A federal appeals court on Friday ordered the Los Angeles MTA to buy hundreds of new buses to relieve overcrowding throughout Los Angeles County. The decision, which took 16 months for the court to hand down, rejects the MTA's appeal of a court order issued more than two years ago calling for the agency to buy 248 additional buses, reports the Los Angeles Times. A 1996 consent decree aimed to limit the number of standing passengers on the buses and the court found the MTA failed to comply with that decree. The decree required that, by the end of 1997, no more than an average of 15 passengers be standing on a bus during any 20-minute peak period. The maximum number of standees dropped to 11 by June 2000 and that number will drop to nine next July. The decree also requires the agency to reallocate resources from other programs to reduce overcrowding. Since March 1999, the Los Angeles MTA has received more than 1,000 new buses. More than 400 of those were delivered this year.