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CHICAGO (AP) ― Nikita Campbell knows it will take longer and cost more to get to school and her son's day care if Chicago Transit Authority eliminates her bus route and raises fares.

It's what she doesn't know that worries her: Will her commute take so long that she ends up paying more for day care or be forced to find another place for her 2 1/2-year-old son? Will she be so late to classes that she has to drop her studies to become a medical technician? And can she and her son even make it to another bus stop when the streets are buried in snow?

"We don't have the luxury of getting into our car and starting it up," said Campbell, a single mother. "We need the CTA."

But the nation's second-largest transit agency has warned riders that it might have to eliminate 39 bus routes and increase fares as much as $1 to contend with a $110 million state funding deficit. The plan was put on hold at least until early November after the CTA's oversight agency, the Regional Transportation Authority, accepted Gov. Rod Blagojevich's offer of $24 million in stopgap state funding.

The governor's bailout also includes advancing the RTA its full $54 million 2008 grant for suburban paratransit service, $6 million for suburban transportation agencies and expediting the release of $7 million already headed for the CTA this year.

But without a permanent solution, those for whom public transportation is the only transportation remain fearful -- caught in the middle of the kind of battle that has been waged in other cities, where public transit agencies have cut service, raised fares or both to deal with financial crises.

Most recently, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) raised fares by an average of 11 percent after a contentious struggle over some of the same issues and resentments Illinois is facing between urban and rural areas.

"The politicians in rural areas have to answer to constituents on taxes and their constituents say the transit systems are sinkholes for money, they don't generate any profit and are mismanaged," said SEPTA spokesman Richard Maloney.

Illinois legislators are expected to consider a plan soon that would raise sales taxes in the Chicago area, but not downstate, to shore up transit funding. The plan also would include money for some downstate transportation needs, as well as management reforms meant to prevent future financial problems for the CTA.

Aboard one of the buses slated for elimination in Chicago, Lena Stevinson, 65, voices a sentiment similar to what Maloney heard in Philadelphia.

"This is a power play... (politicians) all threatening each other and we're at the expense, we're in the middle," said Stevinson, the cane she uses to get around resting against her leg as the bus made its way downtown where she works for the county.

Some riders who are unemployed or barely scraping by wonder where they would find the extra money to take the bus. Campbell wonders where she'd get the $10 the day care charges if she's five minutes late picking up her son.

"These people are on the edge, barely making $8, $7.50 an hour," said Audrey Rice, a 59-year-old clerk.

Other riders say they're already trying to figure out what they'd do without if they paid more to get to their jobs.

"I'm thinking about cutting out a little magazine I get," lamented Karen Sanford, a 48-year-old customer service rep for a cab company as she rode the bus to work recently. "I love that magazine."

Deborah Words is already thinking about the extra $50 a month that higher fares would cost her and the possibility that she would have to cut out movie night with her 13-year-old son.

More importantly, she thinks about the time the express bus she was on allows her to stay home with her son a bit longer in the morning -- time that will be lost if she will be forced to take a slower, local route.

"This bus does allow me to make sure he gets up and running," she said.

Berle Clemens, the president of a senior citizens advocacy group called Metro Seniors in Action, has her own fears, particularly about the fare increases.

Clemens, 75, was in Chicago in 1995 when a heat wave hit the city. She remembers how some of the 700 victims were seniors who died in their sweltering homes simply because they thought they could not afford to turn on their air conditioners.

For those already living with the bare necessities, even a small fare increase could be the difference between a trip to the doctor and staying behind their doors, she said.

"There are some who will just sit back and die," she said.

Aboard buses slated for elimination, the CTA funding battle has done something else: Added to the suspicion that, for all the words of concern for the poor and working people at City Hall and in the state capital, city and state leaders aren't all that concerned about them.

"Look at this list," said Rice, pointing to a flier the CTA has been handing out that shows which routes will be cut. "Poor people, poor people, poor people.

"I knew they were going to cut this bus because it's in the poor neighborhoods."

(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)