The omnibus was a large horse-drawn coach running a fixed route and timetable for a flat fare, open to anyone who paid rather than hired privately. A working service began in Nantes in 1826 and the model was scaled up in Paris from 1828 under Stanislas Baudry, whose name 'omnibus' (for all) stuck. Vehicles typically seated a dozen or more and stopped along the line to pick up and set down passengers.
It was the first true mass urban public transport, making daily travel across the city affordable to the middle and working classes. By letting people live at a distance from their work, it began the spatial separation of home and workplace that would define the modern city.
See it on the timeline →