I have mentioned on many occasions in the past how Auckland’s bus route maps look like someone “threw spaghetti at a wall”. Let’s have a look at the eastern isthmus area as a classic example of this:

This map is actually completely useless – except for reinforcing the point that Auckland’s bus network is extremely complicated and difficult to understand. Perhaps one of the most annoying things about this map is that there’s no distinction between the quality of different services. Some routes like the 011, which operates just a few times a week, are shown in exactly the same way as other routes that operate far more frequently. What we really need to know, when planning how to get around the city by bus, is a simplified map that offers some sort of indicator of the service quality that you’ll get: particularly in terms of frequency.

The Seattle Transit Blog has put together exactly the type of map Auckland needs:


Auckland Transport really should create a map like this for Auckland. But in the meanwhile, are there any readers brave enough to dig through timetables, and with some skill in image editing software to put together something like this? It would be extremely useful.

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20 comments

  1. I have to say I find both the Auckland map AND the Seattle map enormously confusing. I think the Wellington map, however, is VERY user-friendly – though that may be an effect of me having spent a year or so living in Wellington – However I am unfamiliar with most Wellington bus services having driven most places whilst there.

  2. The Wellington map is very intereting. I think it works better because there are a few limited freq services and not to many very high freq services and the need for differentiation is not so great.

    The middle section with about 20 bus routes on the same road is where the light rail should be operating for sure.

    1. I think the other thing, which I didn’t quite notice until after some careful study of the Wellington map, is that it has virtually every option available for greater Wellington. Including all interchange points – at a quick glance, one can see there are at least hourly ferries to Eastbourne from the CBD, and that I can connect from almost any point in the city through Wellington Station.

      1. In terms of ferries, the Wellington map is misleading – they definitely don’t run hourly. I also think it does a poor job of indicating the service frequencies of the routes. There is no distinction between routes having an hourly frequency weekdays only with no evening or weekend service and those with a 10-15min weekday base frequency + full evening & weekend services.

  3. Personally I don’t see much value in this. When I want to get from A to B, I ask google maps and get back a nice itinerary with alternatives. What problem is the map solving – Helping people know where they can get PT to easily for when house hunting etc?

    1. Corrin, while google maps is useful for giving specific trip details I think there is a lot of value in creating a map that gives an understanding of the system as a whole and which bits of it are high frequency. The London Underground map is hardly unnecessary these days just because we have journey planning software.

  4. Part of the problem with the Auckland map is that it’s drawn onto the street network, maps like the London underground are more understandable because they are semi-abstract and are designed to make the network was clear as possible rather than strictly adhering to the urban form.

    1. It’s worth noting that London Buses tend to use road maps, just like Auckland does. While Auckland follows the Underground approach for rail maps. So we’re actually following London’s school of thought (somewhat) in regards to PT mapping according to mode of transport.

  5. Admin: Surely the modellers from ARC/ARTA could whip up a frequency map like the Seatle one from the APT (Auckland Public Transport) Model.
    Once you had that it’d be easy to turn it into anything you wanted.
    The outputs even show thicknesses.

  6. All the information that’s needed is all in the Google Transit Feed, you just need to know how to import the data and visualise it – quite easy if you know what you’re doing. Unfortunately my background isn’t in computational visualisation so I couldn’t do it.

  7. I think the most useful would be a map of inter-peak frequencies (not peak), with thick lines showing all routes with four or more services an hour (i.e. 15mins or better services) and thin lines with two or three services an hour (i.e. 20-30 min service). Anything once an hour or less interpeak gets left off.

    An important thing would be to map individual routes and to stack them next to each other where they share a road or track.

    This would then give you a visual representation of the parts of Auckland you can easily access at any time of day… If we did this the results might be fairly dissapointing.

  8. The sorts of thick-and-thin line maps Nick R calls for have often been prepared internally for particular local purposes, in order to work out where bus lanes or apartments should go in a given suburb. When this is done it’s found that most CBD-bound roads that actually have bus routes on them have a bus every 10 minutes or more pretty much all day during the week, not just the well-known examples of Dominion and Mt Eden Roads. However what comes through from that kind of exercise is that cross town services on key desire lines are sporadic (e.g. 007 Balmoral Road) to nonexistent (e.g. Beach Haven to Takapuna via Glenfield). So far these internal planning maps have not been produced for the purposes of more general marketing. IMHO Auckland Transport could do more to push its busiest routes and to remind people that Dominion amd Mount Eden Roads are not the only ones in Auckland with a decent bus service. On the other hand this would also expose the weakness of the cross town services and could lead to pressure for those to be improved.

  9. Chris, thats why I suggested that routes be stacked next to each other rather than combined. That would show there are some (often sporadic) stretches of most main arterials that get frequent service, but perhaps not in a way that is useful for people! Four buses an hour from divergent origins to four different locations isn’t really the same as a bus every 15 minutes.

  10. Am I the only one who prefers the Auckland map? The Seattle map makes it hard to follow given the routes are not colour coded by route. I much prefer the Auckland map since you can actually follow a route from start to end, and figure out where to transfer (if one is required) simply by looking the right colour lines.

    I do agree however that the bus routes could be simplified. However some of the routes there are actually meeting the needs of the people that use it. So while I advocate simplifying the routes — I also think it’s worth keeping in mind that there are some cases where it make sense to have a variety of different routes to meet different types of travel in the same area.

  11. I like the Auckland maps too. The problems are they are misleading because they don’t differentiate between frequencies and therefore allow Auckland Transport to suggest we have wonderful PT to all areas of the city. Anyone who uses it knows better. While the simplified maps might be good for locals, I don’t think they’d be any good for tourists or those who didn’t know where they’re going. You don’t get generic/abstract road maps.

  12. The fact that they are stacked and coloured separately is good. All it really needs it to vary width based on frequency, and perhaps drop anything that doesn’t run more than once an hour (for a main map at least).

  13. QUOTE: I have mentioned on many occasions in the past how Auckland’s bus route maps look like someone “threw spaghetti at a wall”. Let’s have a look at the eastern isthmus area as a classic example of this…

    You know…

    Why not take a map of Auckland and throw spaghetti at it, and see if you get some ideas for new routings? Fettuccine is nice and thick, try it 🙂 The results may be surprising…

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