WMATA has reached a settlement agreement with Belgian KBC Group over after nearly three full days of court appearances and negotiations.

There’s no details available on the terms of the settlement, however, because the parties agreed to keep them secret. For their part, Metro is touting the agreement as having been a victory for them.

“Taxpayers have been saved tens of millions of dollars, and Metro no longer faces the immediate threat of cuts to our capital budget and a downgrading of our credit rating,” Metro GM John Catoe said in a statement.

KBC Group had been seeking an immediate $43 million payment from Metro after the credit rating of AIG insurance company was downgraded. AIG had been the insurer of a series of lease-back deals between the transit agency and the bank, which allowed Metro to sell its equipment to KBC and then rent it back.

Metro had asked a federal judge to temporarily bar the bank from collecting the $43 million, but the judge pressed the two parties to come to a settlement. If Metro had been forced to pay all $43 million, they had warned that they would have had to raid their capital budget, which would have spelled major financial problems for the agency down the line.

This may not be the last time we hear about Metro being asked to pay the piper in the wake of the recent collapse of AIG. WMATA says it has 14 similar leasing agreements with other financial institutions. The agency has asked the Treasury Department to back the deals in order to avoid more court battles.

A lot of other transit agencies around the country are in the same AIG-related boat, and many of them are planning to lobby Congress on Tuesday to require the Treasury Department to back AIG and other insurers’ credit ratings.

Photo by soleil1016