Silver Line route SL5 serves Downtown Crossing at a midblock bus stop on Temple Place, half a block from the nearest subway entrance.

[4] An additional elevator – open business hours only – leads to the Roche Brothers store which connects to the Summer Street concourse.

Because Downtown Crossing is an older station built at two different times in a dense urban area, transfers between the two lines are convoluted.

[7] The Phase II improvements, which will complete elevator connections for all transfers, are part of the 2006 settlement of Joanne Daniels-Finegold, et al. v.

[9] As of December 2024[update], design is complete for the three elevators, with bidding for the nearly-three-year construction project planned for early 2025.

[13] Stations on the tunnel were built in pairs with different names and separate entrances, an appeasement to merchants on the street who desired maximal pedestrian traffic.

[13] As part of a system-wide rebranding by the newly formed MBTA, on January 23, 1967, the Orange Line platforms were renamed Washington as well.

[13] The renaming, which had been approved in 1985 as part of a series of station name changes, was coordinated with the opening of the Southwest Corridor.

[15] As part of that project, the MBTA investigated the feasibility of connecting Essex, Park Street, Washington, and State with pedestrian tunnels.

[26] In 1979, the Winter Street Concourse was opened, connecting the upper level of Downtown Crossing station (inside fare control) to the upper level of Park Street station two blocks away, utilizing an existing but previously unopened section of the concourse.

[30] Modernization in the 1980s included the installation of Situations, a set of 31 skewed marble seats designed by Buster Simpson along the Red Line platform.

One work on the Orange Line level, a take on Invasion of the Body Snatchers, featured 'alien' eggs that grew and eventually hatched 'aliens' portrayed by costumed actors.

[13] The Temple Place exit from the southbound Orange Line platform was reopened to allow easier transfers.

A sales office for the passes was opened in the Summer Street concourse outside fare control on December 26, 1978.

[42][43] Due to unreliable computer systems and high demand, the store initially experienced long wait times.