Unexpected Places Embrace Mass Transportation

In spite of the popularity of going green, we live in a country driven by car culture. We love our cars, our industries and our independence. Even if they were manufactured and assembled elsewhere, we adore our heavy-duty SUVs, our sleek sedans and our cute Hybrids—but above all, we love the freedom that a personal vehicle allows us. However, with oil prices recently having risen past $120 a barrel and gridlock so bad that a one-mile trip in the city can take over an hour, a sudden influx Americans have traded in their car keys for a public transportation pass.

For places like Boston or New York City, this increase is expected, since their public transportation infrastructures are already well established and traffic tends to be so horrific that taking the bus or the subway is a natural recourse. However, what’s surprising is that cities like Houston, Denver and Nashville—strongholds of car culture—are experiencing similar jumps in mass transit commuters.

An article from last week’s New York Times reports that ridership in places like Boston and New York has increased by five to ten percent so far this year. In many metropolitan areas in the South and to the west, however, ridership rose by ten to 15 percent throughout the course of 2007. Where empty seats on the bus were prevalent, there is now only standing room. The same article even notes that the parking lots at many bus and rail stations in towns around the country overflow to the point where desperate commuters have parked on grass or in vacant lots, running the risk of being either ticketed or towed. The Energy Department has predicted that Americans would consume less oil this year than they did in 2007—“the first yearly decline since 1991.”

Now, I confess that I have never particularly enjoyed taking public transportation. My lazy legs protest at the prospect of standing in a shaky train for over even 15 minutes, mashed against countless strangers in a diesel-scented chamber shaped like an elongated Sardine can. I dislike waiting in long lines, only to be turned away once it is my turn and then forced to wait for the next bus, which will inevitably arrive ten minutes behind schedule. I love the convenience of driving from point A to point B, without the hassle of waiting (except in traffic). But public transportation systems are improving—the subway system in Boston has certainly become cleaner and more efficient (thank goodness for the introduction of Charlie cards and the abolition of those horrid tokens), and the metro in Washington D.C. is even cleaner and more efficient than the one in Boston—and the advent of the Blackberry, PDA and wireless internet allow us to work effectively, if not peacefully, on the rail or on the bus. Add to this potent combination the problems posed by high gas prices and urban gridlock, and the attractiveness of getting a public transportation pass rises exponentially. Plus, it helps to reduce the amount of carbon emissions we emit, so what’s there not to celebrate?

Clearly, I’m not the only recent convert to public transportation. All that’s left is to do something about those darn lines.