That applies to every culture, ever, and I have a hard time identifying some "California culture" that encompasses the state. The difference is that in California, the people who don't want it largely outnumber the people who want it more than in most places.
Measure R (2008, 67% in favor) and Measure M (2016, 71% in favor) both passed with supermajorities and raised Los Angeles taxes by billions to pay for rail and other public transit options. To me, that seems to indicate that the majority wants these kinds of projects.
Also, it goes without saying that LA County is not representative of "California culture."
Would you ban a teleportation system that was energy efficient and insist people take trains and subways? Trains and subways are much inferior mode of transport compared to a functioning road system with vechicles. I wonder why so many people have this car hate? Scared of driving a car? They are dangerous and you have to pay attention to drive them, so that makes some sense to me. Some kind of socialist reason that people should be forced into contact with random other people. Sitting at home is what one should be doing instead of going places? Where did you get this idea that cars where some kind of evil device?
Cars are one of the least space-efficient transportation option imaginable. In an urban environment, space comes at a premium. At the same time, car infrastructure is quite heavily subsidized. Finally, there is a very large car lobby that absolutely abhors the idea of spending a dime on anything that's not cars such that talking about mass transit is equated with a war on cars. (And quite frankly, you sound much closer to that end of the spectrum).
> When there is no congestion you get fast point-to-point transportation at any time.
Following on the above point I made about space-inefficiency... it's impossible to allocate enough space in cities to prevent such congestion. And tunnels don't help because it means you have a vertical circulation problem, which is a problem that we struggle to solve with conventional mass transit systems already, and it's even harder with cars.
Ultimately, the reason why people like me are so against Loop is because we see it as Musk doing to car owners what Trump does to coal miners: sympathize with their plight, blame it on completely the wrong thing, and then peddle fantasies that he'll be able to make it better.