Buying Large Subway Map Prints

[Cebby]

I've been searching for a map of the DC Metro system to hang in my kids room (they went on their first ride this past holiday and loved it). All I've been able to find are PDFs. While enticing to have one printed to whatever size I want, I'm afraid the print quality will be lousy since it is pretty much an 8 x 10 pdf of about 472kb.

Anyone come across a source for these?

[Good Times]

pdf's are a collection of vector based images/text so you should be fine on the quality side.

[neliconcept]

get a PDF file, and take it to a print shop and see if they can enlarge it for you and how much.

otherwise I could retrace it for you in illustrator but would take me some time

[Seanz0rz]

looking for subway maps? im sure Department of Homeland Security would LOVE to talk to you... hahaha.

contact the subways, they might be able to help out.

[RobG]

I know they have them in most of the local (DC) gift shops.

Here is one link, not sure if it too small. http://www.dcgiftshop.com/items/Metro_System_Map_Poster.html

[freefallmarine]

Cebby is this what your looking for? http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/systemmap.cfm

[calrockx]

do you have any idea of how involved a subway map can be, blake? it'd take a long long time to retrace it for anything worthwhile.

like lance said, a vector PDF should be scalable to any size while retaining its quality. 100% vector files are usually on the smaller side, so don't let the measly file size get ya.

http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/colormap.pdf
seems that one would scale up nicely.

it'd be cool if you gave the kids room a metro theme, and used maps form a bunch of worldwide cities.

[Cebby]

I know they have them in most of the local (DC) gift shops.

Here is one link, not sure if it too small. http://www.dcgiftshop.com/items/Metro_System_Map_Poster.html

That is EXACTLY what I was looking for - $40 for a poster is a bit steep though.



Cebby is this what your looking for? http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/systemmap.cfm


I had found that one in my search, but it's a little low on the res for my purposes.



like lance said, a vector PDF should be scalable to any size while retaining its quality. 100% vector files are usually on the smaller side, so don't let the measly file size get ya.

http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/colormap.pdf
seems that one would scale up nicely.

it'd be cool if you gave the kids room a metro theme, and used maps form a bunch of worldwide cities.


That's a good one to use Charles, thanks! The native size is nice and large. We don't have a specific theme going, more so just trying to gather cool stuff that we've done, places we've gone, and framed pics - to replace the multitude of crap taped, tacked and hanging from the walls and ceiling (and usually 1/2 of it on the floor from inadequate kid administered tape jobs.

[neliconcept]

do you have any idea of how involved a subway map can be, blake? it'd take a long long time to retrace it for anything worthwhile.

like lance said, a vector PDF should be scalable to any size while retaining its quality. 100% vector files are usually on the smaller side, so don't let the measly file size get ya.

http://www.wmata.com/metrorail/colormap.pdf
seems that one would scale up nicely.

it'd be cool if you gave the kids room a metro theme, and used maps form a bunch of worldwide cities.


im sure i could at least try and help Charles

[Cebby]

I appreciate the gesture Blake, but it would be a boatload of work for something amounting to nothing more than a decorative item for my kids room.

I'm going to see what my local printer would charge for a large format color print of the PDF that Chaz found as a first step.

Thanks all!