the mainline platforms at Paddington (platforms 11 or 12) or Liverpool Street (platforms 15 or 17), mostly early morning or late at night, rather than the new Elizabeth line platforms, which are known as platforms A and B.
The presentation of Euston station – a change first made in the comprehensive redrawing of the Tube map last May that was the first to incorporate the Elizabeth line – continues to spark debate.
A series of lines and circles show Euston’s connections with the Victoria line, the two branches of the Northern line, the London Overground services from the station and the walkable interchange – along Euston Road – to Euston Square station.
Others have spotted that Euston Square is shown to be west of Warren Street station, when it reality it is about 150 yards east.
The new map also shows that Bond Street’s Elizabeth line station is now open. It also adds the name of the new sponsor of the London cable car, IFS Cloud, and illustrates the fact that step-free access has been provided to the Northern line as part of the transformation of Bank station.
But the cover of the pocket-size paper version of the map has drawn criticism for the art work on its cover – leading to some to dub it the “Pube Map”.
London-based South Korean artist Do Ho Suh has overlaid hair-like threads on the Tube map in an attempt to “trace familiar routes through embroidery” and show that not all passengers follow the most rational routes.
But some transport enthusiasts claim the threads – the 37th commission by Art on the Underground, a work called Routes/Roots: London - look more like “drain hair”.
The first Tube map, by Harry Beck, was published in 1933 and used an “electrical wiring diagram” design to simplify the network rather than basing it on “real life” above-ground geography.
TfL said the cover art on the pocket Tube map “created an embroidered facsimile” of the Tube map focusing on the routes that Suh habitually uses around his home and studio.
Suh said: “For over a decade, I have put my roots down in London and made it my home –â¯both of my children were born here – so it is a privilege to work on TfL’s iconic Tube map.
“At heart, so much of my work is about the transportability of space, about what we carry with us as we move through the world, so I’ve loved working on an actual map and thinking about the gaps between the locations and complicating the neatness of the lines.”
Eleanor Pinfield, head of Art on the Underground, said: “Do Ho Suh’s new artwork centres on the part of London he travels most regularly, and in doing so, we delve into the personal stories of this mass-transit system.
“The curling threads that trail from each station envisage our commutes as swooping flows of colour, capturing the poetic nature of the quotidian journey.”
