Prior to 1948, most public transportation in New Jersey was provided by the
Public Service Corporation of New Jersey, a utility company that also operated the
Public Service Railway division. In 1948, the Public Service Corporation was divided into two entities: the
Public Service Electric and Gas Company, which inherited the utility operations, and the Public Service Coordinated Transportation Company (PSCT), which inherited the transit operations. PSCT provided service throughout New Jersey, originally using
trolleys and then transitioning to
trolley buses, and buses. During the 1970s, the
New Jersey Department of Transportation began funding the routes of Public Service, now renamed Transport of New Jersey (TNJ), contracting with TNJ and other companies to operate local bus service throughout New Jersey. NJ Transit came into being as the result of the New Jersey Public Transportation Act of 1979 to "acquire, operate, and contract for transportation services in the public interest". NJ Transit Bus Operations came into being the following year, when it acquired Transport of New Jersey from PSE&G. Other purchases and buyouts in the 1980s expanded the bus division of NJ Transit, including the assumption of service for Somerset Bus Company in 1982 and the acquisition of the Atlantic City Transportation Company in 1987. In 1992 NJ Transit Mercer, Inc., which was the successor to the former "Mercer Metro" operation that NJ Transit took over in 1984 for the Trenton and Princeton areas, was folded into NJ Transit Bus Operations. In 2010,
PABCO Transit (Passaic-Athenia Bus) taken over under the subsidiary NJ Transit Morris, Inc. Following the
COVID-19 pandemic in New Jersey numerous private carriers went out of business and NJ Transit took over many of their routes, including those of
Olympia Trails subsidiaries (
ONE Bus,
Red & Tan in Hudson County),
A&C Bus Corporation,
DeCamp Bus Lines, and
Transdev. == Routes ==