Comment by throwaway2037

You raise a good point. My guess: It is not possible to provide what people need/want at a reasonable price point, especially in low density cities. As a result, it requires a lot of subsidies. I assume that cities create bus services primarily for people below middle class who may not be able to afford a car.

Re-read your same response, but replace "mass transit" with "private automobiles". The economic case is equally weak/negative. For a moment, imagine there is a small RaspberryPi-like device in your car that records every mile driven within city limits, then sends you a monthly bill for the true cost to maintain and police those roads. The cost would shock most users. Without a doubt, private automobiles are massively subsidised by tax payers. However, it is a democracy, and the voters are OK with it, so it continues.

To go further, there are very few mass transit systems in the world that do not require large gov't subsidies to operate. (I guess less than ten.) In all such cases, the gov't funds nearly 100% of the construction cost of railways.