Citilink — the modern system

1968–TODAY · TWELVE ROUTES AND A DOWNTOWN STATION

The system as documented: The PTC operates from its garage and headquarters at 801 Leesburg Road. Its scale, at the dates the published record fixes it: in 2012 the combined fleet numbered 52 buses, and fixed-route buses ran 1,441,800 miles and carried 2,061,576 one-way trips. Annual one-way passenger trips stood at 2,011,992 in 2011 and 1,969,599 in 2015. The 2015 fleet consisted of 37 fixed-route buses, eighteen of them hybrid-electric, and 16 demand-response buses; the hybrid fleet had begun with seven buses added on 23 June 2010. The system as currently described runs twelve fixed-route lines plus two deviation (flex) routes, Monday through Saturday, with no Sunday service and no service on six holidays — service to Fort Wayne and New Haven. John Metzinger became general manager in April 2021, and under him the agency reports ridership restored to 97 percent of its pre-pandemic level and full staffing recovered.

Terminals and special services: For most of the system's life its downtown terminal was a transfer point rather than a building — the descendant of Transfer Corner. The corporation built a second hub, the Hanna-Creighton Transit Center in southeast Fort Wayne, in 2005, co-located with the Pontiac Library, the Fort Wayne Urban League and a Head Start center. The downtown station took a decade: Citilink began the effort in 2002, chose a site on Barr Street between Washington and Jefferson, and lost years when the property could not be assembled; the project moved to land Citilink already owned at Baker and Calhoun, next door to the former Amtrak station, where ground was broken on 29 August 2011 under a $4.4 million construction contract, and Citilink Central Station, at 121 West Baker Street, opened on 14 September 2012 — a 2,700-square-foot building with covered bus bays, an information center and passenger amenities, designed with space for taxis, county and social-service transport, and a future intercity-bus tenant. In 2009 the system added CampusLink, a free shuttle linking the IPFW (now Purdue Fort Wayne) and Ivy Tech campuses with dormitories, shopping and residential areas; when IPFW's funding was not renewed in 2015 the route was refocused on Ivy Tech's Coliseum and North campuses.

Sources: NIRCC, Bus Fort Wayne plan (2012 fleet, mileage and trip figures; the Central Station opening, 14 September 2012); Fort Wayne Citilink reference data (2011 and 2015 ridership; the twelve routes and service span; 801 Leesburg Road); Citilink fleet records via the 2015 fleet summary (37 fixed-route and 16 demand-response buses; the 2010 hybrid additions); AroundFortWayne, 30 August 2011 (the Baker Street groundbreaking; the 2002 Barr Street effort and its failure; the $4.4 million contract); the News-Sentinel, 25 April 2009, via the Citilink record (CampusLink's debut; the 2015 IPFW funding lapse); Input Fort Wayne, 2025 (Metzinger's April 2021 start; the 97 percent recovery figure, as the agency reports it).