Logan Express

The Logan Express (LEX) is an airport bus shuttle network which operates between Boston's Logan International Airport and Massachusetts suburbs. The service, which is funded by Massport, consists of four routes serving suburban park-and-ride terminals in Braintree, Danvers, Framingham, and Woburn, plus an urban route serving the Boston neighborhood of Back Bay. The service began in 1986 with a route from Quincy Adams station, which later became the Braintree route, and was expanded over the following decades.

Routes

The Logan Express system has five routes: four suburban routes plus a route to the Back Bay section of Boston. Each route stops at all terminals. The routes vary in operating hours; most operate from the early morning to late evening with half-hour headways, except for the Danvers route which has hourly headways. Logan Express fares are priced below market rate to encourage use of the service rather than on-airport parking. , the suburban services are $9 one-way, while the Back Bay route is $3 to Logan and free to Back Bay. The suburban routes use motorcoach-style buses with striping colored by route, while the Back Bay route uses Massport-owned transit buses.

History

Initial services

From November 17 to 23, 1985, the MBTA ran free service from Quincy Adams station and Riverside station to the airport. Full-time service on the Quincy Adams route (with a fare required) began on September 29, 1986. In 1990, the terminal was moved from Quincy Adams to a parking lot in Braintree near the South Shore Plaza and the Braintree Split. {aul Revere took over operation of the service in 1998. Massport purchased the Braintree terminal site for $47.1 million in 2014. The Braintree route was the second-most-used Logan Express route by 2018, with 580,000 annual riders. Frequency was increased to every 20 minutes in May 2019.

A route from Shopper's World in Framingham, operated by Peter Pan Bus Lines, began on November 16, 1986. The initial terminal in the mall's parking lot had limited parking spots and a ten-year lease. In 1990, Massport proposed to move the terminal to a former Trailways bus station off Speen Road in Natick to the east. In 1994, with demolition and replacement of the mall about to begin, Massport proposed a site off Route 30 at Burr Street. Objections from the city, which planned to develop the site as a park, led Massport to consider other locations. The terminal temporarily moved to the south side of the mall on October 1, 1994, due to construction. On July 1, 1995, it moved again to a different site on Burr Street. That became the permanent site; a terminal building opened in February 1997.

A route from Mishawum station in Woburn was added on November 16, 1992. An expanded parking lot and terminal building were added in 1993. Originally operated by Peter Pan, the route was taken over by Paul Revere Transportation in November 1995. The Woburn terminal was moved to the new Anderson Regional Transportation Center on April 8, 2001. A route from Peabody, with a terminal on Route 1 near I-95, was added on September 7, 2001. It was slow to gain ridership due to the post-September 11 drop in air travel and frequency was halfed on November 3, 2001.

Expansions

By 2001, the 350-space lot at Framingham was insufficient; Massport leased additional overflow parking spots in nearby commercial lots to meet demand. In early 2001, Massport received approval to build a four-level, 1,081-space parking garage, but it was not built after the September 11 attacks. The plans were revived in the early 2010s as ridership increased. Service temporarily moved to a lot on the Mathworks campus in Natick on June 23, 2014, to allow construction. The garage opened on April 16, 2015. The Framingham route was the most-used Logan Express route by 2018, with 740,000 annual riders. Service temporarily moved to the Natick Mall on January 6, 2025, for construction of three additional floors in the garage. The expanded garage is expected to be completed in late 2025. It will allow frequency to be increased to every 20 minutes.

On April 28, 2014, the Back Bay route began service as a two-year pilot program during the Government Center station closure. It operated on 20-minute headways, with stops on Boylston Street at Hynes Convention Center and Copley station. By 2019, Massport planned to add a route to North Station and an additional suburban route. On May 1, 2019, the Copley stop was replaced with a stop at Back Bay station on Dartmouth Street. The airport-bound fare was reduced from $7.50 to $3.00 and the Back Bay-bound fare made free; passengers were also given priority at security lines in the airport. By October, these changes had doubled ridership on the Back Bay route. Both back Bay stops were relocated on February 1, 2020 – the Hynes Convention Center stop a block east to the Prudential Center entrance, and the Back Bay station stop across Dartmouth Street to the Copley Place entrance.

COVID-19 changes

Peabody service was suspended on March 18, 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic; Braintree and Back Bay service was reduced to 30-minute headways. Back Bay service was suspended on March 27, with the remaining three routes reduced to hourly service. Woburn service was suspended on January 1, 2021. It resumed on June 1, 2021, along with additional early-morning service from Braintree and Framingham. Woburn, Framingham, and Braintree service all resumed half-hour frequency by mid-2022. Back Bay service was planned to resume in July 2021; due to a shortage of bus drivers, it did not resume until October 3, 2022, with Academy Bus as the new operator. Peabody service resumed on February 13, 2022, with a new terminal at the Northshore Mall in Peabody. The terminal moved from Peabody to Liberty Tree Mall in Danvers on August 6, 2024.

References

External links

Massport – Logan Express

{{Massachusetts Port Authority

Logan International Airport
Bus transportation in Massachusetts
Bus transportation in the Boston area
Transportation in Braintree, Massachusetts
Airport bus services