Boston’s largest employers placed big bets on a return to the office over the summer, signing massive lease expansions and extensions and scooping up sublease space. But employees have yet to flock to the workspaces. Despite leading the nation in office leasing activity and active tenants-in-market metrics in September, according to CBRE, public transit ridership remains at approximately half its pre-pandemic level and office occupancy sits at a fraction of pre-pandemic volume. Though foot traffic in the urban core is improving, the region's thriving life sciences industry appears to be covering a continued lag in the office sector. 
“When you start peeling the layers of the onion away, when you take away all lab buildings, that’s when the numbers become much less optimistic,” Avison Young Northeast Data Team Lead Elaine Wall said. “The lab numbers are really bolstering a lot of the data.”Mobility…  Read the full story here. | 
