King County Metro, officially the
King County Department of Transportation Metro Transit Division or
Metro for short, is the
public transit authority of
King County, Washington, a division of the King County Department of Transportation. It began operations on January 1, 1973, but can trace its roots to Seattle Transit, founded in 1939, and Overlake Transit Service, founded in 1927. As of 2015, it operated 1,882
buses on 215 routes. Its annual ridership in 2012 was over 114 million making it the 8th largest agency in the nation. Metro employs 2,716 full- and part-time operators (year-end 2012).