A Deserved Break for Bus Riders

That the board of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has reached an agreement with lawyers representing riders of the nation’s most crowded bus system is very welcome news. A federal judge still must approve the settlement, but this development means that the end is in sight for a contentious, 2-year-old fight that figured to have a huge fiscal impact on the region’s mass transit plans.

The class-action suit was filed in 1994 by a coalition that includes the Labor/Community Strategy Center. In part, the lawsuit contended that the bus system had been neglected in favor of costly and inefficient rail projects and that there had been intentional discrimination against bus-dependent minorities.

The agreement, announced Wednesday, seems to give the plaintiffs much of what they wanted. It calls for putting 152 more buses on the streets in its first two years, with a timetable for increasing peak-hour bus seat capacity by 2002. The agreement sets the popular monthly pass at $42 a month instead of the current $49, establishes a new $11 weekly pass and drops the price of a 15-day pass from $26.50 to $21. Pass fares will be locked in for three years.

Among other things, bus tokens will remain available and there will be an off-peak discount to 75 cents on heavily used bus routes. Base bus fares will remain at $1.35 and transfers at 25 cents. Cash fares are locked in for two years.

Previously, said Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, “we’ve put way too many resources into fixed rail” while ignoring buses. Now that the agreement has been reached, questions remain on how to fund it. In this regard, the best the MTA was willing to offer in the past was to direct surplus money toward new buses. In fact, such “surplus money” is nonexistent in the current budget. Funding will have to be found, an especially difficult problem since the MTA received less than half of the federal “new start” rail money it expected from Congress.

In October, the MTA is expected to unveil a revised long-term plan for the region’s mass transit system. It will have to factor in this important bus agreement. Now, Los Angeles and its environs need a sober and realistic plan that isn’t based on the cheery fiscal assumptions of the past. The region needs a plan that inspires confidence here, in Sacramento and on Capitol Hill. The bus agreement, we hope, is the first big step in that direction.