St. Louis Metro restoration plan 'ahead of schedule'

St. Louis Metro President/CEO Robert J. Baer said that in the first 100 days since the voters of St. Louis County approved Proposition A, the agency has taken real and meaningful steps toward keeping its pledges to all of the residents in region and, is in fact, ahead of schedule.

"We told the community we would complete service restoration in three phases through November, but we're going to get it done in two phases by August 30 - three months ahead of schedule," Baer said.

Ray Friem, Metro's COO, pointed to implementing the first phase of service restoration on June 28 as the most obvious improvement since St. Louis County voters overwhelmingly passed the half-cent sales tax in Proposition A.

Even though the revenue from Proposition A will not begin arriving until the fall, Metro made a number of important improvements, such as the permanent restoration of service to and in some cases expansion of 20 bus routes, as well as increasing MetroLink train frequency by 25 percent.

By the end of July, Metro will be able to announce even more improvements to be made in the final round of service restoration on August 30.