[rkangel]

[Answer scope limited to the US]

The problem is that these people want to drive, and don't care about it. They want to drive for sociological reasons - driving is seen as a symbol of American independence and financial stability. Look at the people who get weird reactions because they chose to walk to work, or schools that object on spurious grounds when they walk their kid to school.

The car is seen as an assumption, a bare minimum. And any attempt to replace it is taking away a personal right.

[zamadatix]

I think these are really the same thing looked at from opposite side of the circle. When all of your coworkers are driving 45 minutes in on the highway because nothing is local to good housing, public transit isn't available at all, or the public transit available is so bad (in multiple ways) as to beg questions why you'd use it, then it drives the sociological assumptions about other types of transport in the same way the mindset itself drives the conditions which lead to even more assumptions.

One could say it's that people need to want to see better public transit as a good idea for normal people or one could say it's that public transit needs to be made better so people see it that way. In both situations, it's when public transit actually gets improved anything will actually change.

[naming_the_user]

I don't think this is limited to the US, I have exactly the same viewpoint as a Brit and so do many people I know.

People like walking to work and like taking the tube after a night out, but ultimately, the car is just vastly more convenient and comfortable for such a large amount of stuff.

You may as well ask me to give up running water because technically I could just carry it from the well.

Realistically if public transport advocates want progress they need to demonstrate that they also understand the utility of cars because otherwise they come across as simply being wilfully ignorant.

[rkangel]

I think there are two different things though, and in the UK the bar is (mostly) just a practical one.

Lots of my colleagues cycle to work, because the cycling infrastructure is great (both from Cambridge City, and from my employer). For those along the Guided Busway corridor, quite a few get to work like that because it is convenient.

Step 1 is to make the public transport good enough so that it is at least as good as taking a car. But the US has Step 2 - convince people that they aren't looking poverty stricken if they take a bus.