Urban Mobility Blooms
Visualizing the Infrastructure of Movement Across U.S. Cities Through Multi-Variable Glyphs
This project focused on designing a system of glyphs to represent multiple dimensions of a complex dataset in a single, cohesive visual composition. Students were asked to choose one of four datasets and explore how visual cognition principles could guide the creation of glyphs that simultaneously encode at least six distinct variables across all data entries.
The design could be either static or dynamic, but it had to fit within a single-page view and be guided by clearly defined user tasks. The core challenge was to translate data into a form that is not only visually engaging, but also perceptually effective—leveraging insights from cognitive science to inform choices in color, shape, scale, and spatial arrangement. The result needed to balance clarity, complexity, and meaning, offering the viewer a tool for exploration, comparison, and interpretation.
Design Rationale and Final Visualization Analysis
Titled Mobility Index in US Cities, this project visualizes urban mobility infrastructure across selected U.S. cities using custom-designed glyphs. Each city is represented as a flower-like figure composed of five drop-shaped petals, with each petal encoding one variable: population, walkability, bikeability, transit accessibility, and city area. A sixth variable—geographic region—is conveyed through visual grouping and color-coded legends, adding contextual structure to the layout.
The petal form emerged through iterative testing, chosen for its ability to balance aesthetic coherence with functional comparison. Unlike bars or radial charts, the organic shape suggested growth and human-scale design, reinforcing the theme of urban mobility. Petal size reflects quantitative value, while color distinguishes variables—a decision grounded in Cleveland and McGill’s perceptual hierarchy, ensuring legibility and accessibility.
Sketches explored multiple glyph structures and layout approaches, ultimately favoring a curved-line system that loosely maintains geographic logic without demanding cartographic precision. Spatial proximity and repeated orientation support visual grouping, guided by Gestalt principles.
The final design invites both broad pattern recognition—such as regional trends—and detailed comparison between cities. It reveals not only how mobility infrastructure varies, but also where gaps persist, highlighting the uneven progress toward sustainable and equitable urban systems.