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in North America we don't require 100+ verifiable hours of supervised driving.

You are correct. The State of Indiana in the United States required 50 hours last I checked. But at least a couple states in Australia require 120.

Insurance for $850 a year

Or a lot more, I've read, for an unmarried male who enters the workforce before age 25. And is that minimum coverage or full collision coverage, as some banks require until the loan is paid off?

Total: $794 a month

Somehow your city's transit is overpriced. How does Citilink in Fort Wayne, Indiana, get away with offering a $45 per month pass? The only things I can think of are that Citilink does not operate at night or on Sundays or six major holidays.

Many passengers who would have taken a bus or train or walked or biked, now use an Uber.

People in my home town wouldn't have taken a bus today because today is Sunday, one of the 58 days of the year when the bus drivers are at home with their families. (Source: fwcitilink.com)

In a big city with excellent public transit, there's really no need for a car.

What's "excellent public transit"? Is it better than once an hour, nothing at night, nothing at all on 58 days of the year, and nothing at all on Saturdays in outlying areas (source)?

Possibly more people are able to DRIVE to the city now, not GO in the general sense.

I thought the only way to go at all on certain days of the week was to drive, as public transportation systems in many cities tend to shut down entirely on the least busy days. In a plurality-Christian country, this is Sunday (source; source), but I don't know which day of the week would be the victim in a majority-Muslim country.

it's selfish people who don't use mass transit

If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses from 8:45 PM to 5:45 AM (source), and you're given hours at night, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job. If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses on Sundays, and you're given hours on Sunday, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job.

On the other hand, there traffic is usually less problematic during these hours, as there are often less commuters (maybe except for holidays on Saturdays, those can be quite crowded).

So, that use case is hardly a problem, in my opinion (unless I missed something).

it's selfish people who don't use mass transit

If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses from 8:45 PM to 5:45 AM (source), and you're given hours at night, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job. If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses on Sundays, and you're given hours on Sunday, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job.

And if you're paying for a car anway, you don't want to pay the same amount again for a month pass, even if your usual hours are not at night or on sunday.

it's selfish people who don't use mass transit

If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses from 8:45 PM to 5:45 AM (source), and you're given hours at night, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job. If you live in a city that doesn't run its buses on Sundays, and you're given hours on Sunday, you need a car in order not to have to spend the majority of your paycheck on a taxi or lose your job.

and idiots living one hour away from work that are the problem.

A lot of jobs don't pay enough to rent a place to live closer to work. How are people "idiots" for taking advantage of a sharp gradient in annual housing costs? Perhaps the real "idiots" serve on the city's zoning board that created this situation.

Buses in Fort Wayne, Indiana, don't run on Sundays or six major holidays. (Source) But this Election Day, they're running at zero fare.

young new drivers aren't buying cars since they aren't getting drivers licenses at a young age [...] Its cheaper to public transportation

Until they find that they can't keep a job when employers are unwilling to accommodate the limited hours of operation of public transportation, with no service at night or on 58 days per year of scheduled downtime. Is "Reason for leaving: Poor schedule fit" valid?

or ride with friends

Until they find that friends also "aren't getting drivers licenses at a young age".

What other form is available [...] on Sundays and holidays?

What's wrong with a bus?

Buses in Fort Wayne don't run at night, on Saturday evenings, on Sundays, or on six major holidays.

we were both on call.

On call with a deadline of how quickly to show up at the work site? Less than a couple hours does not work for a bus system with a 1 hour headway and multiple transfers.

If you have to physically endanger people to get to a job that doesn't pay you well enough for you to afford a car loan then you are well overdue to reevaluate your life choices.

This goes equally for cars and bicycles.

I can't speak to how often "a lift from family or friends" can be repeated before they begin to object to "using me as your private taxi". But a controller is cheaper than successfully lobbying your city to add bus service at night or on Sunday. (Source)

If you can't get a lift from family or friends and there is no bus service then a controller doesn't help you either, no matter how cheap it is it doesn't get you from one place to another.

I can't speak to how often "a lift from family or friends" can be repeated before they begin to object to "using me as your private taxi". But a controller is cheaper than successfully lobbying your city to add bus service at night or on Sunday. (Source)

statistically speaking the best way to do that is to take the bus

Statistically speaking, in my city, 0 percent of crashes at night, on Sundays, or on a major holiday involve a bus because the buses are not even running. So statistically speaking, what's the best way to use the road while preventing crashes at those times?

What kind of shitty country do you live in with no public transport on Sundays?

Some parts of the United States. (Source)

public transport can be affordable, on-demand and weather-resistant.

Can be but isn't in practice. Fort Wayne's bus system isn't quite "on-demand" because it has at least one 36-hour downtime each week: from Saturday evening through early Monday morning.

You don't mind choosing between a couple of extra bus fares and eating lunch, do you?

I don't know about Toronto's public transit, but even in Fort Wayne's underprovisioned system (60 minute headway and no service at all at night, on Saturday evenings, or on Sundays or major holidays), riders can buy a pass for unmetered rides within a four and a half week period.

Citilink in Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA, is closed on these 58 days.

Anonymous Coward was referring to a "city bus", and I took this to mean something like Citilink, as opposed to a motor coach like the Greyhound bus you're talking about. I agree with you that motor coach trips are closer to the same category as an airline flight.

Public transit runs on sundays.

Not everywhere. From this page: "Buses do not operate on Sundays or the following Holidays: New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day."

Does a city of 200,000 look like a farm to you?

How is public transit more time-efficient when someone has to make three connections to get across town? Or when it doesn't run at all for 36 to 60 hours at a time (Saturday night to Monday or Tuesday morning)? Or when it doesn't go within reasonable walking distance of certain places anytime?

What kind of transit system doesn't run at night or on Sundays?

Fort Wayne's.

If you live in a city and have too many groceries to bring on a bus you're doing it wrong.

How often do you buy groceries?

I have three grocery stores within 5 blocks of my house, no bus needed.

Apart from a convenience store seven blocks away, the closest proper grocery store is about 20 blocks away. Do I live in a grocery "dead zone" that's an edge case?

Sure the Sunday night schedule might only be once or twice per hour

Where I live (Fort Wayne, Indiana, pop. 200,000), the weekday schedule for most routes is once per hour. What should I do to help increase ridership (and hence employers' expectations of ridership)?

Half the buses in our town have wifi

My experience differs. The city buses in Fort Wayne, Indiana, have no outlets and no Wi-Fi. Nor do the Lakefront and Greyhound motor coaches between Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that I rode back in March of this year to go to the Midwest Gaming Classic. (Greyhound offers Greyhound Express service on some of its routes, but Fort Wayne is not among them.) A publisher of video games capable of running on laptops and handheld devices has to be aware of this lack of connectivity among many of its customers.

It will be nigh impossible to restrict access to people inside the bus, unless you feel like changing the passkey for the connection every you hop onto a bus.

Or unless the captive portal requires logging in with credentials issued by the transit authority. For example, even a bus system that doesn't operate on Sundays issues reduced-fare cards to seniors and people with disabilities, and it also sells monthly passes.

I walk to work.

Do you move house every time you change jobs?

Some public transport has free WiFi

I happen to live in a city whose public transport has so little ridership that it doesn't even run on Sundays let alone provide Internet access. The expectation in the United States is that you drive your own car.

Google's expectation is that internet connectivity gets more and more ubiquitous over the next few years.

Then Google can introduce Chrome OS in a few years. Until then, web apps designed for Chrome OS will need to be designed to run offline for hours at a time.

I pay £23/mo for a two year contract.

U.S. contracts are much more expensive than that. A Best Buy Mobile representative told me that all four carriers' smartphone contracts start at 70 USD per month, including a 40 USD per month voice plan and a 30 USD per month data plan. I'm currently on a dumbphone with 5 USD per month prepaid service because I don't make a lot of calls.

As I said, lots of iPhone/Android apps rely on the Internet being available

Apparently, a lot of developers forget that iPod touch exists.

In at least one city of roughly 200,000 people in the midwestern United States, there are routinely stretches of 36 to 60 hours when public transit does not operate. The buses don't run at night, on Saturday evenings, on Sundays, or on seven holidays.

Plenty of people get by with no cars. Instead, they use public transportation.

Public transportation such as bus service is for those who are privileged enough to be able to do all their travel 1. within the city, 2. on the hour, 3. during the day, 4. on Monday through Saturday.

Then how would I go about making the public transportation in my area less unpleasant and inconvenient?

You could contact the General Manager with your specific concerns. Before doing that, though, you may want to peruse the minutes of the last couple board meetings and the transit development plan (both at the bottom of the page).

You can also attend board meetings at 5:30pm on the 3rd Thursday of each month at the Citilink Offices, 801 Leesburg Road. Meetings are open to the public.

Then how would I go about making the public transportation in my area less unpleasant and inconvenient?

You could contact the General Manager with your specific concerns. Before doing that, though, you may want to peruse the minutes of the last couple board meetings and the transit development plan (both at the bottom of the page).

You can also attend board meetings at 5:30pm on the 3rd Thursday of each month at the Citilink Offices, 801 Leesburg Road. Meetings are open to the public.

Then how would I go about making the public transportation in my area less unpleasant and inconvenient?

You could contact the General Manager with your specific concerns. Before doing that, though, you may want to peruse the minutes of the last couple board meetings and the transit development plan (both at the bottom of the page).

You can also attend board meetings at 5:30pm on the 3rd Thursday of each month at the Citilink Offices, 801 Leesburg Road. Meetings are open to the public.

Even if one can commute to and from work on public transit, one still needs a car:

• to carry home a week's worth of groceries for the family or other large loads,
• to go places that public transit doesn't go, such as out of town, or
• to go at times when public transit is not in service, such as nights, Saturday evenings, Sundays, or major holidays.

Between biking and public transit, we got rid of one car at our household.

Groceries? I can carry 100lbs on my bike trailer.

Out of town? I can rent a car.

Cars can be useful, but you don't need to own one.

Even if one can commute to and from work on public transit, one still needs a car:

I don't own a car, and neither do any of my friends (and we could all easily afford a used car, and most of us could afford a new car).

to carry home a week's worth of groceries for the family or other large loads,

Well, none of us have a family, which helps.

When I was taking the train to work every day, I'd often shop twice a week. The supermarket is about 30 seconds walk from the station. This is good for getting fresh bread and vegetables too. Sometimes I'd load up on heavy stuff (fruit juice etc) -- as much as I could carry -- and walk 100m to the bus stop, and wait for the specific bus that stopped outside my house. It would be convenient to load up a car with beer for a party, but I could either get this delivered, use a taxi, or ask people to bring their own beer to the party.

Now I cycle to work, so I stop by the supermarket on my way home once a week.

If I had to shop for four, and was determined not to own a car, I'd either have stuff delivered or buy a bike trailer. More likely, I'd register to use the local on-street rental cars (StreetCar).

to go places that public transit doesn't go, such as out of town

The transport continues out of town here. If I'm really seeing someone in the absolute middle of nowhere, they can pick me up from the nearest station (and will probably expect to). Or I'll take my bike on the train and cycle for 10 minutes at the end.

to go at times when public transit is not in service, such as nights, Saturday evenings, Sundays, or major holidays.

So far, needing to go when there's no public transport isn't enough reason for me to get my own car (transport within the city runs all night, but the middle-of-nowhere stuff doesn't, but I hardly ever need it).

Just because the public transportation in a given area is inconvenient or unpleasant doesn't mean [...] that the public transportation in your area has to be unpleasant and inconvenient.

Then how would I go about making the public transportation in my area less unpleasant and inconvenient?

I think you're making one rather unjustified assumption: that anyone who takes the train will still own a car.

Even if one can commute to and from work on public transit, one still needs a car:

• to carry home a week's worth of groceries for the family or other large loads,
• to go places that public transit doesn't go, such as out of town, or
• to go at times when public transit is not in service, such as nights, Saturday evenings, Sundays, or major holidays.

You're at roadside emergencies more often than you're near a Wi-Fi network? You might consider a refresher in driver's ed. :)

When I'm near a Wi-Fi network whose WEP key I know, I'm also near a land line. I carry a phone on the Virgin Mobile network (service less than $70/yr including tax) to arrange an alternate ride in case my bike has a flat tire and/or the city bus service is either excessively late or not operating at all.

I think it's reasonable to assume that somebody who doesn't own a car either doesn't own a computer or lives in a city where they can just walk to a store.

My computer was a Christmas present several years ago, and I rely on the bus partly because I lack a driver's license.

In the case of needing to ride a bus, I can't imagine why a bus line would be closed for a day or two.

In Fort Wayne, Indiana, the Citilink buses are closed Saturday nights, Sundays, and holidays. The 36-hour figure is from 1800 on Saturday to 0600 the next Monday; the 60-hour figure is from 1800 on Saturday to 0600 the next Tuesday. I asked a resident of South Bend, Indiana, whether the public transportation in her town kept better hours, and she told me that they do not.

"Spending a half hour isn't worth a $2.50 discount," but it sure is worth a $2.50 discount, being able to avoid some crappy software that could be considered spyware, adware, malware, etc., and not be stuck with Amazon's DRM.

My point is that if bus fare + time spent riding the bus to and from a Wal-Mart store is worth more than the price of shipping from walmart.com, I'll pay for shipping.

Plus, we take the bus (have a bus pass).

Trouble is that your school-age child is gone for most of the matinee period of Monday through Friday during most of the year, and the city bus service does not operate on Sundays or holidays. This leaves Saturday and summer vacation; are you happy with that?

By using public transport, like most of the rest of us. Duh!

What happens when the job requires traveling at night (2nd or 3rd shift), or on Saturday evenings, or on Sundays, or on holidays, or to or from locations outside the city limits or other locations not serviced by public transport? Or is public transport in Europe generally better than the bus system in a typical American town of 200,000 people?

Personally I wish gas was more expensive, so people would be forced to take mass transit.

Problem is that at least in Fort Wayne, Indiana, mass transit does not run after 9 PM on weekdays, after 6 PM on Saturdays, or at all on Sundays or holidays.

Except the buses in Fort Wayne stop running before many people get out of bars, and when they close on New Year's Eve 2004, they won't run until January 3, 2005. (Closed New Year's Day, and closed Sundays year-round.)

For instance, is it more convenient for me to spend half of my travel time waiting for buses and trains on a Sunday

You're lucky. If I want to go somewhere on Sunday, and I want to take a public bus in Fort Wayne, I have to wait 24 hours.