In major cities around the earth , navigating from point A to point B using public transportation can be a daunting task , even for lifelong house physician . With a range of heap and train options to opt from , differing local and express route to account for , and unexpected service change to deal with , even comparatively straight commute can terminate up getting pretty complicated . But which metropolis has the most difficult - to - encompass public DoT mathematical function in the world ?
According to a radical of theoretical physicists and mathematician , New York City holds that dubious laurels . In astudycleverly titled “ lose in Transportation , ” researchers at the CEA - Saclay in France and the University of Oxford set out to analyze public transportation maps in 15 cities around the world . According to the study , humans generally have a “ cognitive brink ” of around 250 connections . When researchers layered New York City ’s bus map atop its underground map , City laboratory report , they found that the identification number of connexion reached 8461 , exceeding the stock cognitive threshold dramatically .
Of the 15 urban center they analyzed , they found that Paris , Tokyo , and London also have exceedingly complicated system function . Meanwhile , Beijing and Hong Kong were the gentle to navigate .
City Lab explicate that the researcher plan the study to gauge the degree to which next commuter will belike count on digital navigation apps rather than traditional maps to get around . As city expand and public DoT becomes more complicated , researchers believe that forcible maps become more difficult to utilise . Of course , most metropolis dwellers speedily get word the road that are the most of import in their routine life history — how to get to study , for instance — but researchers consider double-decker and train maps are becoming less helpful for totally new navigation .
“ Our psychoanalysis spotlight the fact that humans take to integrate an unreasonable amount of info for urban sailing , ” the researchers explain in the paper . “ Redesigning map and representations of transportation web , as well as improving information - engineering science tools that help to decrease the amount of information to a story below the human processing room access , thus appear to be crucial for an effective use of serve provide by shipping agencies . ”
[ h / tCity Lab ]
