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World-class signage at Logan Airport
By adamg on Thu, 04/22/2021 - 7:57pm
Welcome to Boston! Michael Malyszko got a warm feeling at Terminal C today.
Update: A Massport spokesperson says:
We have a lot of construction at Terminal C right now, but obviously we’d like to avoid confusing our passengers. Those temporary "sandwich board" signs can get moved around by accident, which I think is the case of the photo, so we have staff walking the areas daily and replacing or adjusting the signs as necessary.
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Comments
Welcome to Boston
Welcome to Boston.. here's your bus
This is what I tell people when they are appalled we have no automated airport people mover
The people movers seem to be
The people movers seem to be a result of an outdated funding structure from the FAA.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/z3v5j3/us-airports-no-longer-have-to-bui...
My knowledge begins and ends with this article.
That is an interesting
That is an interesting article. Made me re-think people movers in airports and how they could just be a subway stop apart of a bigger line.
(there's a link to a tweet, which uses JFK in NYC as an example of how this funding structure created "airtrain" and it bypassed neighborhoods it could have served)
The article and tweet are
The article and tweet are both interesting.
I haven't flown JFK in decades (and probably wouldn't recognize it now), so I've never used their people-mover or airtrain or whatever it's called. (To carbon-date me, I'm old enough to remember the "Train to the Plane" ad jingle, and to have used the post-jingle A-train stop in, ummm... Howard Beach (?) that connected to long-long-term parking and a JFK shuttle bus route). I do remember some of the back-and-forth about the route and eventual stops on the AirTrain.
Parallels with the monorail extension in Newark, too. It was on-airport only, at first, and is useful. The extension to Northeast Corridor is also somewhat useful. At the same time, there was a lot of commentary and discussion about whether it would have been "better" to have it compatible with existing rapid transit so it could be an extension of the PATH train from Newark Penn Station. There have also been (at times) some wish-list discussions of a more-direct connection, either by monorail extension or light rail, south from that airport to Elizabeth.
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A lot of those conversations and commentary can be summed up as
(a) "Hey, such-and-such would take fare revenue from this agency and put it to that agency!!!", and/or
(b) "OMG! Neighborhoods! Residents with pigments and languages and ethnic movements mixing with business travelers and tourists!! Aaarrrgghh!!!"
They never used to have any signs
Signs and maps were like some sort of witchcraft/heresy in Boston. Asking for one would massively upset people before about 2005 or so when maps became acceptable somehow and signs started turning up.
Not to mention the bizarre bus numbering system that was absolutely user unfriendly when it wasn't teamed up with maps or even a list of terminals visited by said abstractly labeled bus.
Bus numbers
The bus numbers at Logan do not make any sense at all. Are they apart of a bigger system we're not aware of?
Ex-MBTA Route 98...
The modern Logan Airport shuttles are descended from MBTA Route 98. MASSPORT took over operation in 1976 and continued to operate it as a single loop route. {Note: this era still had the original terminals for TWA, Eastern Airlines, etc.} By the 1990's, the service was broken up. The "double numbers" {11, 22, 33, etc.} were to minimize confusion.
MBTA Route 98 was inherited from the MTA and ultimately can be traced to early routes connecting "Boston Airport" with Maverick Square via Porter Street.
Two historic routes of note connected the airport to North Station and South Station/Back Bay/Copley. These were cut by about 1950.
Final note on route numbers: The 98 was so designated on maps; the official, internal route number was in the 43xx-series, as it was a Surface Lines Division Four route based outta Eagle Street Garage within Eastie.
UPDATE:
I went and checked my December 31, 1958 MTA route list. There were two airport bus lines in service at that time
Route #4310 Airport to Maverick
Route #4340 Airport to Airport Station
of course
of course you would know :-)
We need to get drinks sometime bud :p
20-25 years ago the system
20-25 years ago the system seemed pretty easy to understand/remember, but I suppose I used the airport more back then.
It was something like 11, 22, 33, 44, 55 and maybe 66?
One route was two terminals (A & B), and Blue Line. Maybe 11 or 22?
One route was three terminals (C, D, & E) and Blue Line. 22 or 33?
One route was a five-terminal loop. 33 or 55?
One was... ummm... remote parking?
One covered ferry/water taxi and a couple of other on-airport stops?
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It seemed to create a cohesive and distinctive identity.
They could have gone with letter routes, but that would confuse with terminal letters and what the routes actually connected to.
They could have gone with single-digit route numbers - routes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 - but the double numbers were a little distinctive. It suggested (especially to out-of-towners) that there was a something systematic to it, rather than "Hey, these idiots have routes 1-5 and they're duplicating a block of numbers from their regional transit system! Why don't they just number the airport routes 601, 602, etc...?" (The scattered duplication of 11, or 66 was less noticeable than duplicating a block of numbers)
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There wasn't a central rental car facility, so the rental car companies operated their own shuttle bus loops. I can't remember for sure, but I don't think the MassPort buses did any rental car stops back then.
This was before A was torn down and rebuilt, before the new Blue Line station was built, before the Silver Line. I don't remember what central parking was like then. I'm not sure if they had that remote/employee parking in Chelsea back then, either.
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All the routes were fairly short loops with a limited number of stops. An actual map wasn't needed - just a strip map showing the stops and transfer points.
Correct
- Route 22, 33, 55, 66 and 88 serve the Airport Blue Line station. Route 22 serves Terminals A & B, Route 33 serves Terminals C & D (both routes between 10am and 6pm), Route 66 serves all terminals, the Logan Airport offices, and the Water Shuttle, and Route 88 serves all terminals plus the Economy lot. Route 55 replaces routes 11, 22, 33, and 66 from 6pm to 10am.
- Route 22, 33 and 55 serves the Rental Car Center (the former rental car agency courtesy shuttles were eliminated in the mid to late 2000s). Route 66 does not serve the Rental Car Center, but it does serve the Logan Airport offices.
- Route 11 serves all terminals and the Rental Car Center, but does not serve the Airport Blue Line station. (Route 11 operates from 10am to 6pm; Route 55 replaces this route from 6pm to 10am)
- Route 44 is an employee shuttle, but is open to the public. Route 44 operates between the Airport Blue Line station to Logan Airport offices during the weekends. It does not serve any terminals.
- Route 77 was a former employee shuttle (also open to the public) to the Chelsea parking lot, but was eliminated when they moved the employee lot inside the airport.
Y'all act like you're not familiar with the concept
of Schrödinger's Transport. If a tree falls in the forest, and there's no one there to tell it, "You cahn't get theah from heah", does it make a sound?
No, that's the access point
No, that's the access point to the platform for the connection to the US counterpart of Hogwarts . Just walk between the signs and straight into that column beyond them. (If you have magical blood,) you emerge on a hidden platform where you board a magical, Jules Verne, Doc Brown, steampunkesque PCC streetcar that rides old magically-concealed interurban routes to the school (I'd suggest the Higgins Armory building in Worcester as a possibly magic location).
Welcome to Boston - Now Leave
Welcome to Boston - Now Leave.
I would but it seems I'm lost
I would but it seems I'm lost and can't get there from here. Is there a sign to point the way?
Signs of the Times
About road signs: If you belong you don't need a sign since you know where you're at; if you don't belong you don't need a sign because you have no reason for being there. One of the many nuances I've learned about New England culture that are lovable and annoying.
At the doctor's office the other day there was a sign at the front entrance indicating to use the side entrance of the building. At the side entrance there was a sign indicating the side entrance was closed and one should use the front entrance. I was bemused.
At the Shaw's in Braintree,
At the Shaw's in Braintree, the exit from the registers said to use the main entrance to get into the store. At the main entrance, the sign says the main entrance is locked at 8pm (they're open for a couple more hours) and to use the exit doors to enter the store. But that doesn't change the fact that when you get to the exit door, it still tells you to use the main entrance to get into the store.
They do that at Morrissey
They do that at Morrissey Star Market, too.
Mainly, I wonder if they're violating fire code by locking a door while the store is occupied.
That has to be a urban myth
That has to be a urban myth that Boston is a world class city.
Except that if you randomly
Except that if you randomly point at the Boston map, nobody in the actual world will recognize this place as urban.