Maryland Transit Administration
The Maryland Transit Administration is a state-operated mass transit administration in Maryland, and is part of the Maryland Department of Transportation. The MTA operates a comprehensive transit system throughout the Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area. There are 80 bus lines serving the Baltimore Metropolitan Area, along with rail services that include the Baltimore Light RailLink, Baltimore Metro Subway, and MARC Train. In, the system had a ridership of, or about per weekday as of.
With 27% of Baltimore households lacking access to a car, the MTA is an important part of the regional transit picture. The system has many connections to other transit agencies of Central Maryland, Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia, and south-central Pennsylvania : WMATA, Charm City Circulator, Regional Transportation Agency of Central Maryland, Annapolis Transit, Rabbit Transit, Ride-On, and TransIT.
History
The MTA took over the operations of the old Baltimore Transit Company on April 30, 1970. It was originally known as the Baltimore Metropolitan Transit Authority, then the Mass Transit Administration before it changed to its current name in October 2001.Many of the routes of most of the agency's current bus lines are based on the original streetcars operated by the Baltimore Transit Company and its parent companies from the 1890s to the 1960s. All these routes were ultimately converted to rubber tire bus operations, and many of them were consolidated, extended into newly developed areas, or otherwise reconfigured to keep up with the ridership demands of the times. Additional routes and extensions were added in later years to serve communities that were later developed, and to feed into Metro and Light Rail stations that were later built.
With the growth in popularity of the private automobile during the 20th century, streetcar and bus ridership declined, and the needs for public transportation changed. Mass transit in Baltimore and other cities shifted from a corporate operation to a service funded and run by the government. The amount of service provided was greatly reduced, and some areas once served by streetcars are currently served by buses very minimally or not at all.
The demise of the Baltimore streetcar took place between the years of 1947 and 1963, as operators found buses to be low maintenance and more cost-efficient. As rails were demolished, Baltimore was no longer a streetcar city. As transit needs and trends changed, rail transit did return to the city, with the Metro Subway opening in 1983 and the Light Rail in 1992. The track gauge was, a unique gauge.
Bus routes
The MTA operates bus services primarily within the Baltimore metropolitan area, with some peripheral commuter bus connections in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, Kent Island, southern Maryland, and western Maryland. The local bus network operated as a daily service is centered in and around Baltimore, with most routes traveling between the city and adjacent Baltimore County or Anne Arundel County communities, and a few routes providing connections between suburban communities.Local bus
Since the BaltimoreLink rebranding in 2017, MTA local service routes have been given either CityLink color scheme designations or LocalLink numbered designations. CityLink routes operate at higher frequency and for a longer duration than LocalLink routes, however, together they function as part of the same network and each individual route has its own duration and frequency which varies based on day of the week and time of day. Most of the routes originate in whole or in part from routes which followed a cohesive number scheme prior to 2017; that number scheme in turn was derived directly from the corresponding historical streetcar routes.CityLink bus line designations are each assigned a color and two-letter abbreviation for that color. Some of the color designations describe shades of the same color, such as the Green and Lime routes or the Blue and Navy routes. The naming scheme also does not disambiguate the colored route names of the Charm City Circulator routes operated in an overlapping service area by Baltimore or the Baltimore County Loop routes operated in an overlapping service area in Towson.
LocalLink bus line designations are numbered across two ranges which loosely correspond to two categories, crosstown routes and feeder routes. There is not one consistent pattern which describes each range, however. For example, LocalLink 80 is a route which provides primarily intra-city service and does not follow the "spoke-and-wheel" pattern associated with feeder routes. The numbering scheme excludes all the historic route numbers which were deprecated in 2017, and not every number in the listed ranges is used for a route. Some of the LocalLink lines are part of the frequent network alongside the CityLink routes, or operate on 24-hour schedules.
In April 2022, the MTA announced a proposal to introduce the first new local bus designation since 2017, the LocalLink 32, which is intended to replace the branch of the CityLink Yellow which travels to the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.
Quickbus
Until June 2017, The MTA operated four limited-stop routes known as Quickbus or qb, which were designated as routes qb40, qb46, qb47, and qb48. In April 2022, the MTA announced the proposed revival of the Quickbus 40 route as the QuickLink 40 in Fall 2022. As of May 2022, the agency is soliciting public feedback on this proposal alongside other service adjustments. In Fall 2023 Quicklink 40 has been reintroduce into service mirroring the prelink Quickbus 40).Neighborhood Shuttle Bug
Until June 2017, The MTA had two neighborhood shuttle routes: The Mondawmin Shuttle Bug Route 97 and the Hampden Shuttle Bug Route 98. These routes can be identified by their distinctive brand colors and logos.Express bus
The MTA operates 9 express bus lines in the Baltimore area, which are the 103, 105, 115, 120, 150, 154, 160, and 163.Commuter bus
Independent bus companies operate 26 commuter bus routes in the Washington, D.C., and Baltimore regions. There are five Baltimore-bound bus lines numbered in the 300 and 400 range; while the sixteen Washington-bound bus lines are numbered in the 600 and 900 range. These routes range from 310 through 995. Buses travelling on MD 200 are numbered in the 200 range. Five routes ranging 201 through 205.Rail services
Rapid transit
This system operates elevated and underground from a corporate and shopping complex in Owings Mills in Baltimore County into the heart of Downtown Baltimore City's business, shopping and sightseeing districts to the world-renowned Johns Hopkins Medical Center Complex. The northwest-southeastbound route includes 14 station stops. Its route through the densest parts of the city is underground, from Hopkins Hospital to a portal west of Mondawmin station, where it immediately rises to an elevated concrete right of way parallel to Wabash Avenue practically at the city line.Entering Baltimore County, the line goes to the surface, passing through communities along the way to commuter-based stops at Milford Mill Road and Old Court Road. From Old Court, the tracks pass underneath the I-695/795 interchange and travel the median of 795 till their end at Owings Mills This station is the centerpiece of a huge project urbanizing that immediate area, with a Baltimore County Public Library branch, and classroom space for the Community College of Baltimore County. Residential and commercial development is planned to follow the completion of the education buildings.
There were efforts underway to extend the line northeast through the city with phase 1 to Morgan State University and phase 2 beyond the city limits to the White Marsh Town Center area. If they come to fruition, the line will be renamed the Green Line, coordinating with the Red Line which Maryland Governor Larry Hogan cancelled on June 25, 2017, with the creation of Baltimore Link. Baltimore's plans for transit were not mapped and $900 million of federally funded money was sent back. Funding for the Green Line extension is still years from being secured but includes an option to extend it as light rail or BRT from Johns Hopkins Hospital.
Light rail
This service travels from a corporate, hotel, and shopping complex in Baltimore County's Hunt Valley, through the suburbs north of Baltimore and northern Baltimore and into the heart of downtown Baltimore's shopping, sightseeing, dining, and entertainment districts, past the harbor and through southern Baltimore and finally to BWI Marshall Airport and Cromwell Station/Glen Burnie in Anne Arundel County. There is also a spur to Amtrak's Baltimore Penn Station.The Light RailLink operates at grade for the most part, though it travels on bridges crossing several bodies of water. There are 33 station stops along the system. Although much of the line was single-tracked when it was built, the MTA completed a double-tracking project on February 26, 2006, and now only a few short single-track sections remain.