Speaking of random...

[randomness]

...I've been working on a list of stations which share the same names in different metro/subway systems. It's tedious work finding them. I figured I'd see if anyone else on the net shared one of my quirky interests and could help out.

The Mornington Crescent intersystem quick reference, a work in progress.

Feel free to pass this to anyone you think interested in transit systems or Mornington Crescent.

Comments

[redbird]

Times Square: New York, Hong Kong
Kew Gardens: London, New York

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

So, I'm doing exact matches, and I think the "Times Square" station in New York is actually "42 St Times Square" At least, so says the TA map. However, I'm not sure where the "Times Square" MTR station is in Hong Kong, so that may not matter.

Similarly, "Kew Gardens" is actually "Kew Gardens Union Turnpike" in Queens, and thus doesn't exactly match "Kew Gardens" in London.

I know you're thinking the strict version of the intersystem rules is an unnecessary restriction on play, but those are the house rules we play with... :)

[tamago.livejournal.com]

So, are you using language as a barrier? I noticed "Central" and "Centraal Station" listed separately. What does that do to stations like Stockholm's Tunnelbana stop "Centralen" which simply translates to "the Central" station?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

So, are you using language as a barrier?

Not per se, but exact spelling counts, which is why "Central" and "Centraal Station" aren't matches. (Well, actually, they wouldn't match even if spelling didn't matter because "Central" isn't "Central Station".

I know, it's quirky. :)

[jimmystagger.livejournal.com]

What in the blue blazes is this Mornington Crescent stuff??? How have I never heard of this...

Chicago's CTA system shares the following names with Boston's MBTA:
Central
Davis
Chinatown

Washington's Metro and Atlanta's MARTA share a Medical Center stop

St. Louis's Metrolink and the CTA share a Grand stop

This site can be of further help

Cool thought. I love subways and public transportation, too.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

What does that do to stations like Stockholm's Tunnelbana stop "Centralen" which simply translates to "the Central" station?

Leaves them separate, alas. Otherwise, "Airport" would connect nicely to "Aeropuerto". And there are a lot of stations in the former Soviet Union that would work for each other, because their pre-1991 names are the same, but not after the station names got changed into the local languages.

Hmmm. I think I need to handle station name changes.

[totient]

the Gold Line in LA is now open, and with it "Chinatown" (shared with Boston and Philadelphia) and "Lake" (shared with Chicago)

Also, Boston and Sydney share two stops: "Museum" and "St Marys".

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

the Gold Line in LA is now open, and with it "Chinatown" (shared with Boston and Philadelphia) and "Lake" (shared with Chicago)

The Gold Line is light rail, right? Opens up that whole urban light rail question.

Also, Boston and Sydney share two stops: "Museum" and "St Marys".

Sydney is one of those weird grey areas, because in a way Sydney doesn't really have a subway system, just a commuter rail system that has a few stations underground in the center city...because then, what do you do about SEPTA Regional Rail, or various German S-Bahn systems.

Decisions, decisions...

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Also, otherwise, Sydney would have been yet another of the "Central" mob, and "Town Hall", "St James", and "King's Cross" would all have come in handy...

[wolfkitn.livejournal.com]

this makes me think of something that a few of us dreamt up once (although i'm sure it wasn't original, even then): the same-name transport device for easy access to far-away places. wouldn't it be cool if you wanted to go to, say, somerville, NJ and you were in somerville, MA and could blink and you'd be transported? suddenly, all sorts of far-away places would become a lot more easily accessible. just imagine the possibilities!

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Yes, I had that conversation with bryant long long ago--maybe it was a related conversation? He came up with an elaboration: street names with the same name would connect, too.

Main Street becomes a very popular roadway. As does Zhongshan Lu. :)

To tie the two threads together, dirque once said that subways could be thought of as teleportation devices which took a finite amount of time to transfer you from place to place.

[frotz.livejournal.com]

Are you willing to accept Hauptbahnhof?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Absolutely, although I really want not to include S-Bahn stations.

Thanks for the suggestion! Which systems are you thinking of? I want to include Wuppertal, just because it's really cool.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Annoyingly, Hamburg's U2 and U3 appear to go to "Hauptbahnhof Nord" and "Hauptbahnhof Sud", respectively. Berlin's U55 isn't completed yet, and in any case the station name appears to be "Hauptbahnhof Lehrter Bahnhof", which means I can't connect them to Wuppertal "Hauptbahnhof". However, Nürnberg looks promising...

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Gah, looks like Nürnberg's is "Nürnberg Hauptbahnhof". And Wuppertal's is "Wuppertal Hauptbahnhof".

German precision. Feh.

[apintrix.livejournal.com]

I think there's an "opera" station somewhere else-- maybe Paris? But I'm going on memory.

[hotpoint.livejournal.com]

Yes, Paris has an Opéra station. Budapest, of all places, has an Opera station on the M1 line! I'd assumed there was no possible way to link them in...

Historical figures might be a good bet for station names in multiple systems

[hotpoint.livejournal.com]

So, Lyon, Milano and Napoli all have stations named Garibaldi -- with slight variations. Lyon's is just Garibaldi, Milano's is Garibaldi F.S. and Napoli's is Garibaldi Centrale.

Paris has Franklin D. Roosevelt as a station name. Chicago has Roosevelt and Roosevelt/State. NYC has Roosevelt Island and Jackson Heights/Roosevelt Avenue.

Another tack: There is a Canal station in Madrid, a Canal St station in NYC. Canal Station would have been the terminus of the Cincinnati subway if completed. North Station in Boston is at the intersection of Canal and Causeway.

There is also an Opera station in Cairo. Vienna's is Volksoper.

Re: Historical figures might be a good bet for station names in multiple systems

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

So, Lyon, Milano and Napoli all have stations named Garibaldi -- with slight variations. Lyon's is just Garibaldi, Milano's is Garibaldi F.S. and Napoli's is Garibaldi Centrale.

Paris has Franklin D. Roosevelt as a station name. Chicago has Roosevelt and Roosevelt/State. NYC has Roosevelt Island and Jackson Heights/Roosevelt Avenue.

Another tack: There is a Canal station in Madrid, a Canal St station in NYC. Canal Station would have been the terminus of the Cincinnati subway if completed. North Station in Boston is at the intersection of Canal and Causeway.

Yah, strictly speaking none of these are matches.

There is also an Opera station in Cairo. Vienna's is Volksoper.

I had my hopes up with this one, because connecting in Cairo would be great. However, Cairo's station is "Gezira (Opera)".

BTW, I'm trying not to be discouraging, because it's great to have all the feedback. I may not be succeeding. :)

[obra.livejournal.com]

I am sorely tempted to automate this process with Métro.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

I started to do that! I got as far as thinking about parsing the lists of stations and then gave up when I realized that Métro was only as picky about spelling as their original contributors were, which wasn't very.

Still might be worth doing, though.

[obra.livejournal.com]

Also, it would be interesting to use graphviz on this data...

Brighton Beach

[obra.livejournal.com]

NYC and Melbourne

Re: Brighton Beach

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. As I understand it, Melbourne has commuter rail which runs underground in a loop under the city centre.

Did the listing come from Métro?

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the pointer! My understanding, though, is that Perth and Sydney have systems that are more commuter rail than metro.

Sydney's I can say for fairly sure, as I used it pretty regularly when I was there.

[skreeky]

Washington: Chicago, Los Angeles

Ahhh, takes me back to the day when Downtown Crossing was called Washington. Okay, no it doesn't, because I haven't lived here that long. But last I noticed, there was still a sign on one of the platforms that said "Washington" if you know where to look.

I'd say it's a cheat because (a) it's not called Washington any more, and (b) the full name was "Washington Street," but the note on Times Square says the one in NYC counts because even though its full name is "42nd St Times Square" there's a platform sign that just says "Times Square." So if they still haven't taken down the sign...

[hotpoint.livejournal.com]

Washington (not Washington Street) in Boston is one of those extra-special cases, because it was only named Washington for a couple decades. Until then, the station actually had three names; separate names for the northbound and southbound Orange Line platforms and one for the Red Line platforms. Early line maps after the color-coding showed it as "Summer/Winter/Washington". That was consolidated to "Washington", and renamed "Downtown Crossing" with "Washington" as a secondary name in 1987 to match the name for the pedestrian mall above. (And I moved here 7 years ago, so I certainly never saw the sign.)

I've found that in general older stations have the shortest possible name; new stations tend to end up with the names of both cross-streets, or the full neighborhood name, or what have you. (Ultimate example: the Washington Metro's "U Street/African American Civil War Memorial/Cardozo" station.) Interesting trend -- perhaps the brevity was most useful when everybody took the subway, while long names make it easier for subway newbies to find the stations today?

[a-dodecahedron.livejournal.com]

For the record, the Houston MetroRail stations are the following:

UH-Downtown
Preston
Main Street Square
Bell
Downtown Transit Center
McGowen
Ensemble/HCC
Wheeler
Museum District
Hermann Park/Rice U
Memorial Hermann Hospital/Houston Zoo
Dryden/TMC
TMC Transit Center
Smith Lands
Reliant Park
Fannin South

In order from north to south. Yes, Houston's light rail is one-dimensional.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

I had no idea Houston even had a light rail system.

[dirque.livejournal.com]

If I had the same weird obsession you did, I would start with http://www.urbanrail.net.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Actually, that is where I started.

Great minds, and all that... :)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Tunnel Vision by Keith Lowe about a guy who tries to ride to every stop on the London Tube in one day.

I think there was either a video or a book about a similar attempt to do a complete circuit of the New York City Subway. I can't remember what it's called but I imagine it's google-able.

Subwayland by Randy Kennedy, which is a non-fiction book about the NY City subway system.

Yeah, I think I just saw that over the weekend in a bookstore in the Village! Looks interesting.

I am a fan of public transportation.
I see a million ways for my hometown's T to improve.

Seriously...at least a million.