![]() S (now 100) Route at Adrienne Arsht Center Metromover station | |
Parent | Miami-Dade County |
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Founded | August 2, 1960 |
Headquarters | Overtown Transit Village |
Locale | Miami, Florida |
Service area | Greater Miami, Broward, and Monroe Counties |
Service type | |
Alliance | Broward County Transit |
Routes | 93 (including 2 contracted routes) |
Stops | over 8,000 |
Fleet | 846 buses: |
Daily ridership | 198,500 (weekdays, Q1 2024) [1] |
Annual ridership | 58,282,300 (2023) [2] |
Fuel type |
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Operator | Miami-Dade Transit |
Website | miamidade |
The Metrobus network provides bus service throughout Miami-Dade County 365 days a year, operated by Miami-Dade Transit. It consists of about 79 routes and 771 buses, which connect most points in the county and part of southern Broward County as well. As of 2023, the system has 58,282,300 rides per year, or about 198,500 per day in the first quarter of 2024.
Seven routes operate around the clock: Routes 3, 11, 27, 38, 77, 79 (No 24-hour service to Hialeah, all trips terminate at Northside Station) and 100. Routes 246 Night Owl & Route 500 Midnight Owl operate from midnight to 5 am. Other routes operate from 4:30 am to 1:30 am. All Metrobuses are wheelchair accessible, in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and equipped with Bicycle racks.
Bus route 301 (Dade-Monroe Express) extends into Monroe County, reaching Marathon, where a transfer is available to a Key West Transit bus proceeding further into the Keys. With the appropriate bus transfers, one can travel all the way from Key West to Jupiter entirely on public-transit buses. Metrobus has many connections to Metrorail and Metromover, also operated by Miami-Dade Transit, mainly in the city of Miami.
Added to the Metrorail on August 21, 2019, and Metrobus on December 23, 2019, Miami-Dade Transit riders are able to use their smartphones/smartwatches to pay (Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay, Fitbit Pay, Garmin Pay) and be able to use their credit or debit card that is contactless enabled (Amex, Visa, Mastercard). As of the 2019 implementation of tap to pay, Discover cards via tap to pay, are not accepted systemwide.
Bus ridership has reached as high as 293,000 daily, [3] but is generally around a quarter million. It reached a high during the real estate bubble of the 2000s, then declined during the bad economy amid service cuts during the Great Recession, before rising again in the 2010s. From 2015 into 2016, bus ridership fell sharply, down to a low of 195,000 daily in June 2016, [4] amid the lowest gas prices in over a decade, despite a locally strong economy and steady population gain. This during a time when much effort was going into enhancements, such as an air-conditioned bus shelter, mobile ticketing, and new rolling stock, including electric buses. [5] Part of the problem is that buses, unlike other transit alternatives, are not exempt from the increasing traffic present. [6] Nationally, bus ridership fell while rail ridership increased slightly in 2015. [7]
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The South Dade TransitWay (originally named the South Dade Busway) is a basic bus rapid transit system, or busway, in southern Miami-Dade County. It began operating from the Dadeland South Metrorail station to SW 112th Avenue on February 3, 1997, and was extended to SW 264th Street on April 24, 2005. The final 6.5-mile (10.5 km) segment of the Busway extension to SW 344th Street in Florida City opened on Sunday, December 16, 2007. It is parallel to US1/ S Dixie Highway, and runs along the abandoned Florida East Coast Railway line. It is an alternative to daily traffic congestion. The 13-mile (21 km) roadway was built by the Florida Department of Transportation just for Metrobus routes and emergency vehicles. Express buses on the exclusive lanes shuttle passengers to and from Dadeland South Station (see Metrorail) in about an hour or less.
Both full-size and articulated buses operate on the Busway and in adjacent neighborhoods, entering the exclusive lanes at major intersections. Local and limited-stop service is offered between Florida City and Dadeland South Metrorail Station. Park & Ride lots along the busway are located at SW 152d Street (Coral Reef Drive), SW 168th Street (Richmond Drive), SW 112th Avenue, SW 244th Street, and SW 296th Street. At Dadeland South Station, riders transfer to Metrorail. Riders headed downtown can transfer from Metrorail to Metromover, which consists of three shorter downtown loops, at Government Center Station.
The South Miami-Dade Busway features 28 stops, all of which look like light-rail style stations. A multi-use path stretches the length of the Busway. The busway stops featured large shelters to provide protection from the sun and rain. These are currently being rebuilt with the reconstruction of the South-Dade TransitWay.
The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP), under its BRT Standard, has given the Busway a preliminary classification as a "Basic BRT" corridor. [8]
The Busway has been the site of many accidents, as some car drivers driving south on US 1 (which runs parallel to the Busway for much of its length) and looking to turn west do not stop at the red arrows that govern the right turn lane at an intersection that has a Busway crossing adjacent to it. They make a right turn and go right into the path of a bus that is entering the adjacent Busway intersection. Buses currently must slow down to 15 mph (24 km/h) before crossing the intersection, and the police often patrol the intersections looking for red arrow runners. Surprisingly, even the intersections on which the Busway runs as far as two blocks west of US 1 suffer the same problem, with car drivers not seeing or flatly ignoring the red lights at SW 184th and 186th Streets. City planners and residents alike have commented that rather than dismantling the former Florida East Coast Railroad line for the busway, the Metrorail system could have been extended southward over the railway line.
April 2012: In the early morning hours of Friday April 13, 2012, an SUV driving southbound illegally down the Busway (as it was known then) by a drunk driver at more than 100 miles per hour (against a 40 mile per hour speed limit) slammed into a mini-van traveling eastbound on SW 184th Street, t-boning the eastbound vehicle, continuing southbound before spiraling out of control, and stopped adjacent to the Northbound SW 184th Street station. One teen was killed, three others (including the drunk driver) were injured, and the drunk driver was arrested. [9] Fortunately, no Metrobus drivers or passengers were injured or killed as no buses were passing through SW 184th Street or stopping at the SW 184th Street stations at the time of the crash. However, the crash caused delays to several Metrobus routes as portions of both SW 184th Street and the Busway were shut down for an extended period of time.
September 2017: On September 10, 2017, Hurricane Irma made landfall in Cudjoe Key as a Category 4 Hurricane. Although the Transitway did not receive hurricane-force winds, several canopies were damaged during the hurricane and subsequently removed. The replacement of canopies fell behind schedule and remains unfinished, as of March 2018 [update] . [10]
February 2019: On February 6, 2019, a car and bus collided near SW 248th Street. There were no fatalities. However, fourteen people were injured, two seriously. [11]
The Miami-Dade Department of Transportation and Public Works broke ground on the South-Dade TransitWay Corridor gold standard bus rapid transit line on June 4, 2021. [12] It will provide a direct transfer to the Metrorail at the Dadeland South Station, extending Miami-Dade Transit's rapid transit system up to Florida City. The opening of the gold standard BRT line is expected for fall 2024. [13] [14] The new line will have 2 terminals and 14 new iconic BRT stations, all featuring fare gates, center platform boarding, all-door and level boarding, next bus arrival screens, air conditioned waiting areas, and other rail-like amenities. These stations can be converted to Metrorail stations in the future. Along the transitway, signal preemption and level crossing gates will be implemented so that BRT vehicles never stop at a light. [12] The BRT will use 60-foot New Flyer Xcelsior battery-electric articulated buses. [15] Also in the works is the proposed South-Dade Bus Maintenance Facility. It will be the first all-electric bus maintenance facility in Miami-Dade County and it will be located next to the Homestead Air Reserve Base. This proposed facility will charge and maintain the 100 60-foot battery-electric articulated buses of the South Corridor and will host parts and equipment for maintenance of the South Corridor's gate arms.
Ridership detail by average daily ridership on weekdays by month, with yearly average and highest ridership month in bold. Note the generally lower ridership during the summer months and December, month of the long Christmas and holiday season. Ridership has been falling since 2014 amid widespread rider complaints, an aging fleet, and sharply declining gas prices beginning in late 2014. Starting in 2016, this was also affecting Metrorail ridership. By 2016, 70% of the bus fleet was considered beyond its expected useful life, as the county was in the process of buying 30 electric buses with an option for 20 more. [16] This is well under 10% of a fleet of nearly 1,000 buses. Other upgrades included a new mobile ticketing and contactless payment system, as well as upgrades to bus stops, including covering shelter-less bus stops and air conditioning at select locations. By mid 2016, average daily ridership was over 100,000 below a pre-recession peak in November 2007, [17] and May, June, July, and August 2016 [18] were the lowest ridership months in over a decade. Some of the ridership loss may be accounted for by overlap and growth of the free Miami Trolley and other pseudo-bus systems. Very poor numbers in October 2016 across the entire system were partially blamed on one day of closures for Hurricane Matthew, [19] which passed close to South Florida. Similarly, September 2017, the month of Hurricane Irma, saw even lower ridership. 2016 was the lowest ridership year since online records began in 1998. Summer 2017 saw weekday ridership decline another 10% on top of sustained decline. [20] January 2018's ridership of 162,300 is the lowest since at least the 90s with the exception of the month Hurricane Irma hit. Annual ridership figures are rounded to the nearest 100.
# | Month | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 |
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1 | January | 212,100 | 216,700 | 215,700 | 208,150 | 205,800 | 231,500 | 242,100 | 265,400 | 260,200 | 258,600 | 244,500 | 222,300 | 238,500 | 248,900 | 248,200 | 241,900 | 240,400 | 209,600 | 192,900 |
2 | February | 218,350 | 220,000 | 227,400 | 216,300 | 219,200 | 240,800 | 251,000 | 267,300 | 266,600 | 266,400 | 254,400 | 230,000 | 253,100 | 257,500 | 264,500 | 258,800 | 238,000 | 217,600 | 203,600 |
3 | March | 215,000 | 220,350 | 221,800 | 209,800 | 217,600 | 238,500 | 246,700 | 270,500 | 270,900 | 266,900 | 252,000 | 229,700 | 250,900 | 260,000 | 258,100 | 250,800 | 249,100 | 210,200 | 196,300 |
4 | April | 205,800 | 204,400 | 210,250 | 207,350 | 208,100 | 227,700 | 251,400 | 260,000 | 257,000 | 265,500 | 256,600 | 230,400 | 249,200 | 255,800 | 255,600 | 250,000 | 232,000 | 214,500 | 193,900 |
5 | May | 208,900 | 214,000 | 210,450 | 206,300 | 208,900 | 237,600 | 242,600 | 255,600 | 262,900 | 273,500 | 239,800 | 232,900 | 248,000 | 245,200 | 244,700 | 242,300 | 227,800 | 207,100 | 189,200 |
6 | June | 195,300 | 206,200 | 202,800 | 191,550 | 200,700 | 223,840 | 225,900 | 248,000 | 248,100 | 258,600 | 219,600 | 221,300 | 237,000 | 235,600 | 235,200 | 226,100 | 212,600 | 195,000 | 174,300 |
7 | July | 203,900 | 209,800 | 208,950 | 196,500 | 205,000 | 229,400 | 212,500 | 240,200 | 243,500 | 256,600 | 211,400 | 213,700 | 231,100 | 237,900 | 231,600 | 226,400 | 209,900 | 191,900 | 175,100 |
8 | August | 200,100 | 206,500 | 207,800 | 199,350 | 198,800 | 226,900 | 241,300 | 245,000 | 257,000 | 250,500 | 227,300 | 220,600 | 232,500 | 237,900 | 243,400 | 235,600 | 216,500 | 189,500 | 175,500 |
9 | September | 211,600 | 217,850 | 208,950 | 209,100 | 219,500 | 226,300 | 241,131 | 270,000 | 280,200 | 269,400 | 234,500 | 233,800 | 254,600 | 257,100 | 259,000 | 248,500 | 223,800 | 202,300 | 147,200* |
10 | October | 210,350 | 208,000 | 210,300 | 212,800 | 226,500 | 242,700 | 241,419 | 270,000 | 267,500 | 257,700 | 224,600 | 243,700 | 252,000 | 257,600 | 261,400 | 246,900 | 226,000 | 187,800 [19] | 177,900 |
11 | November | 221,250 | 221,800 | 209,000 | 210,500 | 225,000 [21] | 244,200 | 267,600 | 262,400 | 302,000 [17] | 243,900 | 226,000 | 239,600 | 256,600 | 258,000 | 252,800 | 240,800 | 220,500 | 203,200 | 177,300 |
12 | December | 206,600 | 209,400 | 205,700 | 198,500 | 216,900 | 229,000 | 255,100 | 258,100 | 257,700 | 240,600 | 215,600 | 216,600 | 240,800 | 246,200 | 242,300 | 234,500 | 211,400 | 195,700 | 172,200 |
13 | Year Average | 205,500 | 259,000 | 233,900 | 227,900 | 245,400 | 249,800 | 249,700 | 241,900 | 225,700 | 202,000 | 181,300 |
Kendall is an unincorporated area and census-designated place in Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. It is part of the Miami metropolitan area. At the 2020 census, the area had a population of 80,241.
Bus rapid transit (BRT), also referred to as a busway or transitway, is a bus-based public transport system designed to have much more capacity, reliability and other quality features than a conventional bus system. Typically, a BRT system includes roadways that are dedicated to buses, and gives priority to buses at intersections where buses may interact with other traffic; alongside design features to reduce delays caused by passengers boarding or leaving buses, or paying fares. BRT aims to combine the capacity and speed of a light rail transit (LRT) or mass rapid transit (MRT) system with the flexibility, lower cost and simplicity of a bus system.
The Silver Line is a system of bus routes in Boston and Chelsea, Massachusetts, operated by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA). It is operated as part of the MBTA bus system, but branded as bus rapid transit (BRT) as part of the MBTA subway system. Six routes are operated as part of two disconnected corridors. As of 2019, weekday ridership on the Silver Line was 39,000.
Miami-Dade Transit (MDT) is the primary public transit authority of Miami, Florida and the greater Miami-Dade County area. It is the largest transit system in Florida and the 15th-largest transit system in the United States. As of 2023, the system has 80,168,700 rides per year, or about 279,400 per weekday in the first quarter of 2024. MDT operates the Metrobus with their paratransit STS systems run by LSF. MDT also operates two rail transit systems: Metrorail and Metromover.
Metromover is a free to ride automated people mover system operated by Miami-Dade Transit in Miami, Florida, United States. Metromover serves the Downtown Miami, Brickell, Park West and Arts & Entertainment District neighborhoods. Metromover connects directly with Metrorail at Government Center and Brickell stations. It also connects to Metrobus with dedicated bus loops at Government Center and Adrienne Arsht Center station. It originally began service to the Downtown/Inner Loop on April 17, 1986, and was later expanded with the Omni and Brickell Loop extensions on May 26, 1994.
The Transitway is a bus rapid transit (BRT) network operated by OC Transpo in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It comprises a series of bus-only roadways and reserved lanes on city streets and highways. The dedicated busways ensure that buses and emergency vehicles on the Transitway rarely intersect directly with the regular traffic, and make it possible for them to continue at full speed even during rush hour. OC Transpo operates a network of rapid routes which use the Transitway to connect communities with the O-Train light rail system. Additional bus routes also use segments of the Transitway.
Palmetto station is a Metrorail rapid transit station in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States, just near the town of Medley. It is the current northern terminus of the Metrorail system. This station is located near the intersection of Northwest 77th Street and 79 Avenue, opening to service May 30, 2003. It is adjacent to the Palmetto Expressway, providing convenience to west Miami-Dade and Broward commuters traveling into Downtown Miami. The station is in a low-density warehouse area and has low ridership. In 2023 a 900-unit housing project was proposed for the site.900 apartments
Government Center station is an intermodal transit hub in the Government Center district of Downtown Miami, Florida. It is operated by Miami-Dade Transit and serves as a transfer station for the Metrorail and Metromover rapid transit systems and as a bus station for Metrobus, Paratransit, and Broward County Transit buses. MiamiCentral is directly connected via a pedestrian bridge over NW 3rd Street. The station is located near the intersection of Northwest First Street and First Avenue, a part of the Stephen P. Clark Government Center Building. It opened to service May 20, 1984, next to the site of a former FEC railway station which is now MiamiCentral.
Brickell station is a Metrorail rapid transit station in Miami, Florida, serving the system's Green and Orange Lines. One of the core stations of Miami's public transport network, it serves the financial district of Brickell. Combined, the Metrorail and Metromover station complex at Brickell sees roughly 8,430 boardings each weekday, making it the system's second-busiest station.
Dadeland South station is a transfer station on the Metrorail rapid transit system in the Dadeland district of Kendall, Florida. It is the southern terminus of the Metrorail system and the northern terminus of the South Dade TransitWay. It is the southernmost passenger rail station in the Continental United States. This station is located near the intersection of Dadeland Boulevard and Datran Boulevard, adjacent to South Dixie Highway, three blocks southwest of Kendall Drive and Dadeland Mall, and just east of the US 1–Palmetto Expressway junction. It opened to service May 20, 1984.
Miami Intermodal Center (MIC) is an intermodal rapid transit, commuter rail, intercity rail, local bus, and intercity bus transportation hub in Miami-Dade County, Florida, just outside the Miami city limits near the Grapeland Heights neighborhood. The facility was constructed by the Florida Department of Transportation and is owned by the Greater Miami Expressway Agency.
Metrorail is a rapid transit system in Miami and Miami-Dade County in the U.S. state of Florida. Metrorail is operated by Miami-Dade Transit (MDT), a departmental agency of Miami-Dade County. Opened in 1984, it is Florida's only rapid transit metro system, and is currently composed of two lines of 23 stations on 24.4 miles (39.3 km) of standard gauge track. Metrorail serves the urban core of Miami, connecting Miami International Airport, the Health District, Downtown Miami, and Brickell with the northern developed neighborhoods of Hialeah and Medley to the northwest, and to suburban The Roads, Coconut Grove, Coral Gables, and South Miami, ending at urban Dadeland in Kendall. Metrorail connects to the Metromover in Downtown, which provides metro service to the entirety of Downtown and Brickell. Additionally, it connects to South Florida's commuter rail system at Tri-Rail station, as well as Metrobus routes at all stations. In 2023, the system had 13,439,300 rides, and about 51,500 per day in the first quarter of 2024.
The Metro Red Line is a bus rapid transit line between the Twin Cities suburbs of Bloomington, Minnesota and Apple Valley, Minnesota. The Red Line travels primarily on Minnesota State Highway 77 and Cedar Avenue from the Apple Valley station in Apple Valley, north through Eagan, Minnesota, to the Mall of America station in Bloomington where it connects to the Metro Blue Line. The line has bus rapid transit elements including bus-only lanes, specially branded vehicles, transit signal priority, and dedicated stations.
Dadeland is a commercial district and urban neighborhood similar to an edge city, amid the sprawling metropolitan Miami suburbs of Kendall, Glenvar Heights, and Pinecrest, in the U.S. state of Florida, at the end of the Metrorail line.
Metroway is a bus rapid transit (BRT) line operated by the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) as part of their Metrobus system. It consists of a single line operating in Arlington and Alexandria, Virginia. It opened on August 24, 2014. It was the first bus rapid transit line to open in Virginia and in the Washington metropolitan area.
Metro Busway is a system of bus rapid transit (BRT) routes that operate primarily along exclusive or semi-exclusive roadways known locally as a busway or transitway. There are currently two lines serving 29 stations in the system: the G Line in the San Fernando Valley, and the J Line, serving El Monte, Downtown Los Angeles, Gardena, and San Pedro. The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) operates the Metro Busway system.
The Miami metropolitan area composed of the three counties of Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach, also known collectively as South Florida, is home to a wide variety of public and private transportation systems.
The Underline is a 10-mile linear park being developed in Miami-Dade County, Florida. When complete, it will run underneath the county's elevated Metrorail system from the Miami River near Brickell to the Metrorail's southern terminus at Dadeland South. The project is essentially upgrading a pre-existing bike path, known as the M-Path, into a full linear park. As of 2024, the first phase of The Underline was completed in the Brickell area on February 26, 2021. The second phase, which runs from Brickell to just south of Vizcaya station, was completed on April 24, 2024. The third and final phase will be completed in 2026.