Boylston Street is the name of a major east-west thoroughfare in the city of Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston street was known as Frog Lane in the early 18th century and was later known as Common Street. It was later again renamed for Ward Nicholas Boylston (1747–1828), a man of wealth and refinement, an officer of the Crown, and philanthropist. Boylston, who was a descendent of Zabdiel Boylston, was born in Boston and spent much of his life in it. The Boylston Market was named after him as was the town of Boylston, Massachusetts.
Another Boylston Street runs through Boston's western suburbs, Newton and Brookline.
From west to east, Boston's Boylston Street begins at the intersection of Park Drive and Brookline Avenue as a two-way, six-lane road in Boston's Fenway neighborhood where it runs through three blocks of recently developed and currently under construction (as of 2015) high-rise, mixed-use buildings one block south of Fenway Park before forming the northern boundary of the Back Bay Fens at the Storrow Drive/Commonwealth Avenue right-of-way. Traffic traveling west on Boylston here cannot continue on Boylston Street, and must use Ipswich Street to continue west. Then, Boylston Street enters the Back Bay neighborhood where it becomes a major commercial artery carrying three lanes of one way traffic eastbound after Dalton Street. As it travels through the Back Bay, it forms the northern boundary of busy Copley Square and provides the southern limits to the Boston Public Garden before becoming a two-way street running along Boston Common's southern edge from Charles Street to Tremont Street. After Tremont Street, Boylston returns to carrying one way traffic east before ending at Washington Street in the downtown area where it changes to Essex Street.