Maps of world subway systems, showing reach and line density

Steve Belmont's Cities in Full is the most important planning book since Death and Life of Great American Cities. He puts numbers and more focused reasons behind Jacobs, plus he links density to (re)centralization of housing, commerce, and transit, and the deleterious impact of automobile dependence on cities.

In the section on transit, he is derisive of "New Generation Transit" system such as DC's, Atlanta's or Baltimore's, because of how far from the city center these systems travel, and their focus on getting suburbanites to jobs in the city center. He looks at reach from the center point of the Central Business District, in making these arguments.

Fortunately for DC, at the core, the subway system functions monocentrically, with about 2.0 stations/square mile.

Cableflame, a colleague on the Dr. Transit blog, found a great website with comparably scaled maps of the world's major subway systems. Comparing the maps certainly reiterates Belmont's points.

Check out what she found from Fake is the New Real, subway systems of the world, presented on the same scale.