The Area Personal Transit serves the Las Colinas area of Irving, a suburb of Dallas. The system has four passenger stations and a maintenance and control center. As built by AEG-Westinghouse, the APT used automated guideway transit technology with a long range plan of 5 miles of dual lane elevated guideway and 20 stations. To date, however, the system has only two routes totaling 1.4 miles.

The APT opened on June 18, 1989 with one- or two-car trains running on two routes from 7 a.m. to midnight on weekdays, 11 a.m. to midnight on Saturdays and 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sundays with a fare of 50 cents per ride. But due to rising expenses and a Dallas-area real estate crash, the system was shut down in July 1993 and expansion plans were put on hold.

As the economy improved, the system reopened on December 2, 1996 and the Dallas County Utility and Reclamation District assumed operation of the line. When the APT's computer was restarted, it was found that it could no longer control the trains automatically. Rather than upgrade the computer, it was decided to run the system manually. Single cars now run from 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. on weekdays for the benefit of workers in the Urban Area riding to the restaurants lining the Las Colinas Mandalay Canal. No fare is charged. The Bell Tower/Mandalay Canal Station is the only public station; all others, protected from the elements, are accessed through private office buildings.

Each APT vehicle can carry 45 passengers comfortably: 33 standing and 12 seated. The drivers run the cars from what was originally an emergency and maintenance control panel at one end of each car.

Recently the guideway has been extended to DART's Las Colinas Orange Line station. When the extension opens in 2013 the APT's operating hours will be increased as it is expected that patronage will increase substantially.

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