About Pace

Pace's family of public transportation services offer affordable, innovative, and environmentally responsible transit options for the residents of 274 municipalities in Cook, Will, DuPage, Kane, Lake and McHenry counties. The backbone of Chicago's suburbs, Pace serves approximately 127,000 daily riders. One of the largest bus services in North America, Pace covers 3,677 square miles, an area nearly the size of the state of Connecticut and about 15 times the size of the City of Chicago. Pace's innovative approach to public transportation gives the agency a national reputation as an industry leader.

Pace is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of thirteen directors. Each serves a four-year term and, with the exception of the Commissioner of the Mayor′s Office for People with Disabilities, must be a Mayor or Village President from his or her respective region, or a former Mayor or Village President residing in his or her respective region.

Our System

Pace's History and Agency Milestones

Pace was created by the 1983 RTA Act to unify the numerous disparate suburban bus agencies that existed at that time. In doing so, fares, branding and management were made consistent throughout the region. On July 1, 1984, the consolidated agency began operations as the Suburban Bus Division of the Regional Transportation Authority. A year after that, the brand name 'Pace' was established.

For its first few years, Pace focused on the unification efforts and renewing its bus garages and fleet, but rapid population and employment growth in the suburbs led to multiple strategic planning and long-range planning efforts that took place in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s.

Accessibility has always been a hallmark of Pace service. Pace provided ''Section 504'' service to people with disabilities several years before this type of service was required by the Americans with Disabilities Act. In 2006, Pace had established itself as a leader in providing efficient, quality service to people with disabilities, and the Illinois legislature designated that Pace would assume responsibility for ADA paratransit in Chicago from the CTA. The move made Pace the largest providers of paratransit service in the United States.

By providing quality public transportation options, Pace helps residents of Northeastern Illinois reduce their carbon footprint, protect the environment for present and future generations, and conserve natural resources. In fact, Pace's family of transit services already removes more than 100,000 cars from our roadways every day.

Pace's Accomplishments

To view Pace's accomplishments over the years, check out our Annual Reports page. 

Go Green: Pace's Sustainability Efforts

According to the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), the "leverage effect" of public transportation reduces the nation's carbon emissions by 37 million metric tons annually--equivalent to the electricity used by 4.9 million households. To achieve a similar reduction in carbon emissions, every household in New York City, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Denver and Los Angeles combined would have to completely stop using electricity. The lesson is simple: when commuters ride public transit instead of driving their own cars, air quality improves.

However, Pace recognizes our own responsibility for pollution reduction as an operator of hundreds of vehicles in our region. This is why one of Pace's top priorities is to reduce our carbon footprint and improve the quality of our community's environment:

• As part of our Driving Innovation plan, Pace committed in 2021 to making the North Division in Waukegan an electric-bus-only facility by 2026 and to converting Pace's entire bus fleet to zero-emission vehicles by 2040. Other upcoming efforts include:
  • A new Northwest Division facility in Wheeling is being retrofitted to become a CNG fueling station. More than 100 low-emission buses will be operated from this garage by 2023.
  • In partnership with IDOT, two electric paratransit vehicles will be added to Pace’s ADA Paratransit fleet.
  • Pace is in discussions with downstate transit agencies to explore a potential statewide initiative to purchase electric vans and paratransit vehicles.
  • An upcoming facilities study will evaluate what is needed for future garage conversions to electric and other alternative fuels, like RNG and hydrogen.
• Pace has 91 buses at South Division which use compressed natural gas (CNG), a fuel source that emits fewer greenhouse gases than diesel. South Division became a CNG fueling station in 2016 and was retrofitted in 2017-18 to allow for indoor maintenance on CNG buses.
• At the other divisions, Pace follows federal guidelines relating to clean diesel and for the maintenance of different engine types to maximize productivity and minimize pollution. We use ultra-low sulfur fuels that meet all federal requirements.
• Pace provides its employees with $75/month incentive to commute to work in a vanpool. Learn how you can join a carpool or vanpool at PaceCommuterRideshare.com.
• Pace recycles tires that can be used for playground flooring, tire retreading and even for tire derived fuel.
• Pace uses transit signal priority on several corridors, which saves fuel and reduces carbon emissions released into the air by buses idling at a red light.
• Any newly purchased diesel-fueled bus has transmissions and hydraulic systems which utilize synthetic fluids that extend drain intervals (every 75,000 miles instead of 12,000) for reduced environmental impact.
• In 2012, Pace purchased hybrid paratransit buses for Schaumburg and Elgin and has two full-sized hybrid buses operating in Highland Park.

People living in households within one-quarter mile of rail or one-tenth mile from a bus stop drive approximately 4,400 fewer miles annually compared to persons in similar households with no access to public transit. This equates to an individual household reduction of 223 gallons of gasoline a year.

Supporting transportation efficient land use patterns saves 4.2 billion gallons of gasoline--more than three times the amount of gasoline refined from the oil we import from Kuwait. Public transportation use saves the equivalent of 900,000 automobile fill-ups every day. The typical public transit rider consumes on average one half of the oil consumed by an automobile rider.