> As to reliability--while in theory transit should be highly reliable, in practice it isn't. In practice it is, just not in the US, which has a problem with c

> As to reliability--while in theory transit should be highly reliable, in practice it isn't. In practice it is, just not in the US, which has a problem with chronic underinvestment in and incompetent management of transit infrastructure. > As to time savings, transit commutes are significantly longer: https://www.geotab.com/time-to-commute https://www.geotab.com/time-to-commute. 30% of public transit commutes in NYC are over 1 hour, compared to just 10% of car commutes. 28% of car commutes are under 30 minutes, versus just 6% of transit commutes. In Dallas, a place without the geographic constraints of NYC, 57% of car commutes are under 30 minutes. People in Dallas are accruing tremendous time value savings by driving as compared to people taking transit in NYC. Better transit improves commute times for both drivers and public transit riders, since people will switch from driving to taking the bus/train, which reduces congestion. More roads improves commute times for NEITHER drivers nor transit riders, since any temporary improvement in congestion will just cause people to drive more (switching from other modes of transport) until the roads are just as clogged as before. That's why investing in transit is generally superior to investing in roads, even if the current transit commute time is longer than the current average driving commute. You are also making an apples-to-oranges comparison by comparing average car and transit commute times, since the two demographics are making _different_ commutes entirely. If everyone could get to work faster by driving why does only 22% of Manhattan own a car? It's certainly not because only 22% of the borough can afford a car; it's one of the richest cities in the entire country. > The US has some of the fastest commutes in the OECD You are completely misinterpreting that statistic. The US has fast commutes because a large fraction of the population lives in smaller metro areas, which have shorter commutes than large metro areas. It has nothing to do with everyone driving instead of taking the train. Fully half of Korea lives in Seoul metro, which has 25 million people, of course the average Korean commute is going to take forever. If EVERYONE in Seoul tried to drive to work, the average commute wouldn't go down to 48 minutes, it would go up to 300 since the roads would be permanently gridlocked.