Maybe mass transit should be in peril.
While people count efficiency of shoveling people in train cars, this is not all to that. US reliance on individual cars is in support of individual liberty and ingenuity and against statism and monopolies. You can change your plans on a fly, you can change jobs without changing where you live, you can get to a job even if you live in a poor neighborhood as long as you can get a working car, you can drive to a different school. Goods can be delivered in trucks to a different customer. Your plumber can come from a different town. These are all great things for the country and we consider it a given, but it will all be different if we were tied to the mass transit.
As an extreme, I worked with a guy who was somewhat rudely dismissed from a contractor job. He said goodbye to us, found a contract in another state next day, packed into his van and left. The company realized that they made a mistake and called him back. He did not hold the grudge, but raised his hourly rate, finished negotiation while driving, turned the van around, and was at his workplace next day as if nothing happened.