Google’s global 1984-2012 satellite timelapse shows remarkable growth in Northern Virginia. Take a look.

Westphalia master plan.

The most striking change is vast land development in Loudoun County, but that’s not the only visible growth. You can also see expansion of Tysons Corner (lower right), construction of the Dulles Greenway toll road, the airport’s new western runway, and at the very end, construction of the Beltway HOT lanes.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

Constitution Avenue used to be a canal, and two creeks used to flow through central DC. David Ramos produced a series of maps showing where they went.

Imagine what a different city Washington might be today if these had been kept in place.

Image from David Ramos on ImaginaryTerrain.com.

Frequent transit maps highlight bus and rail lines that come at least every 15 minutes. They’re great tools that help riders easily identify the most convenient routes.

Such maps exist for more than 20 cities around the US, including DC. Stuart Sirota of TND Planning Group made this one, for Baltimore.

Baltimore frequent transit map, posted with permission from Stuart Sirota.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

This map, produced by the Transportation Planning Board, shows “managed highway lanes” in the DC area. That’s planner jargon for HOV and tolls.

It’s only highways. It doesn’t show non-highway HOV, like along Route 1 in Alexandria. The map also appears to show I-495 incorrectly, since the Beltway HOT lanes are free for HOV-3.

But it’s still interesting to see which highways have special characteristics. One thing that pops out is how Virginia has a fairly comprehensive and interconnected network, while Maryland is more hit-or-miss.

Managed lanes in the DC region, by TPB.

Denver frequent transit map, created by BeyondDC.

Frequent transit maps specifically illustrate buses and trains that come at least every 15 minutes. They’re great tools that help people easily identify the most convenient routes. More and more transit agencies are publishing them. In other places, transit advocates are making their own.

Hopefully in the near future every transit agency will produce a frequent map as a matter of course. But for now they’re still pretty rare.

Wouldn’t it be great to have links to every one in the US and Canada? I think it would. So let’s make a list!

Here’s what I’ve got so far. Of the 42 US and Canadian urbanized areas above 1 million population, I’ve found 14 with frequent transit maps, including unofficial versions. I found several via the Human Transit blog, where Garrett Walker talks about them often.

Surely there are more. If you know of any I haven’t caught so far, leave a comment and I’ll edit the list.

> View the list.

Last week’s post about census tract density in the DC area showed which neighborhoods inside the Beltway are densest. Now let’s look at the densest spots in the core areas of other large cities.

Urban areas are defined by the US Census as geographically connected areas with a population density of at least 1,000 people per square mile (ppsm). The standard provides a uniform definition of “city,” more useful for national comparisons than political boundaries. These maps show the central county in each of America’s 20 largest urban areas, in order beginning with the largest.

1. New York: America’s biggest city breaks the scale. While others on this list might have a few neighborhoods in the top density category, New York is covered end to end. It’s one of only 4 cities with tracts above 100,000 ppsm. Its peak is 200,000 ppsm.
2000	2010
2. Los Angeles: Despite its reputation for sprawl, LA compares favorably to the densest cities after New York. Its peak density of 94,000 ppsm is well above DC’s.
2000	2010

DC area density by census tract, in 2000 (top) and 2010 (bottom). Top image from US Census FactFinder. Bottom from Michael Rodriguez.

Density is a good thing for urbanism. More density means more shops and amenities nearby, better transit service, and shorter walks. But what qualifies as dense? Overall city density is often reported, but a more telling statistic is neighborhood density.

The two maps at right show DC neighborhood density at the time of the 2000 census (top) and 2010 census (bottom). I made the 2000 map using census.gov sometime after the 2000 census. Michael Rodriguez created the bottom map just recently. Unfortunately the two maps use different scales, but they’re still informative.

In 2000 the densest census tract in the DC region was in northern Columbia Heights, between Spring Road and Newton Street. It had 57,317 people per square mile (ppsm).

In 2010 that tract is up to 59,209 ppsm, but that’s only good enough for 2nd place in DC, and 3rd regionally.

The densest tract is now southern Logan Circle, between Rhode Island and Massachusetts Avenues. It’s boomed and is now a whopping 67,149 ppsm.

The rest of central Northwest, from Mount Pleasant down to Massachusetts Avenue, varies from around 30,000-50,000 ppsm. Capitol Hill is in the 20,000-30,000 ppsm range.

Meanwhile, in Alexandria, the tract at the corner of I-395 and Seminary Road is up to 59,886 ppsm, 2nd densest in the region after Logan Circle. There hasn’t been any new development in that tract since 2000, but the suburban-style apartment towers in it may have fewer singles and more families, which could account for the increase. Crystal City is 45,448 ppsm, and Ballston is 43,788 ppsm.

Suburban Maryland’s densest tract is in Langley Park, at 49,354 ppsm. Downtown Silver Spring is 34,816 ppsm, and downtown Bethesda is around 11,000 ppsm.

Denver is in the midst of a huge regional rail expansion. That’s great, but like in many cities (including DC, historically), the urban bus system has been largely ignored amidst all the hubbub over rail.

I got my planning degree at the University of Colorado, and after discussing Denver’s bus system with some friends recently, decided to produce this map. It shows the city’s high-frequency bus routes along with its existing and future rail lines.

Although the geography is obviously different, in many ways this map is a sequel to my DC 15-minute bus map from last August. I applied a lot of the lessons learned during that exercise to this Denver map. Compared to the DC version this map shows more information, presented more cleanly.

Read more at DenverUrbanism.com.

Denver rail and frequent bus map, including future lines. Click map for full size version.
Other sizes via flickr.

It’s common knowledge that the Northeast Corridor is Amtrak’s best line, but the northeast is not the only place in the US where a lot of people ride intercity trains. This map by Michael Hicks shows that California, the area around Chicago, and the Pacific Northwest also stand out as high ridership areas.

In the map, each circle represents one Amtrak station. The larger the circle, the more riders there are at that station.

Image by Michael Hicks on flickr.

Note: Map creator Mike Hicks updated the map to remove Amtrak bus connections, and add Canadian cities where Amtrak trains end. This post has been updated with the new map. He also supplies the first draft of a separate close-in map of the Northeast. – February 6, 2013

This map shows how often trains come at rush hour throughout the Metrorail system. Thick green lines are about every 2-3 minutes, dashed orange lines are every 5, and dotted red are more.

It would be interesting to see a similar map for the bus system.

From WMATA’s service standards report.