Imagine how Melbourne might look in 50 years. The city will have millions more people and countless new suburbs – but what if every train proposal had been constructed, and no train lines or stations shut down?

Welcome to Melbourne’s fantasy rail map for the year 2070 – the brainchild of mapmaker Adam Mattinson.

Mr Mattinson’s love of Melway maps as a child evolved into a career in geospatial science, which encompasses cartography and data analysis.

“We are so used to the way things are that we don’t often think about the way things could be,” he said. “That might affect the way people think about how they want their tax dollars being spent.”

Creating maps, Mr Mattinson said, is an exciting combination of art and science. The Brunswick resident’s map of a theoretical Melbourne train network used a mix of details from the current system overlaid with previously proposed ideas.

“I thought it would be really cool to see how it would all look on one page together,” he said.

He began last year with a 2047 train network map – 30 years seemed like a realistic time frame given the pace of public transport implementation.

Click the link in the picture caption to see a larger version of each map.

Melbourne Train Network 2070 map. Photo: Adam Mattinson

That project led to a 2070 version, completed this year, which incorporated every Melbourne rail project that has ever existed. It envisioned how Melbourne’s train system would look in 2070 had they all been given the green light.

According to the map, a passenger could travel from Flinders Street to destinations such as Healesville, Red Hill and Avalon Airport, or catch a train from St Kilda to Elwood. It also included the elusive Tullamarine Airport railway line, which has been in the pipeline for decades.

Fantasy maps aren’t just a pleasurable pastime for Mr Mattinson. They offer a resource that highlights missed opportunities and the looming transport challenges that a rapidly growing capital city like Melbourne faces.

“In terms of progress over the past 40 years, how much have we actually done? We only had the City Loop in 1982 and the Mernda extension announced in 2014. Not much has happened in the past 30 or 40 years,” he said.

V/Line Network Map. Photo: Adam Mattinson

Mr Mattinson said the 1969 Melbourne Transportation Plan was a major turning point, because it changed the focus of transport to the creation of more freeways rather than maintaining and expanding Victoria’s train network.

“If we had maintained that kind of love we had for trains in the 1950s and ’60s, then we would have a completely different looking city,” he said.

The 2070 train map is one of many detailed maps he created of Victorian public transport systems – including a 2048 fantasy tram network (a 2070 version is in the works) and a regional rail map that featured decommissioned train lines and imagined Melbourne being connected to a national fast rail network.

Melbourne Tram Network Map 2048. Photo: Adam Mattinson

Mr Mattinson considers further decentralisation of Victoria, from Melbourne into other regional hubs, a forgone conclusion. “It’s already happening with people moving to suburbs such as Woodend, Kyneton, Bendigo and Ballarat, he said.

The transport system could have been better prepared to deal with sustained regional population growth if trains had remained a higher priority, he said.

Although the maps represent Victoria’s theoretical transport future, he hoped the maps get people hungry for real action on public transport.

“After Melbourne Metro is built, I’m hoping there is a change of attitude to think that these kinds of projects are within our reach, and they can have a positive impact on the city. Hopefully I’ll be alive to see them happen,” he said.