R-LINE Bus

Great way to get around the heart of downtown Raleigh. Very comfortable buses and run on a consistent schedule. Run Late on the weekends which is great!

My son loves transportation and so riding a city bus was a must. The bus was clean and the driver was really friendly. My son was a happy camper and it was nice to play tourist for the day.

We waited 25 minutes (bus is supposed to come every 6 min) at the Wilmington stop attempting to head to Glenwood South for dinner. The bus didn’t show up. It is not worth the trouble when you have people asking you for money the whole time you wait.

A free service, but not entirely reliable.
I’ve always been a huge advocate of the R-​Line. After all, it’s a free service that will cart you around downtown Raleigh in air conditioning (or heat). The web app still works fine; I always know where the buses are and how long to expect to wait.
Unfortunately, I’ve had buses breeze right by me at night recently at stops near the Warehouse District. I’m not quite sure why. I am 6’6″ so I am hard to miss. I was also standing right near the stop. I am familiar with all of the R-​Line stops and their operating times. I’ve also experienced an R-​Line bus skip right by a couple people waiting at one of its most popular stops by The Hibernian.
On my last trip, I was on the way to Seaboard Station and pulled the cord right on Wilmington Street before the intersection. The bus drove right by the stop and I immediately asked if I could be let off. Unfortunately, I guess the R-​Line can only stop at scheduled stops for legal purposes so I summoned an Über once I could get off.

I’ve taken the R-​Line bus a couple of times now and they were both good experiences for me. A free bus that travels the downtown area. What’s not to love about that? There are plenty of stops all around downtown. So, no matter where you’re trying to get to, it’s only a short wait away. The buses run until 2:00am Thurs — Sat which is nice for people enjoying the Raleigh nightlife.
It’s a simple system where you wait at any bus stop with the R-​Line logo and jump on the next bus that comes along. When you want to get off, you notify the driver by pulling the yellow cord before the next stop. They also have a real time tracking app you can download to your smartphone to see when the next bus is supposed to get to your location. Talk about convenient! I’m definitely going to be taking advantage of this service in the future and I recommend you do too!

So far, I have loved my R-​Line experiences! What a treat to live in a city where you can get from one side of downtown to the other for free! It’s about a 10 – 15 minute wait in between buses and the stops are scattered frequently throughout the city and are well labeled. It’s easy to get on, used by locals and tourists alike and the drivers are pleasant. I make most use of it getting from the Borough area (easy access to the Depot) over to Moore Square (whether for a festival, access to City Market or a local downtown bar) and there’s also easy access to Peace Street and Glenwood. It’s a great part of downtown Raleigh and one that I’d happily encourage all locals to take advantage of.

Haven’t used the R-​LINE? Why not?!
Public transportation services are important in many ways. They can improve a city’s quality of life by providing mobility and by supporting public policies regarding energy use, air quality, and carbon emissions. More importantly, though, they can also promote local economic growth.
The R-​LINE is no exception. As a complimentary bus service in downtown Raleigh, the R-​LINE has definitely had an impact on our local economy. With two buses circulating the downtown Raleigh area, the R-​LINE benefits the city by connecting the various downtown districts and creating a convenient and FREE way to navigate and explore downtown Raleigh’s diverse collection of businesses, shops, restaurants, and attractions.
If you live in Raleigh or are simply passing through, I highly recommend taking advantage of this easily accessible and wonderful service.
I do have a few suggestions for improvements, though. First, having one bus run clockwise and the other running counterclockwise (rather than both running in the same direction) would increase productivity and efficiency of the bus route while enhancing flexibility and convenience when traveling from point A to point B.
Secondly, it would be nice if the R-​LINE operated slightly later than 8:00pm on Sundays. Downtown businesses and venues often host events on Sunday evenings; providing reliable, accessible transit would encourage public participation in these special events and other entertainment/​attractions.

Best way to get around Downtown Raleigh for free

For all the time I have spent at restaurants, bars, and venues in the downtown Raleigh area, I never took the opportunity to ride the R Line until this weekend. I parked up near where I would end up the night (around The Borough) and then took the R Line down to the Moore Square area to enjoy the World Beer Festival at the evening session. It worked out pretty good, took the R Line back and continued my night.
The handiest part is the phone app tracking the buses (there are two circulating counterclockwise in the route loop in the downtown area). You know when to expect the next bus and time your arrival at the stop with it, with a little «you are here» icon for reference. Great feature, no guessing on when the next bus can come for you. For more info on downloading the app and other info on the R Line, try here:
to read up.
The most attractive part is that it is FREE. Free ride, free wifi, free free free… free is good. Free is tremendously awesome (or awesomely tremendous, whichever). Coupled with very clean and well maintained buses that are also hybrid electric buses that help everyone be environment-​friendly, it’s a good deal all around. You will usually see a bus every 10 – 15 minutes, being that there are usually two buses going on the 20 – 30 minute total loop. They do run late night till 215a on Thurs-​Sat, for all the bar hoppers out there, but be careful around end of running time I hear… get out there well before the hours end to make sure you hit that last loop. I do wish they had better Sunday hours though, 1p-​8p is pretty limited but it’s great they even do have those hours period for Sunday. Later Sunday hours would allow for more dining hours type of utilization, I’d think.
Bottom line: R Line is a great and free mode of getting around DTR. Great way to see downtown as well if you get the chance. Two thumbs up!

Free Circulating Bus in Downtown Raleigh
Hey, have you heard about the FREE bus system in downtown Raleigh? It’s called The R-​Line! It is a complimentary bus service in downtown Raleigh that continuously circulates in a counterclockwise fashion from the southern points of the Raleigh Convention Center and Performing Arts Center to the northernmost point of Seaboard Station on Peace Street and servicing City Market, Warehouse District, and Glenwood South.
Hop on and ride all you want for FREE! There are two buses that follow a circuit around downtown Raleigh and it takes about 15 – 20 minutes to run the whole trip. If you want to know more accurately when the bus will arrive, download the free app on your smart phone that tracks the location of the buses by GPS. One Unilocaler mentioned it was available for his Droid phone and I know there is an app for the iPhone since I have one. (BTW, I’m a huge Apple fan and I have a deep and abiding love for my iPhone.) Just a word of advice about the GPS app, it is in real time but sometimes it takes a minute or two to update and the buses tend to ‘hop’ along the route. So if you wish to catch the R-​Line at a specific stop, you need to allow sufficient time. From my experience, I get to the stop where I wish to get on the bus when the GPS shows the bus is at the stop 3 ahead of my stop. Then my wait is always less than 5 minutes and I don’t miss it.
The R-​line route has a slight change after 6:30 pm. Two other ‘areas’, the Warehouse District and Moore Square, are added to the route. Let me point out that the stop at R16/​Moore Square Deck, which is close to Busy Bee and Slims, is not serviced after 6:30 pm.
I can’t add much else that hasn’t already been written. But I’d like to reiterate the highlights:
1. FREE
2. Clean
3. Safe
4. Comfortable (cool in the summer and warm in the winter)
5. Wheelchair accessible
6. Eco-​friendly
Schedule:
Monday — Wednesday 7 am — 11 pm
Thursday — Saturday: 7am — 2:15am
Sunday: 1pm — 8pm
IMHO, there is one improvement the R-​Line could make which is have one bus run counterclockwise and have the other bus run clockwise. I have spoken with a few people on the R-​Line that are here for a convention and staying at the Marriott and want to have dinner at The Pit. They have to basically ride the entire circuit to get there so if one of the buses ran the opposite direction, they would only have to ride for 2 stops to get to The Pit instead of riding through 17 stops.
If you are in downtown Raleigh, take advantage of this wonderful service and get a free ride on the R-​Line!

The R-​Line is great. I will list a few reason why.
1) It is FREE. and who does not like FREE.
2) Raleigh recently had the bright idea of removing all of the free parking spots close to everything, and converting all of them to paid parking with credit card readers. So now, you can park a few blocks farther away from your destination in a free parking area, and ride the R-​Line to where you want to go.
3) Not many people know, they they even have this cool app for your phone. I got mine from the ANDROID market. What happens is that after you download this FREE app to your phone, you open it up, and it tells you where you are, where the bus stop is, and a real-​time location of all the buses. That way you know just how far you are from the bus, and when it will next be along.
4) Free WiFi. There is free Wifi on the bus. And who does not like free.
5) The A/​C works. So, you already know that you will be parking a few blocks from your destination, and you don’t want to get sweaty walking to where you are going, and you don’t want to mess up your heels, so why not catch a nice cool ride to where you have to go.
6) They sometimes plan stuff to do downtown around the R-​Line. I know last year, they had this awesome scavenger hunt downtown that was surrounding the R-​Line, and it’s stops.
7) They run late. On the weekdays, till 11:00, which is when stuff is closing anyway, but on the weekends, they are run till after 2:00 AM. Just remember, it you are lit, tipsy, or have a buzz, get off at the taxi stand, not your car if you don’t have a DD.
8) The buses are in pretty good shape, and not old as dirt. They are eco friendly.
So, now you know why I like the R-​Line. Mainly because I am cheap and didn’t want to have to pay the City of Raleigh to park. So I parked in a free spot, and then rode to where I had to go. :-)

Jumped aboard the R-​Line twice today and realized how convenient and easy it is! Free public transport is a huge plus, and really, this bus route serves as a great downtown connector making it easy to get to and from different districts (like Seaboard Station to City Plaza, for instance).
As buses go, it wasn’t crowded, it didn’t smell, and the nifty R-​Line app keeps you updated on the buses’ exact location in real time! Swell.

Go-​go-​go R-​Line! I’m not a huge fan of buses, spent 5 years riding the Muni in San Francisco, packed like sardines but the R-​Line is fantastico! Clean, free and punctual always works in my book. The service has only been running about a year or so but I’m starting to use it more frequently now that I’m in good enough shape (hah!) to waddle over to the nearest stop on Glenwood! With the new real-​time tracking app, it’s also become really easy to time your trips and catch a bus easily.
The buses are clean and comfortable and the drivers are pretty cool too. So while Raleigh-​ites may still be used to using their cars, give the R-​Line a shot the next time you’re out drinking downtown. Save yourself some gas and money on the R-​Line. It’s the right thing to do in so many ways…