Tikkabik

This is partly because we're a culture that for the last half-century has invested heavily in the automobile as a part of our national identity. There's nothing more quintessentially American than a lone driver on the open road. The Eisenhower administration leveraged a huge amount of funding to link interstate highways, and that's a legacy that continues to drain our tax resources and our collective consciousness to this date.

But it's more than that -- America is also huge, and we have a lot of ground to cover. Alas, the car is still the easiest way to do that. I wish things were different. I wish rail service -- both intercity and light rail -- was a lot more ubiquitous than it is. I wish bus service was a lot more consistent too, and a lot more convenient to use than it is. But these things require money, and the only way for it to make sense is to socialize it, or at least partially subsidize it using tax revenue. That's an idea that rankles my libertarian sensibilities, but from a practical standpoint I find it very appealing.

Part of the reason why Amtrak is losing money hand over fist is because it's forced to run unprofitable routes through states where it just doesn't make sense to have rail service -- places where the population density is still ridiculously low. But if you look at the northeast corridor, Amtrak manages a very profitable enterprise. It's because it makes sense here. People need to travel between Boston and Baltimore.

So what's the solution? Maybe a common sense approach is best -- continue to provide public funding for public transportation where it makes sense -- where it is used enough to be profitable. And give people some sort of incentive to use it, even if that incentive is ultimately altruism -- the common good. But cut off such services where it just doesn't make sense -- where the motivation to service the area is political, rather than sensible.