The blog that started it all! Check out reviews of every bus route and train station in Boston, as well as ongoing reviews of the regional bus systems in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.
Recent Posts from Miles on the MBTA
LRTA: 19 (SEASONAL: Pheasant Lane Mall via Middlesex Street)
A holiday season-only bus route in February? Well, it's better than a summer-only route in January! Not only does the elusive 19 only run from Black Friday to the beginning of the new year, but it also travels to New Hampshire! I'm very excited to say their state...
LRTA: 12 (Tewksbury via Route 38/Wilmington Train Station)
Hey, the LRTA is a thing! Yeah, I've made the least progress with LRTA, so it's time to change that. Here's the suburban 12 route from Wilmington to Lowell! Good to be on this system again! We headed out from the Wilmington Commuter Rail station onto Main Street,...
GATRA: Medway T Shuttle
Oh man, I always get so excited when I do a GATRA review! How many deviations will we make? How few people will use the route? Well, the Medway T Shuttle makes no deviations...and gets lots of people. Huh. The minibus: a bright haven in the middle of the...
Plimptonville
This is the mother of Commuter Rail microstations: one train in the morning and one train in the evening. Plimptonville is a tiny stop in the middle of nowhere within Walpole, and it gets the lowest ridership on the entire system. Could this be the worst station on...
Windsor Gardens
The Franklin Line deviates to serve a housing development? WHAT IS THIS WORLD COMING TO??? Okay, okay, it's not a deviation, it's right there on the line. And Windsor Gardens Station actually gets great ridership considering what it's serving. So no, this won't...
Harvard Shuttle: 1636’er (Quad – Peabody Terrace – Mather House via Memorial Hall)
It's the Saturday before Halloween. We're riding a bus route around a college campus in the late evening. Oh boy, this should be fun... Thanks for being slow! Hot of the heels of our Evening Van trip, Jaret, Nathan, and I needed to get back to civilization from our...
Harvard Shuttle: Evening Van Service
Nathan was working at Harvard for a while, and one of the perks of that position was access to their Evening Van Service, an Uber-like minibus that runs around the Harvard area from 7 PM to 3 AM. We were looking at its service area on the app to try to find the...
WRTA: 33 (Union Station Hub – Spencer – Brookfield via Main Street and Route 9)
Welcome to one of the longest and most rural routes in my jurisdiction. The 33 is a sprawling bus heading straight west from Worcester, terminating at various points, but Nathan and I took it at its very longest: for two trips in each peak period, the route is...
WRTA: 40 (Union Station Hub – Downtown Loop)
Remember the 80? That free little downtown loop that didn't exist anywhere? Well, the WRTA has scrapped that and replaced it with a larger and not-free loop, the 40. They really pushed this one, going as far as to give it...an actual schedule online. Well, it has to...
WRTA: 7 (Union Station Hub – Washington Heights Apartments)
Did you know that the intersection of Mill Street and Park Ave is the most dangerous intersection in the entire whole wide universe? Yes, who knew it would be in lil' ol' Worcester? Well, anyway, after taking 10 minutes to cross this abomination of suburban city...
WRTA: 27 (Union Station Hub – Auburn Mall via Main Street)
Man, I really have not covered a lot of the WRTA, have I? This is a system I've done very little of, and most of the ones I have done are their weird minibus shuttles. Well, the 27 is a decidedly normal WRTA route, and in fact, it is one of the busiest on...
MVRTA: 16 (Washington Street/Westgate Plaza)
This will be our last time taking a local bus out of Washington Square, and I am totally okay with that. These Haverhill routes have all been pretty...well, mediocre and boring. The 16 continues that trend. Our final picture here! We went down Washington Street,...
MVRTA: 18 (Riverside)
Oh boy, another twisty one! Alright, 18, do your worst. Washington Square once again. We went down Merrimack Street in the opposite direction of downtown Haverhill, so there were far fewer businesses along the road. It eventually became Water Street as we went by an...
GUEST POST: Windsor Gardens
Windsor Gardens is a station that I've visited but the review for it has yet to be published. In the meantime, let's see what Ryan Norton thinks of it! For my first guest post, I decided to take a look at Windsor Gardens! Located on the Franklin Line, Windsor Gardens...
MVRTA: 13 (Main Street/North Avenue)
Alright, time to take a trip up to our neighbor state to the north, New Hampshire! I've actually ridden this route before as part of an old Service Change post, but now it's time to review it. We're going to find out what the 13 is really like! The bus at...