Residents of Toronto have found reminders of our public transit system in all sorts of weird places, whether it's an homage in a viral video game, an appearance in the background of a blockbuster film or, this week, in the midst of traffic on a highway in another country.

A person who was visiting the city of Chicago some 800 km away from home over the weekend did a double take when they noticed a giant red vehicle passing next to them on the I-90, which they quickly identified as none other than a TTC bus.

While TTC vehicles have been spotted in museums, on farms, in the middle of the remote Ontario wilderness and on Facebook Marketplace, this incident was somewhat more dumbfounding, as the bus wasn't old or out of use, but evidently brand new and fully functional.

Sharing a snap of the bus to Reddit, the perplexed individual roused tons of jokes about the Blue Night route going "really, really far," subway replacement shuttles taking so long to arrive "because they're coming from Chicago," and operators being forced to make unimaginably lengthy detours due to downtown condo construction.

But, all jokes aside, there's actually a very simple and logical explanation for the sighting — which isn't an uncommon one, either, according to the commission itself.

TTC bus spotted in Chicago today
byu/BopkyTa intoronto

"This is one of the 202 hybrid electric buses we are receiving from New Flyer, largely manufactured in Winnipeg before being sent to Crookston, MN for final assembly," TTC spokesperson Stuart Green tells blogTO, adding that some 100 buses have already made the same trip as the one depicted in the post.

"They are then driven from Crookston to Toronto for commissioning. Driving them is not only cheaper than shipping, it allows us to give them a good test run."

A few in the comments section also noted that the route through the U.S. is favourable because it is shorter, flatter, and less treacherous than going back up north to the Trans Canada Highway, in addition to having cheaper gas options and higher speed limits.

Green says that TTC buses from another manufacturing centre in Saint Eustache, Quebec may also be noticed far outside the city's bounds as they similarly make the trip home via Highway 401.

"I did double check in case this was indeed a bus diverting around Toronto due to construction this summer," he quipped.