Transportation
BB&N Transportation Program
The BB&N Transportation team manages the school’s suburban bus routes, connections with Harvard Square for those who ride public transportation, connections with student parking at the DCR’s Lot 4 in Brighton and connections between the campuses. The Transportation team and the Upper School Dean’s office manage T-Passes distributed to students and employees. The Transportation team also manages transfers of students, parents, other community members and employees during the school day for programming such as field trips and connections with remote athletic facilities and for school based events where on-campus parking is not adequate to meet demand.
The overall goal of the Transportation team is to provide thoughtful routes to students, employees and other community members while furthering the goals of addressing Cambridge and state-wide initiatives to reduce the overall impact on the environment.
Questions can be directed to transportation@bbns.org.
Suburban Bus System
Each summer, BB&N sets its suburban bus routes, which include stops in Boston and Cambridge. This year over 250 students are using the suburban bus system on a regular basis.
Transportation is available to Belmont, Brookline, Cambridge, Concord, Everett, Lexington, Lynn, Medford, Milton, Needham, Newton, Revere, Wellesley, Weston, Winchester and several communities in Boston. Please click here for a detailed schedule of our timetable.
Please note that the bus routes, stops and scheduled times may change from year-to-year based on ridership enrollment. However, the general areas serviced and the timetables tend to be similar year to year. It is possible that a stop or route could be canceled or changed if there is inadequate interest.
Suburban buses serve the Lower and Middle Schools each day. On days where there is a special schedule, students riding the buses participate in programming such as supervised study hall and/or after school care to cover the gap from the time that the school day ends and the buses depart.
Suburban buses depart from the US in the afternoon prior to the end of athletics. For the first time in Fall 2022, the school is offering a late bus that will depart the Upper School at 6:15pm and will run to the Riverside T Station in Newton and Beacon at Charles Street downtown.
Shuttle Service and Connections Between the Campuses
Daily shuttle service is available from Harvard Square to the Upper School and the Middle School. This service is intended to support students, faculty and staff who are interested in taking public transportation via the Red Line to school.
Shuttle service is also available to and from the DCR’s parking Lot 4 in Brighton. This service is available in the morning before school and in the afternoon starting at lunch time until the end of the school day.
Click here to see the timetable for shuttle service to Harvard Square and Lot 4.
There are also shuttles that run between the Upper School/NAC and Middle School in the morning and afternoon. These shuttles bring students dropped off at the Upper School to the Middle School in the morning and bring students back to the Upper School/NAC for athletics, parent pick up and to catch suburban buses. The schedule is linked here at Lower & Middle School/Upper School bus connections.
Daily Bus Passes
Families are able to sign up for daily bus passes for any suburban route where there are available seats. Families must sign up for a daily pass two full days in advance and registration will start the Monday after the first week of school.
Transportation Timetables
The timetables and routes for suburban routes can be found by clicking here.
The timetables for shuttle services and the late bus are here.
How do I sign up?
Sign up for suburban routes and Late Buses are here and non-late day passes are here. Suburban bus registration takes one full week before a student may start riding the bus to ensure all required paperwork is in place for the newly enrolled bus students. Day passes must be reserved two school days in advance of the requested pass.
Late buses are available on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Because we will only run late buses when needed, we are asking you/your student to sign up by noon the day of the trip using this Late Bus Sign Up Form.
There is no need to sign up for shuttle service though once student IDs are issued, all students will be required to present their IDs to board the bus.
Questions can be directed to transportation@bbns.org
MBTA Passes
Students may receive a T-pass through the Office of the Dean of Students at the Upper School (Kerri Anne Shea, kshea@bbns.org) or from the Front Desk (Anne Coughlin, acoughlin@bbns.org) at the Middle School. Two types of MBTA Passes are offered at a reduced rate for students. The first is the "Charlie Card 7 Day Student Pass" (also known as a M7). This pass costs $30 per month and will be charged to your student's FACTS account. The M7 pass is good for unlimited travel on any bus, subway, express bus, and commuter rail (zones 1A, 1 and 2) every day of the week. We recommend this pass to any student who will be taking public transportation to and from school every day.
The second pass is the "Student Stored Value Card" (also known as the S-Card). These cards are free and allow students to load a certain amount of money onto the card. The S-Cards are good for travel on any buses, subways, or express buses but are not valid on the commuter rail. When students use this card they receive half off of a regular fare. When a card is lost or stolen, money on the card will be lost and students can get a new card in the Office of the Dean of Students. We recommend this pass for any student taking public transportation to and from school occasionally. Families can reload funds on their cards - more information on how to do this can be found on this page of the MBTA website.
MBTA Passes are available free of charge for Boston residents funded through a program with Boston Public Schools. These passes are available to Boston residents the week before school starts each year.
M7 and S-Cards will work throughout the summer months. As of June 30 each year, the M7 monthly pass will switch to function as an S-Card so that students can load any amount of money or even a monthly pass onto the card from any MBTA station at a fare vending machine. All student cards are then automatically deactivated by the MBTA on August 31 in preparation for new cards for the new school year. Students can receive a new card each year.