Massport considers Hynes Convention Center for remote Logan terminal

Boylston Street entrance to the Hynes Convention Center.

— Photo by ajay_suresh

From The Boston Guardian

(Robert Whitcomb, the editor of New England Diary, is chairman of The Boston Guardian.)

The Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport) is considering installing a remote Logan Airport terminal in the Hynes Convention Center where passengers could go through security and subsequently be bussed to the airport and dropped off after the checkpoint.

After the substantial success of a pilot remote terminal this summer in Framingham, the Boston Business Journal recently reported that Massport was in early talks with the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority (MCCA). So far, neighborhood representatives are excited about the possibility.

“I think it’s a great idea,” said State Rep. Jay Livingstone, who serves the Back Bay as well as Beacon Hill and the Fenway. “I think it will allow people visiting or living in Back Bay, the South End, to have easy access to [Logan]. Massport’s already proven that it’s been able to successfully do this in Framingham, and I think it would be a great amenity in the neighborhood and for the Hynes.”

Livingstone said he had discussed the idea with the MCCA, but that the authority hadn’t set a timetable yet. He said that MCCA executive director John Barros had already begun doing some basic community outreach. The Hynes is currently undergoing an extensive infrastructure renovation expected to last into 2029. Neighborhood leaders have been hopeful about that renovation, too, because of the benefits its conventions bring to Back Bay business and tourism. Meg Mainzer-Cohen, president of the Back Bay Association which represents businesses in the area, said the remote terminal would be yet another way to bring those benefits about more regularly.

“We would be very supportive of it,” Mainzer-Cohen said. “Anything that makes traveling to the airport from Back Bay will be welcome, and the simplification of having it as what sounds a seamless entry point at the Hynes would be, I think, a great benefit to the neighborhood.”

Serge Savard, chair of the resident group Neighborhood Association of the Back Bay (NABB), said in a phone call that it would also be a benefit to Back Bay residents to avoid a tedious Logan commute.

“To have easy access to Logan Airport without having to commute, to check in right there and be right there in the terminal in the secure area, as a commodity for our residents who are traveling quite a bit, I think it could be beneficial,” Savard said. “If it’s implemented well, and it doesn’t create chaos in the traffic around Mass. Ave in that section, we would be supportive. But it’s going to be really in the detail of the implementation, which we haven’t seen yet.”

Both Mainzer-Cohen and Livingstone said they expected the traffic impact of such a terminal to be minimal.

“I think that the same people right now who are entering by taking a shuttle bus, or public transportation, or Uber or vehicle would be [the people using the remote terminal],” Mainzer-Cohen said. “The traffic is there.”

An existing bus, the Logan Express, already runs from the Back Bay to Logan Airport. Massport has suggested using the Hynes’s large garage on Dalton Street as a potential site for the remote terminal busses to run from. The Logan Express stop in the Back Bay runs from that same street. Massport didn’t specify whether that shuttle would continue to run if the remote terminal was established.

“We are in the very early stages of evaluating the potential to expand the Remote Terminal program, and no decisions have been made,” a Massport spokesperson told The Boston Guardian in an email. “Because discussions are preliminary, we have not established potential bus routes or operational plans, and it’s too early to discuss any approvals or coordination that may be required. If the program moves forward, we would work closely with the appropriate partners throughout the planning process.”