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 (21–38) and feeder routes (51–95). 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).
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 ==