I Won’t Be Posting For a Few Days
Yes, yes, I know I haven’t done a post in a few days, anyway. Nonetheless, I’m going to Florida and will be there until Sunday. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to take a bus in Delray Beach, but we’ll see. Don’t expect a post until probably Tuesday, anyway.
Random Photos: Some Truly Ancient Bus Schedules
I was at Malden Center station waiting for the bus up to Reading (for fun, obviously), so I was looking at the bus schedules in the lobby. They have a big schedule rack here, designed to hold schedules for every MBTA bus. It was looking pretty barren on the day I went, with current schedules only for the 106, for some reason. They had plenty of other schedules, but they were a) covered by plastic panels and b) very out of date. I took pictures of the three oldest:
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| This is from early 1993 – 20 years ago! |
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| This one’s from early 1996. |
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| This seems to be a special schedule about the wheelchair lift capabilities of the “new” RTS fleet. |
SL2 (Design Center – South Station via Waterfront)
The last line. This was the last line I had to take to be able to say that I’ve taken every line on the MBTA. The SL2 to the Design Center ended up being a very interesting ride, although also a very useless one… I got excited right off the bat, as the bus turned out to be one of the “purple destination board” buses – these are some Silver Line buses that have purple destination boards. It’s nothing really special, but it was nice to ride one. The SL2 starts out in the underground transitway along with the SL1. There were only about six or seven people on the bus leaving South Station. No one got on or off at Courthouse, obviously, and one person got on at World Trade Center. When we got to Silver Line Way, the electric to diesel transition took – literally – a few seconds. I was actually dumbfounded! They never make the conversion this quickly! Everyone got off the bus at the next stop, with only me left.
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| Hello? Anybody? |
Shortly after Silver Line way, it gets very industrial. The bus turns onto Northern Ave (travelling with the 4 at this point) and enters the Boston Marine Industrial Park. Along here there are some small factories, as well as a surprisingly large parking garage. It then turns onto Tide Street and again onto Drydock Ave (going by an insanely pointless public toilet). The bus turns onto Design Center Place, right in front of the Design Center, and then turns again onto Black Falcon Ave (at least, I think it is – it appears as an unnamed street on Google Maps). The street makes a U-shape as the bus goes by parking lots and more industrial buildings, and then it turns back into Drydock Ave.
The bus got to the official “Design Center” stop, and the driver turned it off. He started to walk out, and then he looked back to see he had a passenger in the back of the bus. “Where are you going?” He shouted to me in a very angry voice. I decided to tell the truth and said I was just taking it for fun. “Oh, okay.” He said. “I leave in four minutes.” While the driver was outside smoking, I looked around at the scenery: a random parking lot, the Design Center, and the deserted cruise ship terminal.
The driver soon got back in the bus and we set off down Drydock Ave. On the left are even more random industrial buildings, and on the right is the massively long Design Center building – divided into separate buildings, apparently, as the stop names at this point are simply along the lines of “Building 55.” Drydock Ave soon turns to the right, and the bus goes by some impressive tanks. It then turns onto “unnamed street,” which runs only a few feet from the water with only a tiny fence in between. There was a lovely (kind of) view from here of some massive cranes. It’s only for a few seconds, however, as the bus turns onto another unnamed road inland.
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| This was taken a little before the bus turned onto the road by the water, but you can see how small that fence is. |
There’s actually a stop over here, and two people got on at it. It then goes onto Black Falcon Ave, a deserted, industrial road between the Design Center and the cruise terminal. There are no stops on this sequence until the bus turns back in front of the Design Center, and then makes its way back onto Northern Ave. One of the landmarks here that I didn’t notice before is the “Harpoon Brewery.” It looked fairly impressive, actually.
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| I mean, look at those massive tanks! |
It was charted territory from then, but at Silver Line Way, there was yet another five-second conversion! Simply crazy! After that, it was back into the tunnel with only a few people on the bus. World Trade Center and Courthouse were quiet as usual, and everyone got off at South Station. Having failed to get a decent picture of the bus, I actually crossed over to the other side of the station to get it going back to the Design Center. It was a pretty good picture, although I swear the driver looked at me funny.
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| I just realized why the conversions were made so quickly: it’s the purple headlights. They’re magic. |
Route: SL2 (Design Center – South Station via Waterfront)
Ridership: Like I said before, not many people were on the bus on a Saturday. I’m sure during rush hour, it’s full of people who go to work in the industrial area, and I’ll bet it gets its fare share of tourists coming from cruise ships (because nothing says “welcome to Boston” like a disgusting industrial area). On Saturdays – and presumably Sundays – this bus is empty.
Pros: It runs very frequently, however this isn’t necessarily a good thing…
Cons: Now I know I’m being a massive hypocrite here. I know I often rant about buses not running frequently enough. However, those buses had more ridership than the SL2. Therefore, I don’t see why the SL2 needs to run every 15 minutes on weekends and nights. Instead, run most of the buses to the airport (because they’re always packed), and maybe every half hour or even hour, a bus could go around the Design Center loop. There’s just no reason for so many buses to go to such a deserted area, at least on weekends. And it’s not even that long of a walk to Silver Line Way – just 10 minutes! Seems useless to even have this bus running. Nonetheless, on weekdays the current schedule can be operated, as I’m sure it gets decent ridership during rush hour.
Nearby and Noteworthy: Industry. Big long buildings. Parking lots. Cruise ships. Beer. That’s about it for this route.
Final Verdict: 3/10
Seems like the SL2 is the first “bad bus” featured on the blog! But really, it just feels so unnecessary. There is simply no need for it to run on weekends, or even exist, in my opinion. I’d imagine the sort of people who work down there can handle a 10 minute walk. The only thing keeping this from having a lower score is the fact that although it’s completely unnecessary, the bus does run quite frequently, which is nice. But pointless.
Latest MBTA News: Service Updates
The MBTA is extending late-night service! In Spring 2014, subway trains and Key Bus Routes will run until 3 A.M. Also, the MBTA broke a ridership record in October, likely due to the World Series. Finally, from December 9-13, you can help children or teens in need by donating toys to Fill a Bus With Gifts. More information can be found here, although it’s a PDF.
Random Photos: I Prefer Medium Rare
What we have here is a leak in the ceiling at South Station with no bucket to collect the water, so it’s just falling on the floor. They put down a caution sign, luckily, and made sure to put a traffic cone in it for extra emphasis. They were a bit short on caution signs that day, however, so they had to use the one with “Raw” written on it. I had to showcase the amount of attention this situation was getting. Good job, MBTA!
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| Simply amazing. |
Breaking the Record: An Account of the Biggest MBTA Adventure Ever
As most of you know, Adham Fisher and I broke the record for fastest time travelling through every MBTA station. This account, however, will most likely not be one of my best works. It may even be downright boring. The thing is, I can’t actually disclose the route in case someone uses it to break our record (if you want to break it, do it fairly). Sure, everyone knows we ended at Ashmont and Mattapan, since that’s where all the reporters were, but I’m not revealing anything else. Therefore, this account will be simply in line order.
Preliminaries: My father was nice enough to drive us to the first station, at the lovely hour of 6 in the morning. Right after he left us, we found out that Adham’s credit card didn’t work on CharlieCard machines, so we had to quickly find an ATM before starting.
Red (Main trunk portion, from Alewife to JFK/UMASS): It was at Davis that we met up with Steven Beaucher, the owner of WardMaps. He was with us for much of the journey, but not the whole thing. Other than that, there wasn’t much of note on this stretch (although Adham really liked the view from the Longfellow bridge by Charles/MGH. If you haven’t been over there before, I consider it the best view on the system).
Red (Braintree Branch): This was when we were starting to hear of the camera crews at Ashmont. Steven had been Tweeting about what we were doing, and Adham was making calls to lots of different journalists. A Commuter Rail train would’ve made the trip back to JFK/UMASS a lot faster, but our train was a few minutes late.
Red (Ashmont Branch): We were on the home stretch by this point. When we got to Ashmont, we were very surprised to see an entire film crew. Over the course of the the trip, not many people had actually asked us what we were doing. There were only about three or four people who did, including a guy who pointed at an article in the Metro and asked Adham, “Are you this guy?” This made the crew all the more surprising. Unfortunately, we still had the Mattapan High Speed Line to do, but everyone was taking pictures of Adham and interviewing us. The driver was actually getting mad at us, as the train was supposed to leave. We had to move to the station lobby. After missing two trolleys, we finally managed to get everyone onto one and head off to Mattapan.
Red (Mattapan High Speed Line): This portion of the trip was mostly spent doing more interviews. I did point out when the trolley was going through the graveyard, which is a very unique part of the line. When we got to Mattapan, Adham jumped out of the train and let out a moan when reading the stopwatch: 8 hours, 5 minutes, and 16 seconds. This was an hour and a half later than our original planned time. We were all satisfied, nonetheless, and I at least had had a great deal of fun that day.
Orange (South): Nothing of note, except for a long run going by some of the most infamous housing projects in Boston. They seemed fine when we went through.
Orange (North): We were planning to take a bus from Sullivan, but we were very behind and had missed it by a long shot. We were scurrying around trying to find schedules, and then chasing after buses that were only laying over for 20 minutes. We ended up getting on the right one, but we had wasted a lot of time running around that stupid busway.
Blue: At Bowdoin (BOW-doin, as Adham called it), we almost got to go around that really tight loop, but the doors closed before we could get in. Other than that, nothing much happened on this line. It was Adham’s favorite, though – he said he liked the “spaceship look” of the trains, as well as the stations, particularly Bowdoin and Maverick.
Green (Central Subway):
Adham [at Kenmore]: Wait, why is that train on the other track going our direction? [train on other track leaves] No! [another train on other track arrives] Great, what’s this?
Miles: We’re a B, the train that just left was a D, and that train is a C.
Adham: I give up!
Green (B Branch): This was, in my opinion, the deal breaker for the trip. The B was bunching, first of all. There were two trains in a row, then shortly behind was another two trains. We were the train ahead in the second pair, and it was packed. So much, in fact, that the driver was kicking people off, saying “there’s a train right behind us.” Adham also lost his gloves in the madness. To top it off, it was going insanely slow, a hallmark of the B.
Green (C Branch): The C went pretty well. The train wasn’t that crowded and it moved quickly down Beacon Street. Nothing much of note happened here, except for the longest, steepest, and overall worst run on the whole trip.
Green (D Branch): The D was quite fast, as usual. There were supposedly delays, although none that we could see. However, Adham dropped his camera right when we were about to get off. Somehow the off button fell out, but we had to leave it behind when the doors opened. The camera still worked, luckily.
Green (E Branch): The E was surprisingly quick. We unfortunately just missed one when we got to the station, though, and had to wait another 10 minutes or so. I was expecting the portion where it runs with traffic to be miserable, but it wasn’t that bad.
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| A few fans and me. |
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| Adham, me, and another fan. |
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| Steven and me – I look really weird in this photo. |
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| And finally, Adham and me. |
UPDATE: I can’t believe I made it through this entire post without a “weird hat” reference! Oops, too late.
WE DID ITTTTTTTTTT!
Adham Fisher and I have just broken the record for fastest time travelling through every MBTA station. We also had a lot of help from Steven Beaucher (co-owner of WardMaps, the best store ever). Our time was 8 hours, 5 minutes, and 16 seconds, and hour and a half later than our original goal of six and a half hours. I’m not allowed to disclose the route we took, but I’ll have an account of the ultimate MBTA adventure at some point. In addition, I see I’ve gotten a lot of new readers from all the news coverage that happened today. I suggest reading the “Suggested Reading” list published a few days ago.
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| Hopefully this will satisfy you readers for now. |
352 (Burlington Express – Boston via Route 128 and I-93) – also includes the 350 to the end!
You may recall how when I took the 350, I only took it up to the Burlington Mall. I knew, however, that I would be able to take it all the way after riding the 352, which ends at the same place. This wasn’t the reason I wanted to take it: I actually just wanted an excuse to get off at State Station, which is literally right in the Old State House. Unfortunately, I arrived 20 minutes late and planned on simply exploring State. Suddenly, I heard the noise of a bus. Rushing outside (without thinking about having to repay my fare), I saw a 352, the bus after the one I missed.
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| A really bad, blurry picture of the bus in front of the Old State House. |
I got on, along with maybe nine other people. The bus laid over for a bit in front of the Old State House, and then started to leave. The part of the route in Boston is very simple, surprisingly. It heads down Court Street, which turns into Cambridge Street, passing City Hall, Government Center Station, and the famous giant tea kettle. It turns at New Sudbury Street, the lone entrance to Bowdoin hiding just out of a rider’s view from the bus. It passes Haymarket Station, and then turns onto I-93.
It was actually very exhilarating, riding alongside I-93 (the exit ramp doesn’t physically connect to the highway until later) over the Zakim Bridge at the typical 75 miles an hour. Then the bus hit a snag – specifically, rush hour traffic (or not really rush hour – it was 4 PM). Luckily, the traffic was moving somewhat, and the slow pace gave me a chance to look at the lovely view. This is where 93’s northbound and southbound sides stack on top of each other, and the northbound side is on the top. There were some great views of the Bunker Hill Monument sticking up above small apartments and, if you turn around, a beautiful skyline view.
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| Unfortunately, there were raindrops on the bus windows, making this another really bad, blurry picture. Note the massive amounts of traffic on both sides of the highway. |
It gets industrial around Sullivan Square (which is kind of visible in the photo above), but once past there, the two sides of I-93 level out again and dense houses and apartments appear. Then the highway goes through a rather swampy area and then it gets industrial again. It’s fairly urban in Medford, but there’s a dense layer of trees on both sides of the highway, preventing people from seeing through. Then the houses go away and the highway just runs through a dense forest (keep in mind there’s still a huge traffic jam). After a while, office parks, less densely spaced houses, and massive superstores start appearing.
Here the bus turned off of I-93 onto the mercifully less trafficked I-95 South. It is mostly the same fare, with quite a few office parks lining the highway through the tree layer. There’s an interesting point where the forest clears away for a short time for some massive telephone wires to cross over the highway. It is also at this point where the bus turns off and heads onto Cambridge Street with the 350.
This is a little after the Burlington Mall, so this is also previously uncharted territory for me. The 350 and the 352 share the route from this point onward, so consider this the final part of the 350 as well (and I took the 350 back the whole way after this bus, anyway). My preconceived notion of the area north of Burlington Mall was mostly just spread apart houses. It turned out to be more office parks along the road, with houses dotted in between. The bus went through Burlington Center (there’s a Burlington Center? You learn something new every day), and after that there were some small commercial buildings with big parking lots.
There was a point where the bus turned onto Wilmington Road and then again onto Chestnut Ave. I was absolutely thrilled to see there was a shelter, as I had no idea when the next 350 was coming. I assumed this was the last stop, as the driver opened both doors and “kneeled” the bus down. No one got off, though, so he closed them again. I had no idea where we were going now, but the bus made a very sharp turn onto Cambridge Street. There was another stop here, and yet again he opened both doors and kneeled the bus. This time he said “last stop,” so I figured it was time to get off. The driver turned the destination board to “NOT IN SERVICE” and drove off to who knows where.
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| This is where the bus dropped me off. Not the nicest place in the world… |
As everyone went their separate ways, I wanted to get back to that shelter on Chestnut Ave (this stop on Cambridge Street was just a sign). This was easier said than done. First of all, Cambridge Street was full of reckless drivers, speeding by at 60 miles per hour. Luckily, there was a traffic light, so I pushed the button and crossed over. Despite being only a block from where I was, I couldn’t figure out how to get to Chestnut Ave. I ended up just going back to Wilmington Street and then going to the Chestnut Street bus shelter.
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| And this is where I had to wait. I’m thankful for the shelter, but geez Louise, what a dump. |
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| I had to save the best for last. This picture is so darn cool! |
Random Photos (Videos): Spastic Fare Gate
I was at Alewife Station (the smaller entrance) when I saw this weird fare gate. It was simply opening and closing repeatedly. Everyone was gingerly using the other one, and when I got back that afternoon it was fixed. Someone could’ve easily broken through without paying a fare, but no one did when I was there. Which is kind of nice, actually. You can also watch it on YouTube here.
Random Photos: Hey, Who Turned Out The Lights?
I was on the Red Line leaving Alewife. There were only three other people in the car with me, when the train stopped right after leaving the station. This happens fairly often, so I didn’t think much of it. Then the lights turned out. It was rather eerie just sitting there in the dark with only a few other people. I took out my camera and snapped a few pictures. Soon after, the lights turned back on and the train started moving again, without a word from the driver.
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| The pictures speak for themselves, really. |
558 (Riverside – Downtown Boston via Newton Corner and Mass Turnpike)
The 558 is one of many express buses in the 500s that travel on the Mass Turnpike from downtown. In this case, the bus goes to Riverside, although taking a very indirect route. It is also the highest numbered bus route operated by the MBTA.
It starts at the intersection of Federal and Franklin Streets downtown, about halfway between Downtown Crossing and South Station. My father and I chose to use Downtown Crossing, and were late for the bus as usual. Luckily, being an MBTA bus, the 558 was late as well, and we were able to catch it at the beginning of the route. From there, it navigates through heavily trafficked one-ways and stops at Otis and Summer Streets (remember that?). From there, it continues making random turns until reaching Surface Road, where it goes by the not-so-famous Boston Chinatown Gate, and then turns off onto the Mass Turnpike.
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| In all its glory, here it is. |
On the Turnpike, the bus goes fast. Like, 75 MPH fast. There was no traffic mid-afternoon on Columbus Day, so the bus just sped along the highway. It passes by the John Hancock Building (barely visible before the Turnpike goes into a tunnel)and Fenway Park before hitting a toll plaza. I was wondering what would happen here, and it turns out trucks and buses have their own special lane at the toll.
It gets pretty suburban by the time the bus takes the exit at Newton Corner. It follows the other “550” buses down Washington Street for a bit before turning off at Adams Street into a residential neighborhood. It turns onto Watertown Street (where there are a few businesses) for only a few blocks before turning again onto Chapel Street and going by a business center. Then it turns onto California Street and again onto Bridge Street, crossing over the Charles and entering Watertown.
It’s fairly industrial once the bus turns onto Pleasant Street right after Bridge. There are a lot of car dealerships and office parks in this neighborhood. The industry ends right about where the bus enters Waltham, and Pleasant Street turns to River Street (it’s not in Watertown for very long). There are densely packed houses, as well as an amphitheater-esque building. The houses turn to businesses as the bus comes into Waltham Center, connecting with the 70, a few other “500” buses, and the Commuter Rail.
It follows the other buses down Moody Street but shortly turns off at Crescent Street. This is more residential than Moody, but soon a massive factory pops up. Soon after the bus turns onto Woerd (pronounced “word,” I think) Ave, and yet again onto Rumford Ave, which is also pretty industrial. It then turns again onto Lexington Street back in Newton, where there are connections to a few other buses. Travelling down Lexington Street along with the 505, they reach Commonwealth Ave (imagine if the B Line went out here) and split off. The 558 goes right, leaving behind the minor businesses of the intersection for a more residential area.
Passing a Marriott, the bus crosses over the Charles River and then merges onto I-95. It’s not on it for very long, though, turning off at the very next exit onto Grove Street. It passes by the good ol’ Hotel Indigo, and then turns into the Riverside parking lot.
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| The 558 way back in downtown. Lovely picture, if I do say so myself. |
Route: 558 (Riverside – Downtown Boston via Newton Corner and Mass Turnpike)
Ridership: One thing’s for sure, no one took this from beginning to end. The ridership was sort of split into two chunks: Downtown to Waltham, and Waltham to Riverside. That being said, a fair amount of the people that rode it (around 20 for our ride) used it for just local service around Waltham.
Pros: Cuts out a nice route through Waltham that serves a lot. The express to Boston is fast, but probably not during rush hour. Ridership was decent, but not excellent.
Cons: The schedule is pretty darn terrible: the bus runs weekdays only, about every hour. On top of that, four out of the ten trips the bus makes in a day only run from Riverside to Newton Corner. I feel like it should at least have limited Saturday service. The bus is obviously not faster than the train – from Downtown Crossing to Riverside on the bus is about an hour, while the train from Riverside to Downtown Crossing (utilizing the Winter Street concourse between Park Street and the latter) is only 45 minutes. Finally, the bus is very curvy, although as there aren’t that many traffic lights (or traffic in general) along the route, it’s not nearly as much of a problem as it is for the 83.
Nearby and Noteworthy: Other than downtown and Newton Corner, not much. It was a mostly residential/industrial route. Fenway Park and the John Hancock Building were visible, but that doesn’t really count.
Final Verdict: 6/10
This is one of those buses that I don’t see what’s wrong with it until I actually do the post. The schedule was sort of a deal breaker in my opinion, although the Waltham area is pretty under-served in general, at least on weekends. But think about it: the 76 gets at least a pseudo Saturday service and it got about the same amount of riders as the 558. However, the impractical transit geek in me says it’s still a very fun ride. It’s also the highest numbered bus operated by the MBTA (not including contracted buses), which is kinda worth checking out, right?
Latest MBTA News: Service Updates
The MBTA is starting work on the Government Center Station rehabilitation project. This unfortunately means the station will be closed for two years starting spring 2014. Also, a lawsuit has been filed against the MBTA for displaying pro-Israel ads at various locations.
Miles on the MBTA in Boston Magazine!
I see some people have noticed a reference to Miles on the MBTA in the Boston Magazine article, “‘Transit Racer’ Will Attempt to Travel to Every MBTA Station In Record Time.” So yes, I will be travelling with Adham Fisher on his record breaking/setting adventure. In the meantime, here are some recommended blog posts for new readers from the article:
- The 459 – My first bus review wasn’t that great, but hey – it was the first.
- The 30 – My second bus review, and also one of my worst transit experiences.
- The SL5 – One of the blog’s only low-scoring routes as of yet.
- The 1 – An amazing crosstown route.
- The 31 – Scored a perfect 10!
- Science Park/West End – Has one of my favorite photos on the blog.
- The 439 – An amazing route that’s on its last legs.
- Bowdoin – Closed on weekends and evenings, insanely tight loop, door-open buttons…really weird station.
- The 441/442 – Sort of irrelevant now that the weather’s getting colder, but it was a fun ride to Marblehead.
- Minatur Wunderland – The best place ever is located in Hamburg, Germany.
- The MBTA Control Center – Definitely worth a look.
- The 71 – Trackless trolley. Period.
- The 4 – Great ride through downtown Boston.
- The 76 – A very weird route.
- All of the Service Change posts, wherein we ride non-MBTA transit systems, are worth a look.
Photos From Around Riverside
I am very late with my usual bus review (as usual), but here are the rest of the pictures I took around Riverside Station.
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| Sort of an overview of the station. The back of the 558 bus peeks in. |
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| Whoops! Missed that train! Looks nice, though, with the trees just starting to change color. |
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| A Boeing LRV train, retired from revenue service in 2007, now being used as a work car. I believe this one is usually stored in the central subway, but is at Riverside on this particular day. |
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| And another, this one orange. |
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| A lot of tracks and wires, as well as a few garages. |
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| A wider look at the yard. |
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| Why isn’t this work car operating, I wonder? |
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| And again. |
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| An old forgotten ticket booth at the far end of the station where no one ever goes. |
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| An old forgotten bus shelter in the same place. |
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| Whoops! I was planning to take that one! |
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| I love this staircase area! |
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| There seems to be another abandoned bus shelter to the lower right. |
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| I had to do this one again, I love it so much! |
Riverside
I’ve always found it funny how the C and E branches of the Green Line end more or less in Boston and the B branch barely makes it into Newton – but then the D branch stretches all the way out to the Weston border on its own amazingly fast right-of-way. The terminus of the D is Riverside, a massive complex practically in the middle of nowhere. I had been there a few times for fun, but had never left the station (I didn’t want to have to pay my fare again). Taking the 558 (review coming soon) out there, however, gave me the chance to explore, and I can now say that Riverside is like heaven for transit-lovers.
This is one of the only (if not the only) above ground Green Line station with actual CharlieCard gates and trains opening all doors instead of just the front. However, there seemed to be no employees on duty at the station when I went (around 1:30 on a weekday), and there was a random rolling chair sitting around that someone could’ve easily stolen. Riverside is also the location of Pluto in the Museum of Science Community Solar System. Finally, it has a massive parking lot with 925 spaces.
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| The parking lot. |
The platform has a bit of a inefficient layout. The outbound platform (i.e. trains coming into Riverside) is on the far end of the station, requiring commuters to cross over the inbound tracks to get to the exit. It’s pretty nice overall, providing a lot of shelter on both platforms (although who would use the center platform going back to Boston when it requires crossing over the tracks)? Something I found interesting on the platform was an “assistance box” with buttons for information and emergency help. Emergency help makes sense, but I don’t know why there would be tourists out at Riverside wishing to figure out “information” (or tourists in general, really). Also, the box didn’t seem to be connected to anything, and I wanted to see if it worked but there were some bees who had taken up residence in there.
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| The platform. |
The area with the fare gates is nice, with a rounded roof to one side and a staircase area to the other. There’s a concrete carving in the staircase area that says “RIVERSIDE.” It is also in this lobby area that the Museum of Science Community Solar System Pluto is located. Walking down the staircase and along a sidewalk, you can observe the drivers getting into their trains to leave for Boston. Going further, there’s a busway with a few regional coach buses, including Go Bus. The only MBTA bus to serve Riverside is the 558 express to Boston via Waltham. It used to also be served by the 500 and 555 express buses to Boston, but they were eliminated due to bad ridership (Taking a bus on crowded I-90 over the train? Sign me up)!
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| The fare area. |
At the busway, there is also a useless bike rack that’s been completely uprooted out of the ground (yet it had bikes attached to it, anyway – must not be very many thieves out here). There’s also a nice Go Bus building. Going inside, there are vending machines (a very convenient amenity), free coffee (fantastic) bathrooms (an amazing feature) and a lot of posters with pictures of New York on them (not as helpful). There’s also a desk with maps of Manhattan and the MBTA bus system. My father and I got into a long conversation with a nice clerk there.
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| Pretty swanky. |
As you get further away from the station proper, you can see some forlorn bus shelters that used to be served by the 500 and 555. There is also a massive work car on a platform (not connected to the yard, for some reason). There are some amazing views at this end of the station of some old Boeing LRV cars that were retired in 2007. I saw two that are currently being used as work vehicles. I don’t think people visit this end of the station much, because I was getting a lot of odd looks from people sitting in their cars for no reason. There is also a hotel right next to the station that I’ll talk about in a minute. Since I took so many pictures of the yard and the station, I’m also going to have to make a separate post for the bulk of them.
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| Beautiful! I love this picture! |
Station: Riverside
Ridership: This is a very commuter-heavy station. What with the massive parking lot, as well as the convenient location right next to I-95, this station screams “commuters.” In general, I think most people drive to this station even if it’s close by – that parking lot was packed.
Pros: This is probably the best above ground Green Line station there is. It actually feels like it could be a heavy rail station, especially because it has actual fare gates. This is also heaven for anyone who likes transit, vintage train cars, or just trainspotting. This is a massive yard complex, and you won’t be disappointed. I also really like the Go Bus office, as it makes Riverside one of the only MBTA stations with both food and bathrooms.
Cons: This station has an air of neglect to me. From the random rolling chair sitting around to the detached bike rack to the beehive in the assistance box, it seems like an employee hasn’t looked around the station in years. It also gets more and more forgotten the further you get from the station proper. The station proper is very nice, as I said before. Then you get to the busway, which has the excellent but slightly hidden Go Bus office, although no shelters. Then there’s a stretch of sidewalk and a big bin for recycling paper (a popular spot for bees) where it seems no one has gone since the 20th century. Then there are the forgotten bus shelters, the random work vehicle on a platform, and from there on empty asphalt sprinkled with sand…
Nearby and Noteworthy: No offence to anyone who lives out here, but Riverside is in the middle of nowhere. There’s a golf course to the east, housing and a small office park to the north, a massive highway interchange to the west, and the “Hotel Indigo” directly to the south. Now don’t get me wrong, $119 a night is insanely cheap and it looks like a nice hotel, but the website tries way too hard to hide the fact that it’s in the middle of nowhere. “…our Newton MA hotel is minutes from Logan International Airport…” Fantastic.
Final Verdict: 8/10 if you like transit, 5/10 otherwise
Bottom line, if you like transit then you should definitely pay a visit here. The yard is very interesting, especially if you poke around the more neglected parts of the station. That brings me to my next point: the station seems almost forgotten, and although the station proper is nice, the rest is pretty awful. And even the station proper has signs of neglect, such as the rolling chair.or the beehive. However, I do really like how this station has those fare gates; that’s a major plus for the Green Line.
Latest MBTA News: Service Alerts
New Red Line and Orange Line cars are being ordered! They could possibly have LED maps that tell you where the train is, “if the price is right.” I personally hope they’re implemented in the cars. Also, it’s official: the Silver Line is being extended to Chelsea! The extension should hopefully take pressure off the 111 bus.
MBTA BusTracker
As this is my first experience with any MBTA bus app, all I can say is…wow. I’ve never tried one of these for myself, so I was blown away with how easy it was to use; I had figured out what to do in about 30 seconds. Upon getting onto the website (it’s all online, which is nice since I don’t own a smartphone and could try it on a computer), there is a simple search bar asking you to type in a stop name. When you type in a street name (for example, Massachusetts Avenue), you get a long list of stop names back. You can either scroll through them all or just narrow it down by writing more of the stop name. If there are multiple routes at a stop, you can select the ones you want to appear on the map. You also have the option to save stops or specific routes at stops for quick reference (a fantastic feature).
There is also a button called “Find Stops Near Me.” This feature figures out your location and shows you all the closest bus stops. You can then click on individual stops to see when the next bus goes to them. There’s also a button at the top that says “Click Here City Center,” which takes you to Downtown Boston (although there aren’t too many buses going there).
I like all these features, but there are also unfortunately some bad things about the app. First and foremost, if you try to search for a train station (Harvard, for example) with or without bus connections, it says “There is no bus stop with that number.” I mean, if you type in “Harvard,” “Harvard Square Station” is the first thing on the list, yet it doesn’t lead to anything! There is no way to find out when buses get to stations like Harvard, so you have to use stops that are close to the hubs. A smaller annoyance is the fact how when you type in a station name, it sometimes deletes a few letters for no reason and you have to start over. Overall, though, it’s quite a useful app that I would recommend (as long as you’re not getting any buses from train stations)
Why I Haven’t Posted
If you’ve been following this blog for a while (or if you’ve looked at our Facebook page), you’ve probably seen me complain about my computer crashing at some point or another. Well, it crashed again, and this time I can’t get it working. I’ve emailed the folks at Google, but they haven’t responded. And when (or possibly if) I get my computer working again, I’ll lose all my pictures and I’ll have to upload them again (which is a pain, because Chromebooks can’t save pictures directly from SD cards, so I have to load them onto my father’s computer, then email them to myself). I don’t know how long it will be until I start full-length posts again, but I’ll try to finish the one I’m working on (Riverside Station) on my father’s computer if I can. If not, then I apologize for this rant and I’ll hopefully post again at some point.