Tag: transportation

  • Uber vs. Taxi (in New York)

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    I just spent the weekend back in my hometown of Philadelphia and while we walked most places, there were a few Uber rides. As someone who doesn’t use the app and normally will hail a taxi when necessary, I had been looking forward to posting this piece. FiveThirtyEight looked at data for New York comparing…

  • Night Tube

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    Brendan Barry
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    Transport for London (TfL), the organisation that runs the London Underground or Tube, has announced a nighttime service called Night Tube. It is not for the entire system, but only a few specific lines. That means that TfL needed a new map. And that means that everyone will want to create their own version of…

  • The Curviest Tracks on the Northeast Corridor

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    If you remember a little while back, Amtrak No. 188 derailed in North Philadelphia at Frankford Junction. I covered it here and here. Well, the New York Times has analysed the Northeast Corridor to identify the curviest segments of track, excluding entrances and exits from stations. Perhaps as no surprise, Frankford Junction is right among…

  • Aircraft Cabin Flow

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    Brendan Barry
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    Today’s post looks at an illustration from the BBC about aircraft cabin flow. As I have flown on four aircraft in the last month—quite a lot for me—I do recall thinking during one particular flight just where the air intakes were on the aircraft. It never dawned on me that they were in the actual…

  • Illustrating a Table

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    Brendan Barry
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    Let’s face it, lots of people think tables are boring. They convey data very quickly and very efficiently. But they often don’t look “pretty” enough. So, today, I just wanted to show a table from the Washington Post from last week. It does nothing fancy. Nor do the illustrations actually communicate the information more quickly…

  • Others’ Coverage of Amtrak 188

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    Tuesday I posted my late-night work on Amtrak No. 188’s derailment, (now with a few minor updates, including the speed information released this afternoon) so you could all get a sense of what happened yesterday. Of course, in the last 24 hours, we have seen a lot of news outlets covering the story. The New…

  • Amtrak Train No. 188 Derails

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    Brendan Barry
    in ,

    I am a big fan of trains, rail transit, and Amtrak. I think the rail network connecting the East Coast’s big cities from Boston down to Washington is one of the big draws of the Northeast. Not surprisingly, I have taken that route I don’t know how many times. So, when Amtrak’s Northeast Regional No.…

  • Parking in LA

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    Brendan Barry
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    Today’s piece comes via a colleague with the original article appearing in Wired. The article looks at new parking signs that the city of Los Angeles has proposed. The reason? Parking on streets with multiple signs for parking sometimes make no sense. These signs aim to simplify the communication of those parking regulations. Credit for…

  • Germanwings Flight 4U 9525

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    Brendan Barry
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    Yesterday an Airbus A320 operated by Germanwings, a subsidiary of Lufthansa, crashed in the French Alps with no survivors. This morning, I am showing the two best graphics I have come across thus far attempting to explain just what happened. The first is from the New York Times. In a series of maps, it points…

  • Masses and Payloads

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    While last week ended with an xkcd post, I want to start this week with an older one I missed about spacecraft. Because spacecraft are awesome every day of the week. In particular it looks at mass and payload capacity of spacecraft and rockets over time. Credit for the piece goes to Randall Munroe.