Five years ago this week, Boston was unrecognizable. Its normally bustling streets were deserted. Its office towers and arenas empty. Its restaurants dark. The days stretched to weeks, then months, ofwondering when the people would come back.
Eventually, they did.
Five years after COVID shut down Boston, things feel, by and large, normal again. There are lines at lunch spots, crowds at the Garden, college kids at the bars. But the city isn’t the same.
Measures of foot traffic and office vacancy haven’t fully rebounded. Hybrid work remains pretty common. Car traffic is worse. Empty storefronts persist.
But more than anything, we just don’t mix like we did before.
A Northeastern University study of cellphone data found that when COVID hit, inhabitants of Greater Boston became far less likely to interact with people of different socioeconomic backgrounds. Those numbers have been recovering, but for many parts of the region, particularly in the suburbs, levels of what researchers call “social exploration” have fallen sharply.
Continue Reading at Boston Globe
