PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The Berkshire Regional Transit Authority will offer free bus fares starting next week on Nov. 29 and running through Sept. 30, 2025.

It’s part of the “Try Transit” program and the authority is getting about $700,000 from the state to fund it. 

“Customers get an opportunity to ride the bus more than a couple of days and see if it fits into their schedule, can it work for them, and for the part that were seeing so far, yes it can,” said Robert Malnati, administrator for the BRTA.

The BRTA is seeing an increase in ridership and says last month their paratransit had the second highest ridership in 10 years. 

They are thinking they will exceed 600,000 riders for the fiscal year. Last year they had 539,000 on the fixed route.