By 1925, streetcars were gone from most downtown streets.

Map of the planned West End Street Railway network from 1885. These existing routes were officially merged in 1887.

The Boston Elevated Railway (BERy) was the precursor to the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, operating rapid transit, streetcars and buses in the Boston, Massachusetts area. It was formerly known as the West End Street Railway. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) is a quasi-governmental organization formed in 1964 that controls the subway, bus, commuter rail, and ferry systems in the Boston, Massachusetts area. ... Subway redirects here; for the restaurant named Subway, see Subway (restaurant). ... a historic postcard showing electric trolley-powered streetcars in Richmond, Virginia, where Frank J. Sprague successfully demonstrated his new system on the hills in 1888 A streetcar is a railway vehicle designed to carry passengers on tracks, usually laid in city streets. ... The Bus, established by Mayor Frank Fasi, is Honolulus only public transit system. ... Boston is the capital of and the largest city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. ...

The rapid transit lines have evolved into the Red, Blue and Orange Lines. The only streetcars that remain are the various branches of the Green Line and the Ashmont-Mattapan High Speed Line; the rest have been converted to buses. View of Boston from the Red Line The Red Line is the newest of the four MBTA subway lines in the Boston, Massachusetts metro area. ... The Blue Line is one of the four subway lines of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority. ... The Orange Line is one of the four subway lines of the MBTA. It extends from Forest Hills in Jamaica Plain, Boston in the south to Oak Grove in Malden, Massachusetts in the north. ... The Green Line is one of the four MBTA subway lines in the Boston, Massachusetts metro area. ... The Ashmont-Mattapan High Speed Line (or Mattapan-Ashmont Line, or just the M Line) is considered part of the MBTAs Red Line, even though it uses different equipment (trolleys) and passengers have to change at Ashmont Station. ...

The Boston Elevated Railway operated in the following cities and towns:

• Arlington
• Belmont
• Boston and the municipalities that have been merged into it
• Brookline
• Cambridge
• Chelsea
• Everett
• Malden
• Medford
• Newton (only to get between Boston and Watertown)
• Somerville
• Stoneham (only the southern bit, in the Middlesex Fells)
• Watertown

Additionally, streetcars from adjoining towns, run by other companies, operated over BERy trackage.