An ode to the MBTA; or, Three 66 buses and a 64 crawl into a bar-filled intersection in Allston, Mass, on their way to campus ("walk with me" series, vol. 2)

This is what happens when a writer goes to urban planning school... I don't think this piece makes sense outside of a Greater Bostonian commuter context, but he is I and I am him.

Two number 1 buses, following each other, parleyed and politicked in Central Square (next to the Target, and right by the towering housing-for-professionals development that looms just down the street from formerly-segregated public housing projects on Main Street);

The 1s, among the last remaining workhorses in Boston, break a grin at the denizens of the Mandela Homes near their last stop in the heart of Roxbury: Nubian Square, offering shelter and community to 15 routes and over 100 individual buses every hour.

A 22 whizzes down Columbus Avenue in their dedicated middle lane, beaming with pride past cars in deadlock and waving to the two-wheeled motorists popping wheelies in Franklin Park; the 29 and 44 follow minutes later, chuffed to finally get priority.

Mr. Brand-Spanking-New Orange Heavy Railcar brings his friends from Jamaica Plain to downtown and beyond via Roxbury and the South End, chugging along underneath the Southwest Corridor Park and happily beeping and buzzing with new digital screens that belie the train’s irregular activity.

A Green Line trolley groans and moans over her hundred-year-long Sisyphean path to and from Chestnut Hill; once emerging triumphantly aboveground in Kenmore, now she rolls with an out-of-breath wheeze over the hump.

A crosstown 2 shuttles us from Allston to Sullivan Square, happy to stop infrequently on her merry, weary path across the BU Bridge.

The 80 completes its last rides through Somerville, down Medford Street and past the hulking public high school grounds before being phased out of service to retire; he ambles along on an hourly schedule, with plenty of time to rest and catch up with compatriots in East Cambridge.

A northwest-bound Red Line train inches through the Kendall Square tunnel into darkness at the other end, stinking of humidity-accrued sweat commingling with dry air-conditioned breezes.

Another two 66 buses and their 64 pal from earlier congregate outside of the Walgreens on the corner of Cambridge Street at the end of a long day, all headed the same way for a bit; the 66ers bid the 64 goodbye as they careen around the berm and are joined by an errant 57 en-route to catch a Sox game, swinging past Brighton Ave and Allston Street as I finally step off and traipse home.