Image of BART train.

I am acutely aware of how the American ideal always appears somewhat better from behind the wheel of your own car, but Public Transportation is going to save the world. It is faster than driving. You can save your attention for a good book, reading your mail, or talking on the phone. You can eat and drink. And, it is much more reliable that traffic. If the schedule says that it will be there at 6:15pm, it will most likely be there at 6:15pm.

Sure, there are a few trade-offs. You do not have the freedom to run errands on the way home. You have to stick to your own schedule–you forfeit the flexibility to change your mind. And, there are other people aboard.

The positive sides, however, dramatically outweigh the bad. It is MUCH less expensive for you to ride public transportation than to own, insure, operate and feed gas to a car. There are minimal or zero emissions from public transportation–in a long, convoluted chain of logical events, it will actually reduce green-house gases and help fight against global warming. It is much safer than driving your car or riding your bike (certainly NOT as much fun as riding the bike). And, you can do something productive with the time that would normally be spent driving–even if that means simply looking out the window to decompress from your day.

There is strength in numbers. If more of us ride and use public transportation more often, more resources will get devoted to public transportation. There will be more trains. They will run more often. And, so on and so on . . . .