Soaring gas prices are pushing more Americans to take public transit, with streetcars, trolleys and other light rail experiencing a 10.3 percent increase in ridership for the first quarter of the year, according to a report released yesterday by the American Public Transportation Association.
Americans took 2.6 billion trips on all modes of public transportation, including subways and buses, in the first three months of 2008, a 3.3 percent increase, or almost 85 million more trips than in the same period last year, the report said.
Some people who shift to mass transit are probably doing so even though it's actually an inconvenience. The real question is how much "more better transit" starts to enter our politics. It's always a tough one because there's never any money for massive proposals, and smaller proposals are always going to only benefit some people.