When key decisions are made on capital infrastructure programs at the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), it is often necessary to relate maps to mental or physical images of the built environment. Multimedia tools have evolved so that such queries can be addressed using off-the-shelf software combined with innovative development techniques to achieve powerful results. A spatial multimedia system was developed for CTA. Such spatial multimedia technologies can integrate spatial representations of existing or proposed urban environments with qualitative descriptions by linking maps to static and dynamic images.