Underground hit - researcher's tube map goes viral

A daring design that reinvents the iconic London tube map has sparked international interest.

Created by Dr Maxwell Roberts his concentric circle chart aims to tidy up the current plan – which he describes as “lamentable”.

The Department of Psychology lecturer initially created the portrayal of the capital’s arteries in 2013 but updated it again this year.

After posting the creation online it went viral, and Dr Roberts hit the headlines – even appearing on the flagship BBC Breakfast programme.

In total more than one million people have viewed and interacted with the post.

Dr Roberts has been overjoyed with the interest as he created the original design as a joke.

“I hadn't expected the 2013 design to be taken seriously, if I had expected so many people to respond so positively then I would have designed it differently,” said Dr Roberts.

"The new map is completely redesigned from centre to edge, this time I've been much more careful about keeping to my own design rules and distorting geography."

The map uses circles to show colour-coded routes for all 11 lines and is spatially accurate to station location.

The success of the latest London design follows Dr Robert’s work which inspired the Cologne transport map, which is used by 800,000 passengers a day.

Dr Roberts specialises in creating unconventional designs which are easily readable at a glance.

They blend psychology and art to make maps compatible with how the brain makes sense of information.

His first concentric circles map was created for London and then rolled out across the globe, creating over twenty circular charts including Paris, Moscow, New York, Tokyo and even the Essex coast.

Profile picture by Reka Komoli