h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You think bus service is bad in the UK??!!?





If you ever come to the US, don't even try to use the public transportation system - in most places it's almost non-existant! (One notable exception is New York City)

This has been discussed ad-nauseum other places, but suffice it to say that unless you live in one of maybe a dozen *very* large cities in the US, you won't be able to get from one place in a city to another place in that same city by bus without making several bus transfers which involve walking several blocks between transfer points and waiting half an hour or more for the next bus to come. A simple trip from one side of town to the mall on the other side of town, which would only take a maximum of 15 minutes by car (assuming every traffic light along the way is red and there's a few traffic slowdowns along the way), could easily take 2 or 3 hours (or more) by bus. And that's only in the cities that happen to have bus service. Small towns simply don't have bus service at all.

The train system is even worse in the US - no service at all to most smaller cities (don't even think about train service to a small town!), and the ones that do have service only offer it minimally, so that once again, a trip that might take 10 hours by car could easily take 2 days or more by train.

All this serves to make the whole idea of a long distance relationship even within the US very dependant on car travel.