This is going to be quick because we were literally about to abandon CityMetric towers for the weekend when we saw this – but this is too good not to write up.

Remember that 1928 advert for the London Underground, showing how busy it was at each hour of the day? The clever marketing bods down at Transport for London (TfL) have produced an update. Here it is:

The key lessons, in no particular order:

  • The morning rush hour is later than it used to be;
  • The network is now much busier in the middle of the day;
  • The evening rush hour goes on for longer, perhaps because office hours have changed, or perhaps just because more people are socialising;
  • The network is a whole four times busier than it used to be.

This isn’t the first time TfL has decided to capitalise on a bit of viral content like this: a few weeks ago, it decided that, since everyone loved its secret geographical tube map so much, it would officially the publish the thing on its website.  London’s transport authority is getting quite good at this “playing the media” thing, isn’t it?

(Hat tip: @padders23)