Santa Barbara MTD Celebrates 50 Years of Public Transit Service

Santa Barbara MTD is celebrating 50 years of service to Santa Barbara’s South Coast community. While an act of the voters officially created the Santa Barbara Metropolitan Transit District in 1966, public transit service officially began on February 1, 1969. 

To share our rich history with the public MTD has launched a special webpage at sbmtd.gov/50years has been designed with an interactive timeline showing photos and news clippings of milestones from the past 50 years.

Additionally, members of the community are encouraged to share their favorite MTD stories. The special webpage at sbmtd.gov/50years has a space where people are encouraged to share their earliest MTD memory, favorite bus riding story, or how MTD has helped connect our community.

To commemorate this occasion, the agency will be hosting an event on Wednesday, March 27th, 2019 at the MTD Administrative Offices at 550 Olive Street in Santa Barbara from 11:00am to 1:00pm. A brief program will begin at 11:30am, and members of the public are invited to come enjoy refreshments, tour our new buses, and help celebrate MTD’s golden anniversary. The John G. Britton Auditorium will be transformed into the MTD Museum, full of local transit artifacts and archives to explore.

Attendees are, of course, encouraged to arrive by transit — the Line 20 and Crosstown Shuttle serve the area surrounding the event location.