The Allegheny Institute is a non-profit research and education organization. Our mission is to defend the interests of taxpayers, citizens and businesses against an increasingly burdensome and intrusive government. To that end, we will formulate and advocate public policies that roll back the size and scope of local government as well as create a more accountable government. Our efforts will be guided by the principles of free enterprise, property rights, civil society and individual freedom that are the bedrock upon which this nation was founded.
Pittsburgh City Council raised property taxes 20 percent in December and reopened and passed a revised 2026 operating budget in April. But if estimates from the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) second quarter report hold, the year will end in a deficit. The preliminary 2027 operating budget and five-year forecast shows four years of negative operating results and a negative ending fund balance in 2031.
Introduction: In 2005, Pittsburgh Regional Transit (PRT), then known as the Port Authority of Allegheny County, had a passenger total for bus and light rail of 66.2 million. By 2010, the total had fallen to 63.4 million and just before the COVID impact in 2020, passengers totaled 62.2 million.
After falling sharply in 2020, the passenger count recovered to reach 36.1 million in 2025, 42 percent below the pre-COVID reading. A further small rise in ridership in 2026 lifted the count to 38.1 million. Note that the annual counts reported are based on the fiscal year of July 1 of the prior year to June 30 of the reporting year. For example, the 2026 total is for the 12 months following July 1, 2025, through June 30, 2026.
This Policy Brief reviews PRT spending per passenger, county population decline and the performance of the key factors that affect public transportation use.
Pittsburgh could face a major budget deficit this year and perhaps a multimillion-dollar shortfall in coming years. And a researcher at a local think tank says there are myriad steps that must be considered to help begin to balance the books.
Pittsburgh Regional Transit (PRT) has consistently failed to adjust to myriad changing metrics – economic, population and operational — resulting in a continuing higher than necessary cost structure, concludes a researcher at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy.
“PRT has been operating in an overall long-term weakening environment regarding the number of potential riders on the buses and light-rail system,” says Jake Haulk, president-emeritus of the Pittsburgh think tank (in Policy Brief Vol. 26, No. 34).
