Though car driving and ownership are a big cultural phenomenon, especially among men 18-50.
Environment as well. In terms of "safety" it is unfortunately very risky to bike (or even walk) in my area due to the sprawling roads everywhere. Drivers don't look out for anything other than large boxes, and I've quickly had way too many close calls to consider it useful.
I legit took a girl home after I asked her if she knew why the train was late.
In Amsterdam at least one of the train stations has a piano. It becomes a 3rd place were people can make friends and socialize.
We don’t have many 3rd places in the US where you can exist without spending money.
Politicians and the public don't seem willing to invest to overcome the chicken and egg problem. Doesn't help that the legacy transport we do have is neglected, further harming it's reputation.
It does seem to work.
It's a great setup, and/but the very specific infrastructure[0] that I use only services maybe a quarter of the city's mid-suburbia. There's other public transport that services plenty of the rest though.
Doxxing myself here, but anyway: [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O-Bahn_Busway
The interchange has a four level car park that fills up to about three quarters full by 8am-ish. A secondary car park was just finished maybe a couple of years ago, with an additional ~50% capacity.
It's also not that expensive to rent inner city or buy an apartment. The outer suburbs mostly exist because people have a mentality of invest in land at any cost, even if it means living in a wasteland and commuting 3 hours a day.
Like, why post this? The difference between the two figures is so vast as to be pointless, and it likely just made them up anyway. This is something that you can actually look up.
900 or so people per square km.
To give a random comparison (because I know it well) Sacramento has a density of 2000 per square km and far, far worse transportation.
Anyway the density doesn’t feel high here and maybe that’s the more relevant bit
This is a weird form of American exceptionalism where people insist that the US can't have the nice things that all other rich countries have, because Density. And this might even be true if you're talking about, say, Wyoming. But it absolutely isn't an excuse for places like California or Florida.
So it's not country density, but population center density. Single family homes with yards and individual garages make public transport pretty bad, as the catchment rates of each stop just don't have enough people. Just put the people closer together, and have more farmland/forest around the town.
A lot of people barely make enough to pay rent before factoring in a car.
Your options end up being iffy used cars or financing. The used car market is a nightmare, you can easily end up with a lemon, but legally you have no real recourse.
If Bob sells Bill a used car, and the engine explodes 2 days later Bob owes Bill nothing.
This doesn't always happen, but it's a concern.
Finance a car and you'll probably spend a significant portion of your income just commuting.
Vs living in a transit centric city where bus/metro fair is a nominal cost
Yesterday I was delighted to see a nice new piano in its place.