Viking Magazine - March 2022 - 28

white text on a black background. " ) Lodén delivered and
variations of the symbol have been in use in Stockholm
ever since. Notable evolutions include the symbol's fi rst
use on three-sided signs in 1952 to identify the new
Tunnelbana station entrances and its fi rst instance of
illumination and reliance on a blue color scheme in
1958.
Oslo Takes Its Cue
While the T symbol originated in Stockholm as part
of the development of the city's precursor to the
Tunnelbana, the fi rst tunnel and underground transit
line of any sort to open in Scandinavia occurred in
Oslo in 1928, only three years aft er the city dropped its
former name of Kristiania. A long time in the making,
construction on Oslo's precursor to the Tunnelbane
began in 1912 but was paused due to complicated legal
disputes that resulted from damage to buildings that
occurred in the process.
When it fi nally opened aft er construction resumed,
the Undergrunnsbanen connected Majorstuen, a
neighborhood west of the Royal Palace and adjacent
to Frogner Park and Vigeland Sculpture Park, to
Nationaltheatret in the heart of the city's center. When
developing extensive standards to improve the system, ranging
from station aesthetics, system maps, and of course, the T symbol
itself.
Chermayeff and Geismar felt that the T symbol would lend
a coherent sense of identity to the system because the letter
T possesses strong connotations with many relevant words
associated with it-transportation, transit, tunnel, tube-and of
course, it had already been proven to be successful in Stockholm
and Oslo had just adopted its use as well.
While clearly modeled on Stockholm's symbol, Geismar
developed the specifi cs of the standards for the symbol to be used
in Boston-such as its font, color, and proportions of letter size to
size of the surrounding circle. So while Boston's symbol derived its
appearance from Stockholm's, it is not exactly identical.
The team also developed a new system map and manner of
identifying its diff erent lines. Prior to this time, the system lines
were identifi ed primarily by their terminal stations. Chermayeff
created a new color scheme to offi cially distinguish the lines, and
thanks to this innovation, passengers now ride the Red Line to
Harvard where the university color is crimson, the Green Line
through Fenway and the Emerald Necklace of parks, or the Blue
Line along the coast.
Helping Riders Navigate
Stockholm and Oslo both eventually followed suit and have colorcoded
their systems' lines as well, with Stockholm in particular
relying on the colors for identifi cation of its lines while Oslo still
maintains a stronger emphasis on the numbering of its lines. All
three systems employ topological maps inspired by the original
created by Harry Beck for the London Underground in 1931,
which applied colors to the system lines for ease of legibility
but did not designate the colors themselves as an offi cial sort of
identity for each line as is the case in Boston and Stockholm.
The implementation of the changes suggested by Chermayeff
and Geismar made the Boston system much more comprehensible
for its users-and gave it its now iconic identity. Few people who
live in or near Boston or who have visited the city and made use of
the system realize that the Boston T isn't original.
The Ts in Stockholm and Oslo were already up and running
the Oslo City Council decided to build the Tunnelbane
in 1954, it chose to model its system on Stockholm's,
and 12 years later the fi rst line opened, connecting
Jernbanetorget-where the main Oslo Sentralstasjon is
today-to the southeastern suburb of Bergkrystallen.
A Redesign for Boston
In 1965, one year before Oslo's Tunnelbane opened,
the MBTA hired CambridgeSeven Associates to rework
the graphic design, wayfi nding, lighting, and general
appearance of the Boston system, which had become
very disorganized and poorly maintained by this time.
The team, lead by architects Peter Chermayeff and
Tom Geismar, worked on the project for fi ve years,
28
March 2022
before the United States' oldest underground system joined
their shared sense of visual identity. But that identity does its
job well and provides an incredibly eff ective visual cue to help
navigate each of the three cities: whenever anyone visits Boston,
Stockholm, or Oslo and needs to utilize the transit system, he or
she just simply needs to look for the circular symbol of the T. ▼
Why The Letter T?
It possesses strong connotations
with many relevant words associated
with the system-transportation,
transit, tunnel and tube.
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Viking Magazine - March 2022

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