Getting around Boca Raton without a car
Two railways with separate stations, seven Palm Tran routes, a free downtown on-demand shuttle and more than eighty miles of bike routes. What each one is for, and where the gaps are.
Boca Raton was built around the car, and most of it still assumes you have one. But it has two railways, a county bus network, a free on-demand shuttle downtown and a long run of bike routes — enough to manage without driving, if you know which piece does which job.
Two railways, two stations
The first thing to know: Tri-Rail and Brightline do not share a station here. They are a few miles apart.
| Tri-Rail | Brightline | |
|---|---|---|
| Station | 680 Yamato Road | 101 NW 4th St, downtown |
| What it is | Commuter rail with frequent local stops | Intercity rail with few stops |
| Goes to | North to Mangonia Park, south to Miami Airport and MiamiCentral | Miami, Aventura, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach and Orlando |
| Parking | Free for commuters | Garage, added when you buy your ticket |
| Best for | Daily commuting, the airports, stations in between | Downtown to downtown, and Orlando |
Tri-Rail's station is on Yamato Road in the north of the city, by the office parks — the city's pages call it the Yamato Road station. It is a bus and shuttle hub as well: Palm Tran routes 2 and 94 stop there, and free shuttles run from it to The Park at Broken Sound and the Boca Raton Innovation Campus (weekdays).
Brightline's station is downtown, within walking distance of the middle of downtown, which is the whole point of it: you can arrive from Miami or Orlando and never need a car for dinner.
Palm Tran buses
Palm Beach County's bus service runs seven routes through Boca Raton:
| Route | Runs along |
|---|---|
| 1 | US-1 (Federal Highway), north to Palm Beach Gardens |
| 2 | Congress Avenue, north to Palm Beach Gardens |
| 3 | Military Trail, north to Palm Beach Gardens |
| 4 | Jog Road, north to West Palm Beach |
| 91 | US-441 and Lyons Road in West Boca, then east along Glades Road to FAU |
| 92 | East–west across the city on Palmetto Park Road, West Boca to Mizner Boulevard |
| 94 | Tri-Rail station to FAU, then US-1 south to Camino Real |
Route 94 is free for FAU and Palm Beach State College students and staff. The Palm Tran app plans trips and tracks buses live.
Heading south into Broward County, you change buses. The city's transit page lists Broward County Transit's Route 10, which comes up US-1 to Mizner Park; check BCT's own timetable before you rely on it.
BocaConnect: the downtown shuttle
BocaConnect is the city's on-demand shuttle, run through the Circuit app: you request a ride and a vehicle comes to you. It has run since June 2024, and the city still describes it as a pilot, so check its page that it is operating before you plan around it.
Rides that start and end inside the central red zone are free. Roughly, it is the box between I-95 on the west and about 5th Avenue on the east, from the Hillsboro Canal up to Glades Road — plus the beach road from Gumbo Limbo down to the inlet. The city's page has the map. Rides out to the wider zones cost a fare.
By bike
The city counts more than 84 miles of bike lanes, shared paths and trails, and publishes a bike map as a PDF on its bicycles page. Both Tri-Rail and Palm Tran carry bikes under their own rules, so a bike plus a train covers a lot of the county.
The El Rio Trail is the one to know: a paved path beside the El Rio Canal, used for walking, cycling and running, with free parking at the Tri-Rail station end.
Flying
Boca Raton sits between two commercial airports: Palm Beach International to the north and Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International to the south. Tri-Rail does not run to PBI, but its line south runs past Fort Lauderdale toward Miami's airport.
Boca Raton Airport, near FAU, serves private, corporate and flight-training flying — if you are booking an airline ticket, it will be from PBI or FLL.
What you cannot use
FAU's campus shuttle is for students, faculty and staff, and you need an FAU Owl Card to board.
What this page will not tell you
Fares. Every operator above sets its own and changes them; the links below go to the source.
Where this comes from
Checked against these on 2026-10-03. Fees, deadlines and portals change — if one of these pages disagrees with this one, the official page is right and we would like to know.
- Tri-Rail — Boca Raton Station
- Brightline — Boca Raton Station
- Palm Tran — Bus routes
- Palm Tran — App
- City of Boca Raton — BocaConnect Circuit Shuttle
- City of Boca Raton — Public Transportation
- City of Boca Raton — Bicycles & Pedestrians
- City of Boca Raton — El Rio Trail
- City of Boca Raton — Innovation Campus shuttle
- City of Boca Raton — Airports
October 2026 — First published.
We record when a guide was published and when it was last revised. We do not yet record what changed, so this is a dating record rather than a changelog.
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