Thanks for the thoughtful response! I definitely agree that trams offer a better rider experience. However, I'd argue that these benefits are outweighed by the

Thanks for the thoughtful response! I definitely agree that trams offer a better rider experience. However, I'd argue that these benefits are outweighed by their prohibitive cost. According to the American Public Transportation Association it's roughly $30-$70m per mile, as opposed to $3-$30m per mile for busses. For example, with the $133m spent on Cincinnati's 3.6 mile tram line, you could have purchased about 300 electric busses. Additionally, trams in the U.S. usually end up running in lanes that are also occupied by traffic, which means that they have to start/stop much more frequently and can't achieve the speed/efficiency that many european trams can.