LEC Persistence allows a LEC to immediately rejoin its ELAN over a backup interface in the event of the failure of the primary ATM interface to which it is bound. The LEC connects to the same LES it was connected to over the primary ATM interface and uses the same MAC address it had been using. These values are not altered based on the configuration. For example, the LEC will not recontact the LECS to find its LES or use the burned-in address on the backup ATM interface, if those were the configured actions. The LEC's configuration information is otherwise preserved. The LE_ARP cache is also preserved, and if the addresses in it can be re-verified, the associated Data Direct VCCs are automatically re-established.