The Red Sox play their first game of the 2026 season at 4:10 p.m. today in Cincinnati. It's the first of a six-game road trip to start the season, so you'll have to wait until their home-opener next Friday to try Fenway Park's new chowder-covered lobster "poutine" (an apparent attempt to see if current U.S.-Canada relations can get even worse). However, we do have one big game, er, match, locally: The T's test match: Gillette Stadium is hosting an international friendly this afternoon between two of the world's top soccer teams, Brazil and France. It's also serving as a warm-up for the MBTA, as the agency prepares to transport 20,000 people to each of Gillette's seven World Cup matches later this year. " We want to make sure that we work the bugs out in advance before we have 20,000 people late for their soccer match," Ryan Coholan, the MBTA's chief operating officer, told WBUR's Andrea Perdomo-Hernandez. "But that's not gonna happen." (Fingers crossed.) - What are they doing differently? The T will run four special event trains between Boston and Foxborough, compared to just the single train it runs for most Patriots games and concerts. Unlike usual event trains, these will run nonstop between South Station and Foxborough, leaving every 15 minutes starting around 12:45 p.m. (The match itself starts at 4 p.m.) The match will also allow the T to test out "recycling" the first train to Foxborough, which means it will loop back to Boston — using an infrequently used track to Mansfield — to pick up more passengers. "We don't expect any problems, but we want to prove it out to make sure everything's going to work as we expect," Colohan said. And last but not least, the T is instituting boarding groups and queues for passengers to get on the train.
- Can you still get train tickets? As of yesterday, Colohan said around 2,000 train tickets had been sold for today's game — roughly one-third of the four trains' combined 6,000-person capacity. He expects more to fill up. Some people "risk it" and just buy a ticket when they show up at South Station, according to Colohan. But he recommends simply buying a ticket via the mTicket app ahead of time.
- What does this mean for regular commuter rail service? The special event trains mean there will be no regular commuter rail service to Foxborough today and five Franklin line trains will be canceled, since part of the line is a single track. There will also be reduced service on the Fairmount line after noon.
- What to expect this summer? For World Cup games, the T plans to ramp up from four game-day trains to 14. Colohan says that will be more disruptive to other commuter rail lines "simply to free up the equipment."
- Heads up: Tickets for those World Cup train tickets go on sale in less than two weeks, on April 8, for those lucky enough to have snagged match tickets.
- PSA: Gov. Maura Healey's administration launched a new online hub yesterday with everything you need to know about the state's plans for the World Cup.
In other MBTA news: Red Line riders are in for some mild disruption after dark. Due to a new phase of an ongoing signal upgrade project, riders on the Braintree branch will need to switch trains at JFK/UMass after 8 p.m. The new phase begins tonight and will go on for about two weeks, before it switches and becomes a problem that riders on the Ashmont branch will have to navigate. - There also continues to be reduced service across the entire Red Line after 8 p.m. The T suggests budgeting for an extra 10-15 minutes of travel time.
Breaking overnight: Boston's School Committee unanimously approved the district's $1.7 billion budget for the coming school year, which includes cutting 300 to 400 staff positions . At the same time, Committee Chair Jeri Robinson called for an audit of the district's spending, saying it hadn't improved student outcomes. "It's time to do some self-reflection," Robinson said. "Are we really utilizing our resources to the best of our abilities? We all want to say — and we all agree — that our students deserve more, but we also understand that student outcomes don't change until adult behaviors do." On Beacon Hill: As expected, the Massachusetts House passed the PROTECT Act last night, by a vote of 134-21. The wide-ranging immigration bill, written in response to President Trump's aggressive deportation campaign, now heads to the Senate, where top lawmakers have signaled they have more provisions to add. P.S.— Not a soccer expert? You can become one real quick with this new World Cup glossary from WBUR's Roberto Scalese. It covers everything from soccer tactics and rules to the tournament format to all those strange British idioms. |
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