In the Driver’s Seat : A 32-Year RTD Veteran Gains a Day of Fame by Launching the Red Line

As politicos and dignitaries lavished each other with praise before a sea of TV cameras, Yandell (Sonny) Lister sat alone in the driver’s compartment of a darkened train, waiting to turn the key that would set the Red Line in motion.

Amid all of Saturday’s fanfare and hoopla, this was where the first driver of Los Angeles’ first modern subway felt most at home--away from the spotlight, in the background, attending to the mundane details of moving passengers from one stop to another.

“Oh, I’ll be happy when this day is over,” sighed the 57-year-old jazz lover, football fan and father of three. “Then all the big wheels will go back to their office and we can settle down to what it’s really all about . . . making this system work day in and day out.”

As if to confirm his suspicions, Lister’s most public moment of fame was botched. During the opening ceremony, a top transit official announced that the driver of the inaugural Red Line run would be none other than Yar dell Lister--not Yan dell.

“See why they call me Sonny?” a bemused Lister quipped.

Finally, Mayor Tom Bradley tooted a whistle, which was the cue for Lister to turn the small key in the bottom right corner of his dashboard. He gave the train’s horn a blast. Then, with the four cars full of VVIPs--Very Very Important Persons--Lister pulled back on the spring-loaded throttle and cruised at 50 m.p.h. down the round concrete tunnel.

Flashbulbs, cheers and waves greeted his arrival at the next station. One photographer ran to Lister and clicked off at least a dozen frames of him in his snappy new uniform--waist-length jacket, padded shoulders and an uncustomary tie.

“So, what do they call you?” the photographer asked. “The conductor on, uh, the first main voyage?”

Lister shrugged. “Whatever,” he said.

When Lister stepped behind the wheel of his first bus, John F. Kennedy was President, the fare was 20 cents and drivers made change. It was also one of the few decent career opportunities for a young black man from Texas, trying his luck in Los Angeles after a stint in the Army.

In fact, Lister had hoped to be an RTD mechanic, but soon discovered that that was a profession not readily available to members of his race.

So, he took up driving a bus--a job that, at the time, was a source of great pride. His uniform turned heads. Passengers treated him with respect. “People would say: ‘There goes the bus driver,’ ” Lister said.

But Los Angeles changed and so did its streets. Buses became moving canvases, awash in spray paint. Robbers threatened to kill for the contents of a fare box. And drivers, bombarded with an avalanche of negative publicity about drug use and driving records, suffered through years of derision.

“You might have been proud to go to work, but when you got off you were ashamed to walk down the street,” Lister said. “It was like: There goes that damn bus driver.”

He believes rail transit is changing all that, restoring a modicum of dignity to a job he considers an honorable way to put food on the table. That is why he left buses behind in 1990 to become a Blue Line operator. He would like to take a crack at the Green Line if it opens before he retires.

“I’ve seen Los Angeles go from good to bad over the years,” he said. “Maybe a good public transit system is the answer to getting the city going again.”

That is the kind of talk that earned Lister his opening day assignment from a roster of 21 certified, full-time Red Line operators. More than 300 applicants from RTD’s ranks tried out for the jobs, which are considered plums compared to the hassles of life behind the wheel of a bus.

Each candidate was forced to undergo a thorough doctor’s exam, a written quiz on safety rules and a somewhat odd agility test that included an 8.8-mile round-trip hike through the subway tunnel. Only after passing those hurdles did the six-week training course begin.

Lister and others learned to operate the train, which sports several foolproof safety features--including a “dead man” device that shuts off the engine should the driver, for any reason, collapse. Although the train can function entirely on automatic pilot, operators are required to engage the manual controls at least 25% of the time.

Drivers were also selected on the basis of seniority. Eighteen years was the minimum. Lister, with 32 years to his credit, ranked third on the list.

“I selected Mr. Lister because I think he personifies--not that others don’t--the evolution of rail here in Los Angeles,” said Johnnie D. Byrd, RTD’s Red Line division manager. Lister also happens to be a politically smart choice, seeing as he is a shop steward in the transportation workers union.

On Saturday, the job made him a star. “I want to get a shot of you in the door--for posterity,” said RTD spokesman Jim Smart as he followed Lister to the train’s entrance with a camera.

“Oh, man, how come he’s getting all the attention?” joked fellow driver Robert Haskins, a mere 19-year veteran.

Lister, though he handled his role with grace, seemed to prefer talking about the point spread for the Super Bowl.

“I’m honored to be selected,” he said. “But I’ve been in the background for 32 years and I don’t mind another day of it.”