diff --git a/ui/src/views/Forecast.jsx b/ui/src/views/Forecast.jsx
index 2ae51d6..861bd3c 100644
--- a/ui/src/views/Forecast.jsx
+++ b/ui/src/views/Forecast.jsx
@@ -973,7 +973,6 @@ export default function Forecast({ sources = [], sourceId, versions = [], versio
       // throw here would abort the rest of initViewer silently.
       try {
         await ensureRowLabelWidth()
-        await fitRowLabelsNow()
       } catch (err) {
         console.error('[pf-layout] threw', err)
       }
@@ -1255,9 +1254,16 @@ export default function Forecast({ sources = [], sourceId, versions = [], versio
   // A minimum leaves the default spacing alone where it is already reasonable and
   // only intervenes where a column came back unusably narrow. Anything already
   // wider — set by dragging, or recorded in a layout — is untouched.
-  // Three characters, measured in the grid's own font rather than guessed in
-  // pixels, so it holds up if the theme or zoom changes.
-  const MIN_ROW_LABEL_CHARS = 3
+  // Measured in the grid's own font rather than guessed in pixels, so it holds
+  // up if the theme or zoom changes.
+  //
+  // The same floor goes under every row-header column, which is what makes it
+  // safe for the indentation: a level's indent is the previous column's width,
+  // so a uniform floor steps evenly, where a per-column fit does not. Three
+  // characters was too mean to read a label through; this is the one number to
+  // turn if the labels are still squished, and the cost of turning it is that
+  // every level indents by that much more.
+  const MIN_ROW_LABEL_CHARS = 12
 
   async function ensureRowLabelWidth() {
     const grid = (await viewerRef.current?.getPlugin())?.regular_table
@@ -1293,6 +1299,18 @@ export default function Forecast({ sources = [], sourceId, versions = [], versio
   // Every level is measured, because which column is the outermost depends on
   // the depth on show, but only that one is resized — see below.
   //
+  // UNUSED, and parked for the second time. It was called from initViewer and
+  // applyLayout for a while, and the trouble is that a level's indent *is* the
+  // previous column's width: widening any row-header column to fit its content
+  // deepens the inset of everything below it. Which column got widened depended
+  // on how deep the tree happened to be drawn when the layout loaded, so one
+  // level per layout came back deeply inset while the rest stepped evenly —
+  // deterministic, but unreadable as a pattern from the outside. Fitting and
+  // even Excel-style increments cannot both come from column widths. Doing it
+  // properly means pinning every level but the last to a fixed increment and
+  // letting a long label overflow rightwards into the last column, which is a
+  // change to the grid CSS as well as to this.
+  //
   // Measured with a canvas rather than the DOM: the cell is clipped, so reading
   // its box back gives the width it was allotted, not the width of its text —
   // the same circularity that stops headers sizing themselves.
@@ -1354,20 +1372,6 @@ export default function Forecast({ sources = [], sourceId, versions = [], versio
     await grid.draw({ invalid_columns: true })
   }
 
-  // fitRowLabels takes the grid; this finds it, so the restore paths can call it
-  // the same way they call ensureRowLabelWidth.
-  //
-  // Deliberately not routed through the Fit widths button: that one goes via
-  // regular-table's own auto-size, which measures the leaf header's rendered box
-  // over the rows currently in the viewport. fitRowLabels measures the label
-  // text on a canvas instead, so it is not blinded by a clipped cell and does
-  // not depend on what happens to be scrolled into view.
-  async function fitRowLabelsNow() {
-    const grid = (await viewerRef.current?.getPlugin())?.regular_table
-    if (!grid?.saveColumnSizes) return
-    await fitRowLabels(grid)
-  }
-
   const GRID_CSS = `
     /* Let headers and row labels size their own column.
      *
@@ -1580,7 +1584,6 @@ export default function Forecast({ sources = [], sourceId, versions = [], versio
     else if (cfg.expand_depth != null) await applyDepth(cfg.expand_depth)
 
     await ensureRowLabelWidth()
-    await fitRowLabelsNow()
 
     // The persisted copy is taken after the restore, so it carries whatever
     // cleanLayout dropped on the way in rather than the stale original -- and