Bus Strike Reroutes a Holiday Trip

Mark Lucy had no idea that Orange County Transit District bus drivers would go on strike--their first in nearly six years--when he bought his plane ticket for England.

That was in early November, when the operations supervisor of OCTD radio communications could still get an early-bird fare for the Christmas holidays.

By the time he boarded the flight, Lucy said Sunday, the possibility of a walkout loomed. Knowing that he would have to return if a strike was called, Lucy gambled anyway.

He had not seen his wife and two sons since July, when they returned to her homeland as a prelude to a possible permanent move there by the whole family. His 18-month-old son, Robert, was to be christened before “a grand reunion” of relatives once Lucy arrived.

Lost His Gamble

On Dec. 4, Lucy left America. Four days later, he lost his gamble.

Duty called, Lucy said, and he knew he had to come home. So for the last two weeks, he has been driving transit district buses abandoned by the more more than 700 drivers who walked off the job Dec. 8--and thinking a great deal about the family he would not see Christmas morning.

But Lucy may get to spend the holidays with his family after all.

The drivers ended their strike Saturday afternoon and are expected to climb back behind the wheels of the OCTD fleet this morning. If he can get a ticket at this late date, Lucy said, he will be climbing aboard a plane.

“I’m not going to tell them about the strike ending until I get the ticket in my hand,” Lucy, 43, said Sunday. “I don’t want to get her hopes up for no reason. I left my wife in tears at the train station last time.”

Lucy said he will somehow scrape up the money to return to Bexhill By the Sea in East Suffex County on the southeastern coast of England, where his family is living in a rented house. But he hasn’t asked his bosses to pay for his third transcontinental flight in as many weeks.

“I knew what I was getting into when I left,” he said, his English accent still thick. He added that all OCTD supervisors had been told that their vacations would be canceled in the event of a strike, that they would have to call in periodically and, if the drivers voted for a work stoppage, managers would have to drive the buses themselves.

At 4 a.m. (PST) Dec. 8, Lucy telephoned his office and learned that a contract had not been ratified.

“They said, ‘Can you please come back?’ and I said ‘yes,’ ” Lucy recalled. I have to admit, I was asking myself on the return flight, ‘What am I doing on this plane?’

“I’ve been with the county Transit District 14 years, though, and we’ve got to be there for the public,” Lucy said. “So that’s my duty, and I came back to do it.

“Obviously, this has cost me money to do this. If there’s possibility of getting back, I’ll go, because Christmas is important to me and to be with my family. I think a lot of Orange County transit. Had I not, I wouldn’t have returned.”

Although Lucy unabashedly loves his job and Southern California, he and his wife decided to quit wondering about what it would be like to raise their children in England and give it a trial run.

“We wanted to see what the schools were like, what the hospitals and medical plans and the day-in-day-out life is like in England,” he said. “We wanted to be 100% sure before leaving this job I’ve had for 14 years. You can’t really tell those things with a vacation. . . . I already know about the weather. I can say one thing about that: There’s nine months of bad weather and three months of winter.”

So the family’s home was sold, and Lucy now shares in the rental of a mobile home. He and his wife will decide about a permanent move in July.

Until then, Lucy will continue working with buses. He has spent the last 22 years driving or working with them, and his career in Orange County spans the history of the Orange County Transit District.

He began driving double-decker coaches in London. He also drove European tour buses for American Express, and by the early 1970s met “a fella who refurbished old double-decker buses,” Lucy said. So Lucy helped him operate his tour line.

Lucy, still a British subject, first spent time in Southern California when a Newport Beach bank president bought one of the vintage double-decker buses as a publicity stunt and hired Lucy to drive it on day trips. Lucy’s girlfriend, Patricia, left England to join him here and they were later married.

“About this time, the Orange County Transit District was starting up. They had no bus service” other than a few short-distance lines, Lucy said. A year later he was hired.

Asked how he feels about the strike that ended his Christmas holiday, Lucy said, “It’s for every individual to decide what they need to do. If they feel strongly enough, I guess they have to do it. . . . But I’m glad to be leaving town.”