> It doesn't help that most of the planned transit improvements seemingly are focused on greenification of buses rather than just getting more buses on the road to expand routes, make lines frequent enough to use for commuting, etc.
Important note here: US public transit use is way down from pre-pandemic levels and might never recover [1]. I've spoken to several city transit representatives about this and they're looking for ways to green and downsize their buses as a result of low demand. Adding more buses not only doesn't help if there aren't enough passengers, it makes things worse because buses are massively expensive (think quarter million dollars each), need expensive drivers and maintenance, etc. That's money that cities could be spending on things like improving housing instead.
Important note here: US public transit use is way down from pre-pandemic levels and might never recover [1]. I've spoken to several city transit representatives about this and they're looking for ways to green and downsize their buses as a result of low demand. Adding more buses not only doesn't help if there aren't enough passengers, it makes things worse because buses are massively expensive (think quarter million dollars each), need expensive drivers and maintenance, etc. That's money that cities could be spending on things like improving housing instead.
[1] https://www.bts.gov/content/us-passenger-miles