Line of the times

if only there was some kind of public transportation that ran past 12:30.

I fly every week for work and take Uber to/from Logan. They pick you up in the limo area on the second level. I got one at 1am last Sunday coming back from Florida.

Nothing can make you feel more trapped than a long non-moving line when you are this close to home. This kind of thing is totally unacceptable.

People on my street pay each other to haul to the airport. Sometimes this is because somebody has eight people coming in for a family reunion, or needed the minivan for all the stuff (e.g. professional videography equipment) and people involved.

There isn't any app involved, just "Hey, could you pick us up next Saturday at 11? We'll pay parking and gas."

Offering to pay your roommate or neighbor to drop/fetch you kind of sweetens the deal.

The airport is a 24-hour location, yet try getting there or back between 12:30 and 5:30 in the morning and you're out of luck (with the minor exception that the 171 will get you there by 4:15 with connections from Ashmont and Mattapan and the 117 by 5:15 with connections from the 39, 57 and 89, sort of). MassPort provides basically-free shuttle service to Back Bay from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., but good luck getting there at other times of day. Even though a third of all airport workers' shifts begin between 3 and 5 am, there is no dependable way to get to the airport at those time apart from three poorly-advertised buses running from two locations (Dudley and Haymarket). For most people, getting to the airport by bike or foot at these times is a non-starter: there's a minor issue of the Boston Harbor being in the way. And travelers are not the only ones who get stuck after T service in the evening: if planes come in late, the service crews and baggage handlers also have to stay late. So they wind up being forced to drive to the airport, and pay to park in Chelsea, and MassPort has to run shuttles to employee parking in Chelsea.

Why are there no cabs at the airport at this time of night? What taxicab driver, who could be picking up fares are bars in Allston and the Back Bay, is going to drive across the harbor, sit in line at the airport and hope that maybe a late flight comes in and they get a fare? And if not, they get to foot the bill themselves to drive back through the tunnel,empty. I've been refused a meter fare once trying to get to the airport in the morning (and a complaint to BPD resulted in a refund and a reprimand) as the cabbie didn't want to pay to come back through the tunnel empty. I've also been on a late-arriving plane which got to Logan at 2:45 and resulted in a long line of people waiting for non-existent taxis. We sort of organized in to groups ("You're going to JP? I'm going to Brookline, let's share.") and the enterprising drivers charged us each the fare on the meter and at 3:30 we were happy enough to have a ride home that we paid it. But the line was 45 minutes long, almost worth lying down on a bench and waiting for the first Silver Line bus to rumble through in the morning.

When we talk about late night T service, we really should be focusing on airport workers and travelers who might benefit as well. The airport immediately comes to mind. What if, instead of running these few early buses, the T, with the financial support of MassPort (which already subsidizes the Silver Line) to run a shuttle service to and from downtown overnight. Existing Silver Line buses could be used and operate to South Station at the surface during overnight hours. Even though there wouldn't be any transit service available at, say, 3:30 a.m., airport workers could bike, walk or take taxicabs South Station and transfer to a Silver Line bus, as could people with early flights (it's basically impossible to get to a flight before 7 a.m. without using one of the buses shown above). And when a flight gets in late, passengers could board a bus to downtown, where there are a lot more cabs rolling around at that time of day. Or, since MassPort already runs Logan Express buses to Back Bay, perhaps this could be folded in to that service, with MassPort providing overnight service between Back Bay, South Station and the airport between midnight and 6 a.m. It would certainly make it easier for most people to get to Logan without the cost of tolls, gas and parking.

Not only is it explicitly not permissible for me to pick up at Logan terminals, it's also my understanding that my app won't even go online for pickups if I'm in those areas. So I'm not clear as to how an UberX driver got an UberX ping at Logan.

Long cab lines are pretty much the norm at JFK. When I need to get to/from Manhattan, and I don't want to risk waiting 45 minutes for a cab, I reserve a black car ahead of time. They monitor my flight information and are waiting when I arrive at the curb. It costs more than a yellow cab, but it's worth the convenience sometimes.

Can't Bostonians do the same thing?

What people fail to understand is that Massport runs the airport. That taxi line is created by Massport, taxis are required to park in the airport pool over a mile away and wait to be summoned to a particular terminal. They charge each taxi a $2.25 fee for this service. The cabdriver recovers this fee from the passenger in addition to the $5.25 tunnel toll that limos/taxis and commercial vehicles are required to pay to enter the city of Boston. If uberX was to pick up at the airport they would be required to pay these fees as well or be commercially licensed Many of your uber drivers are former cabdrivers so they know this and they know that the majority of their passengers don't know this, all uber does is have a better delivery system that includes your credit card info, This is all run by the mayor of Boston and the City Council who are the true management of the Boston taxi industry a highly regulated public industry not a private consortium.