Pittsburgh Regional Transit opens 5 new bus stations, bolstering key corridor

PITTSBURGH — New weather-resistant canopies, seats and safety features are all part of Pittsburgh Regional Transit’s new bus station upgrades meant to put riders first.

Eli Jones said he rides the bus every day and enjoys the new stations.

“Chicago has them, New York has them and Pittsburgh really needs them,” Jones said.

PRT riders said they’ve been waiting for the PRTX stations and their new features, like real-time arrival screens.

“It makes it a lot easier,” Jones said of the screens. “It’s like having an airport or something, ya know. Sometimes you get to just look at the wall, and then you’re rushing to find a bus or rushing to find the train.”

The upgrades come from PRT’s multi-phase, $291 million University Line Bus Rapid Transit Project.

The entire corridor has about 30,000 daily riders, with most of the riders coming from Oakland.

“This is our highest ridership corridor in the entire county,” said Amy Silbermann, PRT chief development officer, “so investment in this corridor connecting Downtown to Oakland has been talked about for decades and decades, and we are really excited to finally make this happen.

Five locations opened new stations Sunday: Ross Street, William Penn, Market Square, Wood Street and Steel Plaza.

The stations sit along the red University Line, which was recently restricted to buses only. PRT hopes this will make for quicker bus trips, encouraging commuters to take the bus rather than drive.

Phase 2 of the project includes 18 new stations and will be completed by the end of 2027.

“In addition to the University Line buses, there are four of those bus routes that will serve these stations,” Silbermann said. “We have our east busway route and our west busway route using these stations Downtown as well. So, we can have easy transfers for folks who may want to go from the west to the east or from the west to Oakland.”

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