London Underground Dot Matrix Typeface

Heh, reminds me of the early 90s, when I was making my first attempts at complete videogames. I fell in love with the Lucasfilm games, specifically Monkey Island, so I started to build my own graphic adventure engine.<p>I wanted to have the same look, and I naively thought the same fonts would be important (and conveniently ignored the question of how to make high quality art, since I suck as an artist). So I got some graph paper and copied the two fonts by hand, pixel by pixel, off the screen -- the bold font with an outline used for dialogue, and the skinnier font used for the UI.<p>I never finished that graphic adventure (mainly due to not really having a plot, not due to technical difficulties), but the fonts looked pretty convincing! I think I still have that graph paper with the fonts in some box in the basement.<p>PS: OMG, I found an actual screenshot! <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;gabrielgambetta.com&#x2F;files&#x2F;ne2.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;gabrielgambetta.com&#x2F;files&#x2F;ne2.png</a> Please enjoy my terrible 3D Studio skills and even wrose pixel art skills XD

I did a similar thing re-creating the font used by the VBZ in Zürich, Switzerland.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sschueller.github.io&#x2F;posts&#x2F;vbz-fahrgastinformation&#x2F;#the-font" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sschueller.github.io&#x2F;posts&#x2F;vbz-fahrgastinformation&#x2F;#...</a>

The London Underground Regular font struck me as quite peculiar when I encountered it on a trip a few years back. The decision to lower the baseline for uppercase letters is highly nonstandard – I’m not aware of any other Latin-based digital signage system in the world that does that.<p>I wonder if it was the result of a study that concluded visibility was slightly increased over a consistent baseline due to the extra pixel of height for caps. Whatever the reason, it certainly gives the signs a quirky character (no pun intended).

For more British-y rail stuff, check out Geoff Marshall&#x27;s channel:<p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;@geofftech2&#x2F;videos">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;@geofftech2&#x2F;videos</a><p>A few years ago, he and his girlfriend&#x2F;partner (Vicki) visited all (then) 2,563 railway stations in England, Wales, and Scotland:<p>* <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;allthestations.co.uk" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;allthestations.co.uk</a><p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;All_the_Stations" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;All_the_Stations</a><p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;c&#x2F;allthestations">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;c&#x2F;allthestations</a><p>* <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=16461196">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=16461196</a>

I wish Vienna, Austria used nice fonts worth copying in their electronic signs, but alas... <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;imgur.com&#x2F;CQ1dYqk" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;imgur.com&#x2F;CQ1dYqk</a>

I always wondered what tech&#x2F;programming was behind the notification boards on trains and in train stations. Do each station custom build their own solution, or is there a company who provides this to TFL&#x2F;UK stations?<p>There&#x27;s a couple of pubs in London (specifically close to underground stations) which have a notification boards above the bar for the next trains coming in and peering behind the notification display I see a Raspberry Pi dangling...

For &quot;London Underground Medium&quot;, it&#x27;s almost certain this technology is character based (it&#x27;s not archaic enough to be hand-crafted values) and so somebody with even test access to a 1996 stock (ie Jubilee Line trains) can presumably tell one to display notices with the desired characters: F K Qq U V X Y Z and take a photo without it ever being in service.<p>On the other hand, the 1995 stock is very similar, same vendor, same era, likely identical display panels so I&#x27;d expect you could collect some of this data (e.g. London Zoo is accessed via the Northern Line, and that&#x27;s a Z right there if the display mentions this) from those trains and assume it&#x27;s the same.

Love this. Would be a great addition to the &#x27;model my local tube station&#x27; project that&#x27;s probably going to remain on my to-do list for ever

Section 2.13 (page 32) has the matrix used on tram stops: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;tramlink-stop-signs-standard.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;tramlink-stop-signs-standard.pdf</a><p>P56 has what looks like the same font for London Overground: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;overground-signs-standard.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;overground-signs-standard.pdf</a><p>And P47 for the DLR: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;dlr-signs-standard.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;content.tfl.gov.uk&#x2F;dlr-signs-standard.pdf</a>

Also see British Rail which had an equally outsized effect on UK typography, and was (and continues to be) very beautiful in my eyes:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;britishrailmanual.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;britishrailmanual.com&#x2F;</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;British_Rail_Corporate_Identity_Manual" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;British_Rail_Corporate_Identit...</a>

Lovely stuff. Now someone please use this in a Bioshock-like adventure based in London&#x27;s semi-apocalyptic west end.

Stockholm subway had a nice font. Digital version is called esseltube. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sv.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Esseltub" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sv.m.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Esseltub</a>

There is something vaguely solipsistic about this project—the creator apparently didn&#x27;t try to contact TfL to ask if the designer of these displays was still around. Meanwhile Tfl put a lot of effort into memorializing their typographic tradition: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=LIAxVW-9fRo">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=LIAxVW-9fRo</a><p>Without meaning to sneer, I can&#x27;t help noticing this project represents a really trivial engagement with typography (dot matrix characters are really simply to copy). There&#x27;s no craft involved, obviously, and not necessarily any taste either. Typography and graphic design in general are full of those things. Maybe the designers of the signage would have been able to shed some light on those aspects...

Neato - I made an RPI bus arrival sign for my desk, wondering if I can repurpose these fonts.

I’ve always loved how the capital letter extend below the baseline.

Very soothing, I fail to know if it&#x27;s nostalgia or if these geometric primitive based fonts are really massaging your brain positively

The Madonna video Ray of light is filmed in one of the few stations that still have the old font

This is great

Great work!

How is this different from any dot matrix typeface of that time period? I doubt these fonts were made just for London Underground.