Route 22 is a local bus route in Boston, Massachusetts, operated by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) as part of MBTA bus service. It operates between Ruggles station and Ashmont station via Columbus Avenue, Seaver Street, Blue Hill Avenue, and Talbot Avenue. It is among the highest-ridership routes in the system, with service every 15 minutes or less during all operating hours.
Route 22 originated from a streetcar line built by the Boston Elevated Railway (BERy) in the early 20th century. The BERy opened a branch from an existing line on Blue Hill Avenue to Codman Square in 1900. It was extended east to Peabody Square in 1905. Several different service patterns were operated during the line's first two decades; after 1919, service operated between Dudley station and Peabody Square via Warren Street and Grove Hall. The service was extended slightly to Ashmont station upon its 1928 opening.
The number 22 was assigned to the service in the early 1940s. The Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA), successor to the BERy, converted route22 to trolleybuses in 1949 as part of a larger conversion of the Roxbury/Dorchester network. It was converted to diesel buses in 1962. In 1987, the MBTA rerouted the service to Ruggles station via Seaver Street as part of changes associated with the opening of the Southwest Corridor. Center-running bus lanes opened on a segment of Columbus Avenue in 2021; a second segment is planned. As part of systemwide network changes, the northern end of route22 is planned to be rerouted to the Longwood Medical Area in the late 2020s.
Route
Route22 runs between Ruggles station and Ashmont station through the Roxbury and Dorchester neighborhoods of Boston. From the busway at Ashmont station, it runs north on Dorchester Avenue to Peabody Square, then north and west on Talbot Avenue through Codman Square to Blue Hill Avenue. It then runs north on Blue Hill Avenue and northwest on Seaver Street – both part of Massachusetts Route 28 – around Franklin Park. At Walnut Avenue, Seaver Street becomes Columbus Avenue, with center-running bus lanes. The route follows Columbus Avenue northwest and north to the Jackson Square station busway, then continues north in mixed traffic on Columbus Avenue, Tremont Street, and Ruggles Street to the Ruggles station busway. Total distance is inbound and outbound.
Scheduled one-way running times range from about 35minutes off-peak to45 minutes at peak, with shorter times during early mornings and late nights. Service operates from about 5:00am to 1:00am Sunday through Thursday and from about 5:00am to 2:00am Fridays and Saturdays. Headways are 15minutes or less at all operating hours (except after1:00 am on Friday and Saturday nights). MBTA subway connections are available to the Orange Line at Ruggles, , and Jackson Square; and to the Red Line at Ashmont. Connection is also available to the Fairmount Line at Talbot Avenue station.
Route22 runs as a local route with standard local bus fare. In 2018, the route averaged 8,020 boardings on weekdays, making it the 11th-highest-ridership route in the MBTA bus system. Average weekend ridership was 5,140 on Saturdays and 3,890 on Sundays. The route is operated with standard transit buses based at Albany Garage and Cabot Garage in Boston. Most of the routing is shared with other MBTA bus routes, including routes , , , , and on Tremont Street; routes and 44 on Columbus Avenue and Seaver Street; routes 28 and 29 on Blue Hill Avenue; and routes 23 and on Talbot Avenue east of Codman Square.
History Early history By the late 1890s, Dorchester was served by several radial streetcar lines operated by the Boston Elevated Railway (BERy). They operated primarily north-south on Warren Street, Blue Hill Avenue, Geneva Avenue, Bowdoin Street, and Dorchester Avenue. On July 3, 1899, the city granted permission to the BERy to construct tracks on Talbot Avenue between Blue Hill Avenue and Washington Street (at Codman Square). The tracks were largely complete by the end of the year, but rails for the connections at each end were backordered. Service began on April 7, 1900. Streetcars operated from Ashmont Street Carhouse to Park Street station via Washington Street, Talbot Avenue, Blue Hill Avenue, Warren Street, Dudley Street, Shawmut Street, and the Tremont Street subway.
The Main Line Elevated opened on June 10, 1901, with Dudley Street Terminal as the southern terminus of the Washington Street Elevated. Some streetcar routes terminated at Dudley, where passengers could transfer to the faster elevated trains, while others continued to operate into the downtown subway. On November 18, 1905, the line was extended along Talbot Avenue to Peabody Square. The extension did not connect to existing tracks on Dorchester Avenue at Peabody Square. On August 11, 1906, the Dudley Street Terminal–Peabody Square route was changed to run via Dudley Street and Blue Hill Avenue – rather than Warren Street – between Dudley Square and Grove Hall.
Streetcar changes
In 1907, service on Talbot Avenue consisted of the Dudley–Peabody Square route, plus a route between Ashmont Street Carhouse and Dudley via Washington Street, Talbot Avenue, Blue Hill Avenue, Seaver Street, and Humboldt Avenue. Most service on the latter route terminated on Blue Hill Avenue at Franklin Field at the west end of Talbot Avenue. The Washington Street Elevated was extended south to on November 22, 1909. An intermediate station, , was located at Columbus Avenue. On April 2, 1910, an existing North Station–Franklin Park route via Columbus Avenue was extended to Peabody Square via Talbot Avenue. Within several years, it operated only at peak hours, but it was changed to all-day service in mid-1913. On August 14, 1915, the route was cut back from North Station to Park Street; it was rerouted through the Back Bay via Massachusetts Avenue and Huntington Avenue. Additional rush hour service was added on the Egleston–Peabody Square segment.
A surface transfer station at Egleston station opened on January 20, 1917. The Humboldt Avenue line was cut back to Seaver Street at that time. In 1917, the Park Street–Peabody Square route operated every 10 minutes; no direct Dudley–Peabody Square service was run. On December 15, 1917, the Cambridge–Dorchester Line was extended south to Broadway station in South Boston, promoting a reconfiguration of Dorchester streetcar routes. All Talbot Avenue service ran between Egleston station and Peabody Square. The Cambridge–Dorchester Line was extended again to Andrew station on June 29, 1918. The Egleston–Peabody Square route was extended to Dudley via Washington Street, replacing the northern portion of the Lotus Place–Dudley route.
On September 13, 1919, the Peabody Square service was redirected to run to Dudley more directly via Grove Hall and Warren Street. The discontinued section continued to be served by the Egleston–Mattapan service and an extension of Humboldt Avenue service. By late 1920, the Peabody Square–Dudley service operated every 7–8 minutes at peak hours and every 10 minutes at other times, requiring a maximum of eight streetcars. Around 1923, the Talbot Avenue tracks were connected to the Dorchester Avenue tracks at Peabody Square. Although the Talbot Avenue line was double tracked, the connector was only single track so as to skirt the edge of the structurally questionable bridge over the Shawmut Branch. The purpose of the connector was to allow access to the Milton carhouse, as the former route via Codman Street was abandoned in 1921. Contrary to previous plans, regular Talbot Avenue service was not extended to Milton.
Further extension of the Cambridge–Dorchester Line over the Shawmut Branch took place in the late 1920s. The work included reconstruction of the Peabody Square bridge, allowing a two-track connection from Talbot Avenue to Dorchester Avenue. The rapid transit line opened to Ashmont station on the south side of Peabody Square on September 1, 1928. The Talbot Avenue service was extended slightly to terminate at the new station. On September 22, 1928, the BERy began bus service between Ashmont station and Gallivan Boulevard, which used Talbot Avenue between Codman Square and Peabody Square. It was joined on that segment by the Fields Corner belt line bus on February 16, 1929. After conversion of the Norfolk Street line to buses in August 1929, both Washington Street streetcar service and Norfolk Street bus service also used Talbot Avenue east of Codman Square.
1940s and trolleybus conversion
In 1940–41, the BERy reassigned the public route numbers used for its services; those numbers have remained relatively consistent since. The Dudley–Ashmont route via Talbot Avenue was numbered 22. The southern terminal of route 22 was at Ashmont station, where inbound streetcars had a cross-platform transfer with rapid transit trains. They turned north onto Dorchester Avenue, then ran north and west on Talbot Avenue to Blue Hill Avenue. Streetcars ran in a dedicated reservation on Blue Hill Avenue as far north as Washington Street in Grove Hall. A block north, they turned northwest to follow Warren Street to Dudley Street Terminal, where they used the eastern elevated loop track. Outbound streetcars returning to Ashmont station had a cross-platform transfer at the northbound platform, then looped around the north end of the station to reach the southbound platform. Round-trip running time was scheduled for 47 minutes. The Blue Hill Avenue reservation was removed between American Legion Highway and Charlotte Street in November 1940, and between Charlotte Street and Columbia Road in November 1941. Thereafter, streetcars on that segment operated in mixed traffic as they did on the rest of the line.
In the 1940s, route22 used Type 5 streetcars based at Park Street Carhouse adjacent to Fields Corner station. In April 1945, the line ran every 5 minutes during the morning peak, every 10 minutes during midday, every 5.5 minutes during the afternoon peak, and every 12 minutes during the evening, for a total of 139 daily round trips. Rush hour service required 12 streetcars in the morning and 13 in the afternoon. The northern portion of Warren Street, served by route19 (Fields Corner–Dudley via Geneva Avenue), route 22, route23 (Ashmont–Dudley via Washington Street), and route44 (Seaver Street Loop–Dudley), was tied for the most service in the system. It had 605 daily round trips, with headways of 0.9 minutes at morning peak and 1.0 minute in the afternoon peak. The route did not have all-night "Owl" service, though all portions except the Blue Hill Avenue–Codman Square segment of Talbot Avenue were part of Owl service on other routes.
The Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) replaced the BERy in 1947. The next year, the MTA began work to convert the remaining streetcar lines in Roxbury and Dorchester to trolleybuses – an expansion of the area's trolleybus network. Construction of double overhead lines began in early 1948. Various facilities were modified for use by trolleybuses, including Park Street Carhouse and Ashmont station. The most significant changes took place at Dudley Street Terminal, where the east loop was completely rebuilt. Beginning on July 16, 1948, streetcar routes including route22 were temporarily diverted to the west loop to allow construction to take place. Routes 19, 22, and 23 were all converted to trolleybuses on January 8, 1949. The tracks were removed that year, except for the portion on Blue Hill Avenue south of Seaver Street, which remained in use by route29 until 1955.
Bus conversion and the MBTA