[GnarfGnarf]

Sometimes developed countries miss out on some good ideas. When I lived in Lima, Peru and La Paz, Bolivia in the 60's, they had a system called "colectivos". You stood on a main road, and in a few minutes a random car would stop, you'd pile in with four other people, and for 10¢ you'd get a ride downtown.

No permits, no insurance, any driver can participate. Faster and more frequent service than anything I've experienced back home in North America.

Similar systems exist throughout the Third World. God forbid we ever allow something like that in our "developed" countries.

[Mattasher]

This was one of the most pleasant things about living in Cochabamba, Bolivia. In addition to those "colectivos", they had busses, micros, and trufis that covered the entire city. Though regulated (by syndicates as much as anything), individual drivers and vehicle owners made money based on how many people they picked up. It was a for profit system that worked quite well and was cheap even by local standards, if not always fast, though I can't say it was much slower than the public transport in many Western cities.

In Cochabamba you could also flag a taxi and either trust them to charge you the normal rate, or negotiate a fare. Stressful to do at first, but once you got the hang of it no big deal.

Quick story: We never needed a car while living there, but rented one once to take a road trip. Just outside the city a cholita (Quechua speaking indigenous woman) with a huge bag flagged us down along the main road, got into the back seat without a word, then asked to "bajar" a dozen km later. On the way out she handed us a peso (~15 cents), again without a word.

[blisterpeanuts]

When I was a foreign student in Taiwan in the early 80s, the taxis were numerous and cheap, and were a reasonable substitute for the (numerous) buses. Pile in a cab with 2-3 friends and go anywhere in Taipei for a dollar or so. You did get ripped off from time to time, but overall a very convenient system. The system in the U.S. is expensive and limited by comparison, cronyism and monopolistic.