Ten Favorite Metro Systems--A Personal View (reposted from Forbes blog).

10) New York.  Butt ugly, smells bad, too many rats, but gets you a whole lot of places at reasonable speeds.

9) Washington, DC.  Very pleasant, beautiful stations, and when working properly, fast.  But its major design flaw (lack of double tracking) means that if one train goes down, the whole system gets gummed up.  And it is not maintained well enough.

8) London.  See New York, except I haven’t used it enough to see a rat.

7) Delhi.  Modern and fast, but you sure better like your fellow human if you are going to use it.

6) Tokyo. Miraculously efficient, but see Delhi.  As such, it reflects its city.

5) Kiev.  Metros may have been the only economic thing the Soviets did well.

4) Seoul.  Longest system in the world.  Clean and reliable.

3) Taipei.  Almost luxurious.

2) Paris.  If i weren’t for the strikes, it would be as close to perfect as a metro system gets.  The Louvre-Rivoli station is so beautiful, you wouldn’t mind waiting for a long time there.  On the other hand, you rarely have to.

1) Barcelona.  Goes everywhere, swiftly, cheaply, comfortably.

[Update: Hong Kong needs to be on the list too.  Maybe 2.5?]