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Thursday, 10 April 2014

Website Review: Live Tube Map


This is the continuation from the LiveLondon Bus Map which the developer Matthew Somerville made.
Before he made the bus map, he created a Live Tube Map which shows the London Underground trains
in motion on a map. It was made in 2010 using the Google Maps as its maps to show the roads and places of interest but now it uses Open Street Map.

It uses the data from TFL’s London Underground departures but it does not show where the train accurately is on the map. It just shows moving from one station to another. The countdown tends to calculate the speeds from one train to another to show how long it actually approaches the station.

Information from the Yellow dot
When you click on the Yellow dot which is the moving trains, it tells you what line is on, where the train terminates to and how long it approaches the next station.
If you move your cursor to the London Underground roundel it tells you the stations and the Tube Lines it serves.

Part of the Lines missing from the map.
Well it needs to be improved by adding the Hammersmith to Edgware Road section from the Sub Surface Tube Lines which is Hammersmith & City and Circle Line which is missing from the map.  Also what’s missing is the line between High Street Kensington to Edgware Road which is served by the Circle and District Line.  Also it needs the ability to view it by individual Tube Line so you can easily see the trains on one line like what the developer done with his Live Bus Map and also make it easy to use on smart phones as well.
Screenshot from my Android Phone.

Overall I can see the map well with the Android Phone using the Google Chrome browser, but it is quite slow because of the amount of data and physics used to show the live map on your smart phone.
I do like the Live Tube Map and I recommend the site to readers that are viewing my blog.
Here is the URL to the Live Tube Map: http://traintimes.org.uk/map/tube/

There are also variations of the Live Tube map which I listed and linked for your own interest. So I also recommend you to check them out as well.

Thanks for reading.