Because the public transit companies are not fully rider supported, they receive heavy subsidies from the various municipalities they service. Thus, they are i

Because the public transit companies are not fully rider supported, they receive heavy subsidies from the various municipalities they service. Thus, they are in many ways constrained from operating optimally; in addition, they are riddled with politics and empire-building -- why do you think that I can't buy the equivalent of an Oyster or a Carte Orange stored value card that will let me take e.g. the Alameda ferry to MUNI to Caltrain to VTA? Let me also remind you that the distances and population densities are very, very different, even in a relatively dense area of the US like the Peninsula.