R. Smith

Beyond that, I would probably mess around more with route optimization and strategizing best start/end/connecting points. This was planned in <2 hours so I’m curious what else I can come up with if I dig a little deeper. I was biased towards start and end points that were personally convenient.

I think this time is definitely beatable. Better luck could have shaved 30 mins off easily, though that can’t be optimized. I could have ran instead of walking if I really felt like it. I think using the bus to connect Orange to Blue would also have helped.

14. Kenmore ➡️ Boston College (37:39)
B line is slow, what else is new? I chose to end here because this was another line I really didn’t want to be stuck double-backing on. A quick connection at Kenmore fueled a ponderously slow ride out to BC for a total time of 8:42:13.

13. Cleveland Circle ➡️ Kenmore (24:22)
This included about an 8 minute wait at Cleveland Circle, so this travel time was actually quite good. I ride this branch every day and it can feel a lot slower. Midafternoon was a good time for this one.

12. Heath St ➡️ Cleveland Circle (30:48)
One of my principles was to backtrack as little as possible, so instead of heading all the way back in to Back Bay, I walked to Brookline Village, took the D to Reservoir, and then walked to CC. Google Maps lied here, and I ended up waiting 10 mins for the D

11. Gov Ctr ➡️ Heath St (37:47)
Not quite as slow as I feared it could be, but considering I could do the entire Orange Line faster, it’s still a bit sad. Getting out of Heath St was a bit of a conundrum so I took a solution I use a lot in my regular travels to JP from my neighborhood.

10. Wonderland ➡️ Government Center (29:28)
Probably the longest (in time, anyway) segment of backtracking I did in this journey. All that was left was the rest of the western Green Line!

9. Oak Grove ➡️ Wonderland (59:36)
This segment was not great. I debated taking the 110 bus at Wellington and in hindsight probably should have. I transferred on foot from Haymarket to Bowdoin to check that station off, but due to delays on the Blue Line, waited about 12 mins for the train.

Actually- the bus was 32:29. The 35:16 time corresponds to:
8. Forest Hills ➡️ Oak Grove
Absolutely astonishing speed. I was so impressed by how much the Orange Line has improved. I also had a really fast connection time from the bus to the train which helped keep this segment to a minimum.

7. Mattapan ➡️ Forest Hills via the 31 bus (35:16)
The bus got a little bogged down in traffic but I’m still very pleased with this connection. It’s super useful in linking the spokes of the network together.

6. JFK ➡️ Mattapan via Ashmont (40:09).
The long connection at JFK was offset by a perfect connection at Ashmont. I love the quaint old cars on the Mattapan line, but for the sake of the everyday ridership, I look forward to seeing them get modern and accessible trains someday.

5. Braintree ➡️ JFK/UMass (21:09)
These times include the wait at the first station, for reference. I reversed back to JFK to set up for the Ashmont branch. Unfortunately I arrived at JFK just in time to see an Ashmont train leaving a few platforms over- leading to a 12 min connection.

4. Alewife ➡️ Braintree (54:59)
Faster than the D branch! I enjoyed this ride, chatting with another passenger who was also riding the trains on his day off and had stayed on the same train as me. I initially considered ending at Braintree, but changed my mind when looking at Transitmatters data.

7 min wait time at E. Somerville didn’t help my cause though.

3. Medford/Tufts ➡️ Alewife (30:32). Via a ~20 min walk to Davis. Train was a bit slow getting into Alewife. But I ended up getting to stay on the same train for segment 4.

2. Union Sq ➡️ Medford/Tufts (28:14)
I decided to walk to East Somerville and pick up the E line from there, rather than doubling back and repeating Lechmere. I had looked at the Google Maps timings and figured it would likely be a wash either way. (Later, I learned Maps was not 100% accurate though)

1: Riverside ➡️ Union Sq (59:39)
The single longest segment of my run was the first. I definitely wanted to start or end the run in Riverside with how long and slow the western D branch is, and for positioning it made more sense for me to start there.

8:42:13 all in. Not bad for a first attempt! Will do some analysis shortly.

Riverside MBTA station

Going to try out speedrunning the MBTA today.

Former Headquarters of Weyerhaeuser Timber in Federal Way, Washington State, USA r/brutalism

No evidence linking Tufts student to antisemitism or terrorism, State Dept. office found An internal memo, prepared before Tufts student Rumeysa Ozturk was detained by ICE, raises doubts about the Trump administration’s claims that she supports Hamas.

This Tufts student was grabbed off the street, cuffed and taken out of state solely because she co-wrote a completely respectful oped in the student paper.

And Rubio’s State Dept now admits they have nothing more damning than that.

Gift link wapo.st/4j8d5Uh

you, a rube: “i want my kid to grow up to be a doctor or an engineer or a teacher”

lutnick, a genius: “to make america great again your child will make iphones that they will not be able to afford”

— “Backbreaking work on turnip farms and factory lines is good for you, actually”

— Destroying universities

— “You don’t need so many things”

— Elites attacking elitism

— Hate/contempt for cities

— “Suck it up for the greater good”

Am I crazy, or is MAGA starting to sound kinda’ Mao-y?

The biggest reason government officials aren't giving any specifics about the criteria by which these arrests and deportations are selected, is that the criteria is "pro-Israel think-tanks and advocacy organizations created lists of troublesome individuals and gave them to us."

Hundreds of international students have just received an email telling them their visas have been revoked.

The ‘justification’ is campus activism or social media posts.

timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/hun...

Wired is dropping paywalls for FOIA-based reporting. Others should follow As the administration does its best to hide public records from the public, Wired magazine is stepping up to help stem the secrecy

They're called public records for a reason. Starting today, WIRED will *stop paywalling* articles that are primarily based on public records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, becoming the first publication to partner with @freedom.press to offer this for our new coverage.

Trump and Musk are basically trying to deskill America:
1) kill all white-collar jobs and replace them with AI
2) kill universities
3) use tariffs to turn the U.S. into an economic island manufacturing, oil and ag hub
4) empty the cities
5) push men into manual labor & women back into the kitchen

this is an utterly horrifying document that seeks to erase trans kids from being able to exist in schools as well as reimpose their christofascist "education" platform

regardless of the success or failure of the guaranteed legal challenges - which I fervently hope succeed - this is pure evil

Declassified CIA Guide to Sabotaging Fascism Is Suddenly Viral The World War II-era "Simple Sabotage Field Manual" is full of steps that office workers can take to resist leadership.

Well, that's an interesting read. 🧐

www.404media.co/declassified...

right now we are at "first they came for transgender people"

leaving the cruelty aside for just a minute it's absolutely humiliating to imagine being my age or older and getting excited because you think you've been given permission to say a bad word. what are you gonna do next, ride your tricycle past the end of the block

NEW: My staff just got ahold of this memo from House Budget Committee Republicans. It's lengthy and hard to digest but it tells us exactly how Republicans plan to sell out the American people for another round of tax cuts to the rich. We're breaking down the highlights as we go: