The thing you’re missing is that I spent much less than $100 a month in transit costs when I lived in SF. When you have a car there, you will spend probably $500-$1000 on the car, the insurance, the gas, parking meters, etc. Then you will likely need to pay for a parking spot. In the Mission the going rate before COVID was about $400+ a month. My friends who had cars and didn’t have dedicated parking would also get $75 parking or street cleaning tickets fairly often.
So I literally could take a $5 ride each way every time I didn’t feel like walking and I had a huge cost savings, much less hassle with parking and street cleaning at 6 AM, less environmental impact, no problems drinking and driving, etc. After a while, most people without dedicated parking end up leaving their car in the same spot as long as possible and mostly use it for weekend trips outside the city.
So I literally could take a $5 ride each way every time I didn’t feel like walking and I had a huge cost savings, much less hassle with parking and street cleaning at 6 AM, less environmental impact, no problems drinking and driving, etc. After a while, most people without dedicated parking end up leaving their car in the same spot as long as possible and mostly use it for weekend trips outside the city.