Infamously, the commitment was made to replace the Washington Street El with “equal or better service”. The Silver Line (rightfully derided as the “Silver Lie”) falls absurdly short of that standard. According to a 1988 T system map, the 49 bus was estimated to take 22 minutes to travel from Dudley (now Nubian) to downtown; the Better Bus Profile for SL5 shows that it also typically takes about 22 minutes (maybe 20 on a good day) to complete the same journey. The larger buses used today may perhaps result in reduced crowding, but there seems to be little improvement in travel times.
How far short does the Silver Line fall of the standard set by the El? Let me present some charts:
| Journey | Distance | Travel Time |
|---|---|---|
| Nubian – Chinatown via Silver Line | 2 miles | 15-19 min |
| Ruggles – Chinatown via Orange Line | 2 miles | 8 min |
| Nubian – Ruggles via buses on Malcolm X | 1 mile | 7 min |
| Dudley – Essex via Orange Line El | 2 miles | <8 min (est.) |
| Andrew – Downtown Crossing via Red | 2 miles | 7 min |
| Cleveland Circle – Hawes St via Green Line C | 2 miles | 14 min |
| Brookline Hills – Kenmore via Green Line D | 2 miles | 10 min |
Riders journeying from Nubian to downtown have the choice between Silver Line and bus + Orange. However, in practice these two routes will take roughly the same amount of time (even though traveling via Ruggles increases your distance by half again). What’s more, when journeying southbound, the experiences will not be equivalent, as journeying south on the Silver Line requires waiting outside at a relatively unprotected bus stop, whereas Orange + bus entails waiting inside a subway station, and then inside a modestly protected busway at Ruggles.
I haven’t been able to locate travel time estimates for the El. However, Dudley – Essex was almost exactly the same distance as Chinatown – Ruggles is today (timetabled at 8 min), but with two intermediate stops instead of three. The Red Line is timetabled at 7 min to travel an equivalent distance from Andrew to Downtown Crossing. So we can be pretty confident that Dudley – Essex took at most 8 min on the El, and may have been even faster.
On a good day, the Silver Line takes twice as long as the El did, and on a bad day it’s nearly three times as long. And riding to Ruggles and transferring there instead doesn’t help you either.
The Silver Line reguarly averages 20 minutes to go from its terminus to downtown. How far out do we have to go on the Orange Line to find a comparable journey time? As a matter of fact, nowhere: Forest Hills, Oak Grove, Alewife, Ashmont, and Wonderland have all historically been timetabled at (comfortably) less than 20 minutes from downtown.
Closing down the El was the equivalent of picking up Nubian Square and relocating it as far south as Forest Hills.
Now, what does this have to do with the idea of extending the Green Line down Washington St — the “F Line to Nubian”?
Extending the Green Line to Nubian Square will address a number of shortcomings of the Silver Lie. LRT vehicles will offer greater capacity. LRT vehicles will be better for the environment even than CNG buses. A protected ROW will improve reliability and reduce delays due to traffic and double parking in bus lanes. And through-running into the subway will increase the number of one-seat journeys, and provide a better transfer experience than today’s surface transfers.
But extending the Green Line to Nubian Square will not necessarily solve the travel time shortcoming. Another chart:
| Journey | Distance | Travel Time | Speed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silver Line, Nubian to Chinatown | 2 mi | 15-19 min | 6.3-8 mph |
| Green Line E, Northeastern to Brigham Circle | 0.78 mi | 8 min | 5.85 mph |
| Green Line C, Cleveland Circle to Hawes St | 2 mi | 14 min | 8.5 mph |
| Green Line subway, Kenmore to Arlington | 1.3 mi | 8 min | 9.75 mph |
| Green Line D, Brookline Hills to Kenmore | 2 mi | 10 min | 12 mph |
| Orange Line, Ruggles to Chinatown | 2 mi | 8 min | 15 mph |
Only under the most ideal circumstances does the Green Line start to approach the speed of the Orange Line (past or present) — in the subway and in a grade-separated sealed ROW with distant stop spacing.
This is where a bit of history is illustrative. The El had only two stops in the South End north of Dudley — at Northampton St and at Dover St (East Berkeley St). Local service was provided by bus, and then before that by a streetcar which (until the late ’30s) journeyed underneath the El at street-level before running into the Tremont St Subway.
The 49 bus and the Silver Line both resemble that old streetcar more than they ever could resemble the El.
So — to my mind — this raises an obvious question: can a Green Line branch down Washington approach that standard set by the El? And how do you do so without reducing the quality of service for passengers using the Silver Line like a local streetcar?
My point: the corridor from Nubian to downtown has historically had two purposes, reflected in the separate modes that once served it: El and streetcar. We should make sure that the future of rapid transit along Washington Street is able to serve both purposes.