If you’re living here, you can quickly develop a love/hate relationship with the Boston public transportation system. Here are some quick tips to make the best of it:
- If you have a smartphone, there are many apps available that can tell you when buses or subway trains will next arrive, show you bus routes, and warn you about delays or service changes.
- Google Maps can give you directions that only include public transport options. These include departure / arrival times, and show multiple routes so you can choose what’s easiest for you.
- “Link Passes”, available in weekly (7 days from time of purchase, for $18) or monthly (the calendar month you’re in at time of purchase, for $70) form, provide unlimited bus and subway rides for their duration — you can get these at any ticket kiosk, and they can save you a ton on bus and subway fare. There are other passes available that include unlimited commuter rail rides.
- The MBTA is on twitter! Their main account and the Transit Police are two official accounts that regularly tweet and respond to commuters. And monitoring the #MBTA hashtag provides useful info, funny observations, and company for your occasional misery.
Take a look at some more detailed maps of the MBTA. We’ve all seen the subway map plastered in every T-station, but how about a geographically-accurate version of it (shown above)? Or a time-scale map of it? Or get a sense of just how many far-ranging, interconnected bus routes there are with the MBTA’s full-system map. And just for kicks, take a look at Super MBTA World.
- And on escalators, remember: stand on the right, walk on the left! =)