[wyager]

There is no economical way for public transportation to cover the kind of transit patterns serviced by highways. If I had to take buses from Bozeman, MT to Boise, ID, any plausible bus network would take 5x as long to get me from A to B.

Making everyone ride busses and bicycles in a country with the geography of America is a fantasy, even if you buy the premise that this is otherwise desirable.

I don't even buy the premise, because things that are valuable to me include:

1. Expediency

2. Comfort

3. Not being subject to timetables decided by other people

4. Not having to deal with homeless or crazy people while transiting

5. Sanitation. Public transit and pandemic mitigation measures are mutually incompatible

While driving, I only have to deal with one network topology (the road system) instead of two (the bus network on top of the road network), leading to vastly shorter travel times in practice. My vehicles are customized to my comfort. I don't have to get permission or wait on someone else to use them. I don't have to share them with anyone. I can keep them as clean as I please.