Dwell: How have smartphones changed the ways people navigate cities? Did that impact the WalkNYC program? Bierut: Smartphones, GPS systems, and digital technology in general probably had the most dramatic impact on the WalkNYC program. Modern GPS has created the expectation that the top of the map you're looking it is the direction you're facing. Our team's wayfinding specialists at CityID did tons of research showing that people found this kind of "heads up" mapping easier to read. At the same time, the cartographers we work with at T-Kartor created a digital system where the data can be rotated into any position and the type and icons all rotate with the map. This seems like a simple thing but it's really a miracle. When we did the downtown system in the late nineties, we basically had a single overall map with north at the top and we stuck that everywhere and we thought we were doing fine. The mapping systems in WalkNYC are so much more advanced. Photo 5 of 9 in How New York City Developed its Wayfinding Signage by Diana Budds

How New York City Developed its Wayfinding Signage

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Dwell: How have smartphones changed the ways people navigate cities? Did that impact the WalkNYC program?

Bierut: Smartphones, GPS systems, and digital technology in general probably had the most dramatic impact on the WalkNYC program.

Modern GPS has created the expectation that the top of the map you're looking it is the direction you're facing. Our team's wayfinding specialists at CityID did tons of research showing that people found this kind of "heads up" mapping easier to read. At the same time, the cartographers we work with at T-Kartor created a digital system where the data can be rotated into any position and the type and icons all rotate with the map.

This seems like a simple thing but it's really a miracle. When we did the downtown system in the late nineties, we basically had a single overall map with north at the top and we stuck that everywhere and we thought we were doing fine. The mapping systems in WalkNYC are so much more advanced.