Transportation

How Houston's Bus Network Got Its Groove Back

A short documentary gets viewers up to speed on the system’s overnight transformation.
Houston Metropolitan Transit Agency

Not long ago, Houston’s bus service befit a version of the city out of the 1950s. Despite decades of decentralized urban growth, most bus lines still zig-zagged into one small section of the downtown core, where only 25 percent of the region’s jobs are located. Route redundancies were rampant. And despite the all-day transit needs of university students and low-income riders, frequent service (meaning buses arriving every 15 minutes or faster) was mostly limited to weekday rush hours.