For its busiest stop and its downtown, you would think Wellesley would ensure that Wellesley Square is as nice of a station as possible. A valid thought, but a wrong one…

One of the station’s parking lots.

For a downtown station, Wellesley Square’s 224 spaces of parking are great. They’re split between two lots, and like the other Wellesley stations, you’re in luck if you’re a resident – parking is a buck fifty cheaper! Once again, we have strange vending machines that don’t seem to work, as well. There’s an MWRTA bus stop sign for the 8 on Crest Road over the station, and it’s…fine.

Ohhhhhhhh noooooooooo…

Oh man, this is a bad platform. We’ll start with the outbound side, which has a few ads, a wastebasket, and a few bike spaces. Cool. The inbound side, meanwhile, features two benches, a wastebasket, some ads, a map and schedule, and a dingy old bus shelter. Wait, that’s it? No building to make up for how awful the rest of it is? Well…shoot.

That’s a bright light!

Station: Wellesley Square

Ridership: This is by far the busiest of the Wellesley stations, with a cool 804 inbound riders every weekday.

Pros: Like the other Wellesleys, Wellesley Square is integrated pretty well with the neighborhood around it. It also has a good amount of parking.

Cons: If there’s one thing I hate about in Commuter Rail stations, it’s bus shelters. And the bus shelter here is so dingy! At least the other Wellesleys had a building to liven up the station a bit, but Wellesley Square? Nope, you just get a bus shelter. As usual, it’s not wheelchair accessible, and I would really like it if there was better signage to the station from around the square.

Nearby and Noteworthy: Wellesley Square is really nice! Sure, it definitely has that “we’re a really rich town” vibe, but it’s still a great little high-end commercial district. A great thing about it is how big it is – it takes about seven minutes to walk from one end of the downtown to the other.

Final Verdict: 3/10
Sorry, Wellesley, but your stations all blow. This is the worst one, since it doesn’t even have a nice building to redeem it! It doesn’t help that this is by far the busiest of the three.

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