[simpleTruth]

"Pretty sure the highway system does an excellent job already."

Have you even been in heavy Traffic congestion? The Texas Transportation Institute estimated that, in 2000, the 75 largest metropolitan areas experienced 3.6 billion vehicle-hours of delay, resulting in 5.7 billion U.S. gallons (21.6 billion liters) in wasted fuel and $67.5 billion in lost productivity, or about 0.7% of the nation's GDP. Note: That cost is significantly larger than NASA's ~$19B budget.

PS: Simply building more or wider roads does not automatically remove congestion in the long term. However, mass transit really does help. Just look at how much more people are willing to pay to live near a subway station.

[protomyth]

Rail might work in some parts of the country, but after seeing the money spent on the light rail in the Twin Cities (MN), I am pretty sure the expansion of the 494 / 694 loop did more good. If the light rail money had been spent on another loop around the cities, it would have been better spent.