BOSTON — The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority is expanding service on subways and some bus lines on five Fridays and Saturdays this fall, and will also offer free rides after 9 p.m. on those dates on all forms of transit: rail rapid transit, commuter rail, buses, ferries, and RIDE paratransit.
The additional service and free rides will be available Sept. 5-6, 12-13, 19-20, 26-27, and Oct. 3-4. Subway service on the Red, Orange, Blue, and Green lines — which usually ends about 1 a.m. to 1:50 a.m., depending on the line — will be extended by about an hour. During that additional hour, service will operate every 30 minutes on Green Line branches and the Red Line’s Ashmont and Braintree lines, and about every 15 minutes elsewhere. Eight bus lines (routes 1, 22, 39, 66, 110, SL1, SL3, and SL5) will also receive an additional hour of service.
“Extended service is something that we have been working towards,” MBTA CEO Phillip Eng said in a press release, “and I’m proud that the investments being made in the MBTA allows us to now provide later service on subway, bus, and ferries, giving the public the opportunity to choose transit.”
The personnel cost of the extended service is estimated at approximately $2 million.
Said Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, “We know that people travel at all times of the day and night, whether they just wrapped a night shift or were enjoying our incredible restaurants, nightlife, sports, or concerts, so having this extended nighttime service will make a real difference. It’s also great that the T is offering free service on the weekends to encourage students coming back to school and workers returning from vacation to take the T.”
This is exciting news indeed!
Dr. Güntürk Üstün