I used public transportation in a large city for a long time. I still do but not as much as before. I've been lucky enough to avoid the lunatics and criminals, so it's mainly the service that's caused me to avoid it. It worked great when I started using it. Everything ran on time and because of that the amount of service my route got was adequate. Around 4 or 5 years ago that changed. Before you could rely on the published schedules barring inclement weather or some kind of emergency. Now it's clear that the published schedules are nothing more than suggestions and the operators show up whenever they feel like it. If you're in the main city and there's a train/bus that comes every 15 minutes it's not a big deal. But if you're traveling between the city and suburbs it becomes a problem because the buses run far less frequently in the suburbs. When they actually stuck to their schedules it wasn't a problem because you could reliably catch a bus that leaves 5-10 minutes after you get off the train. But if the operator can pull in whenever he feels like it you're gonna miss that bus most of the time and all the sudden you just added 30 or 60 (or even more) minutes to your commute. If that happens 4 out of 5 times you use public transportation you find alternatives real quick. If they want people to use public transportation they need to fix that problem as well as the lunatic/criminal problem other posters are bringing up. They also need to realize that the amount of service they would need to provide to get people in suburban or rural areas to use it will never be economically viable.

I used public transportation in a large city for a long time. I still do but not as much as before. I've been lucky enough to avoid the lunatics and criminals, so it's mainly the service that's caused me to avoid it. It worked great when I started using it. Everything ran on time and because of that the amount of service my route got was adequate. Around 4 or 5 years ago that changed. Before you could rely on the published schedules barring inclement weather or some kind of emergency. Now it's clear that the published schedules are nothing more than suggestions and the operators show up whenever they feel like it. If you're in the main city and there's a train/bus that comes every 15 minutes it's not a big deal. But if you're traveling between the city and suburbs it becomes a problem because the buses run far less frequently in the suburbs. When they actually stuck to their schedules it wasn't a problem because you could reliably catch a bus that leaves 5-10 minutes after you get off the train. But if the operator can pull in whenever he feels like it you're gonna miss that bus most of the time and all the sudden you just added 30 or 60 (or even more) minutes to your commute. If that happens 4 out of 5 times you use public transportation you find alternatives real quick. If they want people to use public transportation they need to fix that problem as well as the lunatic/criminal problem other posters are brining up. They also need to realize that the amount of service they would need to provide to get people in suburban or rural areas to use it will never be economically viable.