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Porter is a
Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (abbreviated MBTA and known colloquially as "the T") is the public agency responsible for operating most public transportation services in Greater Boston, Massachusetts. The MBTA transit network in ...
(MBTA) transit station in
Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...
. It serves the Red Line
rapid transit Rapid transit or mass rapid transit (MRT), also known as heavy rail or metro, is a type of high-capacity public transport generally found in urban areas. A rapid transit system that primarily or traditionally runs below the surface may be c ...
line, the
MBTA Commuter Rail The MBTA Commuter Rail system serves as the commuter rail arm of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's transportation coverage of Greater Boston in the United States. Trains run over of track to 141 different stations, with 58 statio ...
Fitchburg Line The Fitchburg Line is a branch of the MBTA Commuter Rail system which runs from Boston's North Station to Wachusett station in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. The line is along the tracks of the former Fitchburg Railroad, which was built across norther ...
, and several
MBTA bus The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) operates List of MBTA bus routes, 170 bus routes in the Greater Boston area. The MBTA has a policy objective to provide transit service within walking distance (defined as ) for all residents ...
lines. Located at
Porter Square Porter Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge and Somerville, Massachusetts, located around the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Somerville Avenue, between Harvard and Davis Squares. The Porter Square station serves both the MBTA Red Li ...
at the intersection of
Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...
and Somerville Avenues, the station provides rapid transit access to northern Cambridge and the western portions of
Somerville Somerville may refer to: *Somerville College, Oxford, a constituent college of the University of Oxford Places *Somerville, Victoria, Australia * Somerville, Western Australia, a suburb of Kalgoorlie, Australia * Somerville, New Zealand, a subur ...
. Porter is 14 minutes from Park Street on the Red Line, and about 10 minutes from
North Station North Station is a commuter rail and intercity rail terminal station in Boston, Massachusetts. It is served by four MBTA Commuter Rail lines – the Fitchburg Line, Haverhill Line, Lowell Line, and Newburyport/Rockport Line – and the Amtrak ...
on commuter rail trains. Several local
MBTA bus The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) operates List of MBTA bus routes, 170 bus routes in the Greater Boston area. The MBTA has a policy objective to provide transit service within walking distance (defined as ) for all residents ...
routes also stop at the station. A series of commuter rail depots have been located at Porter Square under various names since the 1840s. The modern station with both subway and commuter rail levels was designed by
Cambridge Seven Associates Cambridge Seven Associates, Inc. (stylized as CambridgeSeven, and sometimes as C7A) is an American architecture firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Buildings designed by the firm have included academic, museum, exhibit, hospitality, transpo ...
and opened on December 8, 1984. At below ground, the subway section is the deepest station on the MBTA system. The station originally had six artworks installed as part of the
Arts on the Line Arts on the Line was a program devised to bring art into the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) subway stations in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Arts on the Line was the first program of its kind in the United States and became th ...
program; five remain, including ''
Gift of the Wind ''Gift of the Wind'' is a large-scale public kinetic sculpture, by Susumu Shingu, located in Porter Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts at the Porter, Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority subway and commuter rail station. The art work consists ...
'' and ''
Glove Cycle ''Glove Cycle'' is a 1984 public art installation by Mags Harries & Lajos Héder, Mags Harries, located throughout the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Porter (MBTA station), Porter subway and commuter rail station in Porter Square, Cam ...
''.


History


Early history

There has been a railroad station at Porter Square since the
Fitchburg Railroad The Fitchburg Railroad is a former railroad company, which built a railroad line across northern Massachusetts, United States, leading to and through the Hoosac Tunnel. The Fitchburg was leased to the Boston and Maine Railroad in 1900. The main li ...
began operations in the early 1840s. The first station, built in 1843–1845, was called Porter's Station. A new station building was constructed in 1854. Later stations at the site were known as North Cambridge, then later simply as Cambridge. In 1869, the original station was moved to the North Avenue (now Massachusetts Avenue) bridge over the tracks.


B&M era

A new station was built in 1897, slightly to the southeast, behind the
Lovell Block The Lovell Block is an historic residential and commercial building at 1853 Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The three story brick building was built in 1882 by Andrew Jackson Lovell, with two specific commercial tenants in mind. ...
. In 1927, the
Fitchburg Cutoff The Fitchburg Cutoff (also called the Freight Cutoff) was a rail line running from Brighton Street (Hills Crossing station) in Belmont, Massachusetts, to Somerville Junction in Somerville, Massachusetts. It was constructed in two segments in 1 ...
became freight-only between the area and
Somerville Junction Magoun Square station is a light rail station on the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Green Line located at Lowell Street south of Magoun Square in Somerville, Massachusetts. The accessible station has a single island platform ...
. Passenger trains from the
Lexington Branch Lexington may refer to: Places England * Laxton, Nottinghamshire, formerly Lexington Canada * Lexington, a district in Waterloo, Ontario United States * Lexington, Kentucky, the largest city with this name * Lexington, Massachusetts, the oldes ...
and the
Central Massachusetts Railroad The Central Massachusetts Railroad was a railroad in Massachusetts. The eastern terminus of the line was at North Cambridge Junction where it split off from the Middlesex Central Branch of the Boston and Lowell Railroad in North Cambridge and ...
were diverted to the Fitchburg mainline and began to stop at Cambridge station. In 1937–38, the
Boston and Maine Railroad The Boston and Maine Railroad was a U.S. Class I railroad in northern New England. Originally chartered in 1835, it became part of what was the Pan Am Railways network in 1983 (most of which was purchased by CSX in 2022). At the end of 1970, B ...
built a two-story brick depot by the bridge, with the ticket office at street level and the waiting room and platforms below. The new station opened on May 2, 1938; the old station was demolished to make room for a parking lot for the adjacent
Sears, Roebuck and Company Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began a ...
store. As passenger traffic declined, the B&M sold and leased disused station buildings; the Cambridge station was converted to office use by 1968.


MBTA era

By the time the newly formed
Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (abbreviated MBTA and known colloquially as "the T") is the public agency responsible for operating most public transportation services in Greater Boston, Massachusetts. The MBTA transit network in ...
(MBTA) began subsidizing northside commuter rail operations in the late 1960s, both the Lexington Branch and the Central Mass Branch had been reduced to single rush hour round trips on poorly maintained track. The South Sudbury run on the Central Mass was terminated on November 26, 1971. The Bedford round trip on the Lexington Branch ended after a major snowstorm on January 10, 1977, leaving the Fitchburg Line (with multiple daily round trips) as the only rail service at Cambridge station.


Adding the Red Line

In the late 1970s, Cambridge station was renamed to Porter when it became certain that the Red Line Northwest Extension would include a stop there. ("Cambridge", while sufficient for a commuter rail station, would have been confusing for a rapid transit station, because the Red Line has multiple stations—five in total—in the City of Cambridge.) The Red Line platforms were built in a deep-bore tunnel, while the commuter platform was rebuilt with an accessible
mini-high platform Railway platform height is the built height – ''above top of rail (ATR)'' – of passenger platforms at stations. A connected term is ''train floor height'', which refers to the ATR height of the floor of rail vehicles. Worldwide, there are ...
. During construction, commuter trains were accessed via a staircase from Somerville Avenue. On September 30, 1980, construction worker Paul Leone was killed when a retaining wall collapsed. A new glass and concrete headhouse was built around 1982, and the complete new transfer station opened on December 8, 1984 along with . The new station, designed by
Cambridge Seven Associates Cambridge Seven Associates, Inc. (stylized as CambridgeSeven, and sometimes as C7A) is an American architecture firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Buildings designed by the firm have included academic, museum, exhibit, hospitality, transpo ...
, won awards from the
American Institute of Architects The American Institute of Architects (AIA) is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to su ...
and the American Consulting Engineering Council of New England. Porter and Davis were the first MBTA stations made accessible during initial construction, rather than by renovation. A second entrance on the west side of Massachusetts Avenue was added in the late 1980s. Because of its Red Line connection, Porter Square can serve as a temporary inbound terminus for the Fitchburg Line service when commuter rail service is disrupted between Porter and Boston's North Station. It served this role during the
2004 Democratic National Convention The 2004 Democratic National Convention convened from July 26 to 29, 2004 at the FleetCenter (now the TD Garden) in Boston, Massachusetts, and nominated Senator John Kerry from Massachusetts for president and Senator John Edwards from North Car ...
, when North Station was closed for a week for security purposes, and during
Green Line Extension The Green Line Extension (GLX) was a construction project to extend the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Green Line (MBTA), Green Line light rail system northwest into Somerville, Massachusetts, Somerville and Medford, Massachu ...
construction in 2015 and 2019–20. The staircase from Somerville Avenue was removed in 2020 during retaining wall reconstruction; a new staircase may be added later. An extension of the Union Square Branch of the
Green Line Extension The Green Line Extension (GLX) was a construction project to extend the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Green Line (MBTA), Green Line light rail system northwest into Somerville, Massachusetts, Somerville and Medford, Massachu ...
from to Porter has been proposed by local officials.


Station layout

Porter station has a glass-covered headhouse located on the east side of Massachusetts Avenue just south of Somerville Avenue. The station has four below-ground levels.. The Fitchburg Line runs approximately east-west in an
open cut Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth from an open-air pit, sometimes known as a borrow. This form of mining ...
, with a single
island platform An island platform (also center platform, centre platform) is a station layout arrangement where a single platform is positioned between two tracks within a railway station, tram stop or transitway interchange. Island platforms are popular on ...
between the two tracks. Most of the platform is low, with a raised
mini-high platform Railway platform height is the built height – ''above top of rail (ATR)'' – of passenger platforms at stations. A connected term is ''train floor height'', which refers to the ATR height of the floor of rail vehicles. Worldwide, there are ...
at the west end under Massachusetts Avenue. Direct stair entrances to the platform are located on both sides of Massachusetts Avenue. A mezzanine, partially under Somerville Avenue east of White Street, is one level deeper. It contains fare machines, faregates for the Red Line, a convenience store, and – unusually for the MBTA system – public
restrooms A public toilet, restroom, public bathroom or washroom is a room or small building with toilets (or urinals) and sinks for use by the general public. The facilities are available to customers, travelers, employees of a business, school pupils ...
. Stairs, escalators, and elevators connect the mezzanine to the platforms and the surface. South of Porter Square, the Red Line runs north-south under Massachusetts Avenue. North of the square, the avenue turns to the northwest, while the Red Line runs north in a deep-bored tunnel to Davis Square. The Red Line platforms are mostly north of the headhouse, partially under the Porter Square Shopping Center. The subway tracks and platforms are enclosed in a single cylindrical concrete shell. The two platforms are at different levels, with the inbound (southbound) platform above and laterally offset from the outbound platform. The platforms are near the center of the shell, with the outbound track on the east side and the inbound track on the west side. At below ground level, the outbound platform is the deepest in the MBTA system. Porter's unusual depth is due to the MBTA's decision to build the station in
bedrock In geology, bedrock is solid Rock (geology), rock that lies under loose material (regolith) within the crust (geology), crust of Earth or another terrestrial planet. Definition Bedrock is the solid rock that underlies looser surface mater ...
rather than soft
clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...
, saving time and money in the construction process. Passengers reach Red Line platforms via a series of
escalators An escalator is a moving staircase which carries people between floors of a building or structure. It consists of a motor-driven chain of individually linked steps on a track which cycle on a pair of tracks which keep the step tread horizo ...
,
stairs Stairs are a structure designed to bridge a large vertical distance between lower and higher levels by dividing it into smaller vertical distances. This is achieved as a diagonal series of horizontal platforms called steps which enable passage ...
totalling 199 steps, or a set of
elevator An elevator or lift is a wire rope, cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or deck (building), decks of a building, watercraft, ...
s. The longest single span of the escalators is , the longest in the MBTA system. In 2005, a man was killed when his sweatshirt tangled in the bottom of the escalator.


Accessibility

Porter is fully accessible; elevators lead from street level to the mezzanine with its accessible bathrooms, to the commuter rail platform, and to both Red Line platform levels. Although most of the commuter platform is low, there is a "mini-high platform" – a one-car-length high section – that allows level boarding. The station was originally built with three elevators: from Elm Street to the fare lobby, from the lobby to both Red Line platforms, and from the lobby to the commuter rail platform. The MBTA installed additional elevators at Porter and four other busy MBTA subway stations as part of the settlement of '' Joanne Daniels-Finegold, et al. v. MBTA''. The three existing elevators were overhauled, and two redundant elevators were added, in a $12 million project. The elevator to the Red Line platforms was out of service for construction from March 21, 2011 to June 22, 2012; an accessible shuttle bus ran between Porter and . The elevator to the commuter rail platform was also taken out of service from December 9, 2011 to July 2012; a shuttle bus ran between , Porter, and . An elevator from Massachusetts Avenue to the lobby opened later that year, followed by an overhaul of the existing street elevator; the redundant Red Line platform elevator was completed in 2013.


Arts on the Line

As a part of the
Red Line Northwest Extension The Red Line is a rapid transit line operated by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) as part of the MBTA subway system. The line runs south and east underground from Alewife station in North Cambridge, Massachusetts, North Cambr ...
, Porter was included as one of the stations involved in the
Arts on the Line Arts on the Line was a program devised to bring art into the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) subway stations in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Arts on the Line was the first program of its kind in the United States and became th ...
program, devised to bring art into the MBTA's subway stations in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It was the first program of its kind in the United States and became the model for similar drives for art across the country. Six works, five of which remain, were placed at Porter: * ''
Gift of the Wind ''Gift of the Wind'' is a large-scale public kinetic sculpture, by Susumu Shingu, located in Porter Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts at the Porter, Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority subway and commuter rail station. The art work consists ...
'' by Susumu Shingu, a tall kinetic sculpture with three large red "wings" that rotate the structure in response to the wind * ''Ondas'' by Carlos Dorrien, a tall piece of undulating granite affixed to the station wall both inside the station and outside * ''
Glove Cycle ''Glove Cycle'' is a 1984 public art installation by Mags Harries & Lajos Héder, Mags Harries, located throughout the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Porter (MBTA station), Porter subway and commuter rail station in Porter Square, Cam ...
'' by Mags Harries, a large number of bronze gloves of varying types and sizes scattered inside the station, including alongside one of the escalators * ''Untitled'' by William Reimann, six granite bollards with various ethnic designs carved into them * ''Porter Square Megaliths'' by David Phillips, four boulders with large "slices" removed and replaced with bronze casts of the missing pieces * ''The Lights at the End of the Tunnel'' by William Wainwright, a large reflective mobile in the station's mezzanine. It was removed in 1986 after a lead weight fell off.


Bus connections

Porter serves several
MBTA bus The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) operates List of MBTA bus routes, 170 bus routes in the Greater Boston area. The MBTA has a policy objective to provide transit service within walking distance (defined as ) for all residents ...
local routes: *: Arlington Heights– *: Rindge Avenue–
Central Square, Cambridge Central Square is an area in Cambridge, Massachusetts centered on the junction of Massachusetts Avenue (Cambridge), Massachusetts Avenue, Prospect Street and Western Avenue. , formed by the junction of Massachusetts Avenue, Columbia Street, Sidne ...
*: Medford Square–Harvard station The 77 and 96 run on Massachusetts Avenue, while the 83 turns from Somerville Avenue to
Massachusetts Avenue Massachusetts Avenue may refer to: * Massachusetts Avenue (metropolitan Boston), Massachusetts ** Massachusetts Avenue (MBTA Orange Line station), a subway station on the MBTA Orange Line ** Massachusetts Avenue (MBTA Silver Line station), a stati ...
at Porter Square. Additionally, route stops on Elm Street at the Porter Square Shopping Center, one block northeast of Porter station. The
short turn In public transport, a short turn, short working or turn-back is an earlier terminus on a bus or rail line that is used on some scheduled trips that do not operate along the full length of the route. Short turns are practical in scheduling when t ...
of the 77 formerly operated as a
trolleybus A trolleybus (also known as trolley bus, trolley coach, trackless trolley, trackless tramin the 1910s and 1920sJoyce, J.; King, J. S.; and Newman, A. G. (1986). ''British Trolleybus Systems'', pp. 9, 12. London: Ian Allan Publishing. .or troll ...
on a limited number of runs, as trolleybuses on other routes were brought to and from the North Cambridge Carhouse. Trolleybus operations on the 77A ended in 2022 upon the closure of the Cambridge trolleybusses.


References


External links


MBTA – Porter
*Porter station on Google Maps Street View
Main headhousesecondary entrance from Massachusetts AvenueSomerville Avenue entrance
{{Cambridge, Massachusetts Red Line (MBTA) stations Railway stations in the United States opened in 1984 Stations along Boston and Maine Railroad lines MBTA Commuter Rail stations in Middlesex County, Massachusetts Arts on the Line Railway stations in Cambridge, Massachusetts Railway stations located underground in Massachusetts MBTA subway stations located underground