All the railroads we had in 1921, in one subway-style map

by David Edmondson • February 24, 2016

In 1921, you could take the train from downtown DC to Annapolis, from Baltimore to Harrisburg, or Winchester to DC. I built a subway-style map of the rail service our region once had.



In the Mid-Atlantic region, hundreds of trains and ferries used to serve passengers at over 1,370 stations. But they were run by dozens of individual companies, meaning there was no single unified system map to let people know how to get from A to B. Passengers had to pour over dozens of often-opaque timetables to know how to get around.

Doing that was no simple task, as I can now attest to after having trawled hundreds of these tables in The Official Guide of the Railways to pull together this one map.

Subway-style maps were a genius invention of the early 20th Century. By combining old railway maps with service schedules, they allow travelers to understand at a glance how the transit system works without relying on byzantine schedules.