Why doesn't the US have bus deregulation?

[Dai Corner]

If it doesn't then there is little point in buses, other than to provide transport to the few people without access to a car.

Did you observe your fellow passengers during your bus journeys in the US?

Were they wearing expensive, fashionable clothes or overalls, work uniforms and worn out jeans?

We're they carrying shopping bags from high class shops or from their equivalent of Poundland and Primark?

 

[radamfi]

I think this has been explained in some detail now.

The population density in US towns and cities is just not great enough to enable bus services to be operated without public subsidy.

US cities are much more car orientated; much more so than the UK. In terms of car ownership per capita, the US is 4th (after NZ, San Marino and Monaco) whilst the UK is 35th.

In the UK (and in Western Europe generally), the attractiveness of public transport is greatly assisted by factors such as population density/infrastructure and the prevailing view on taxation.

Comparing Western Europe (incl. UK) with the US is like comparing apples with apricots.

You might have noticed, however, that I have pointed out various big cities where bus usage is reasonably popular and are of reasonably high density, for example east coast cities.

Population density in "sprawling" Philadelphia: 4,554.76/km2
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia

Population density in "bus friendly" Reading, and one of the few places in Britain cited as a major bus success story: 4,040/km2

Reading, Berkshire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Bletchleyite]

The population density in US towns and cities is just not great enough to enable bus services to be operated without public subsidy.

Is that actually true? Milton Keynes is probably quite similar to your average American town/city (give or take our roundabouts vs. US traffic lights and 4-way stops), and that manages to operate a mostly commercial service, albeit one that, like in the US, is very much a distress purchase.

I think the answer in the US is that for it to be commercial they'd need to put fares up to be more like ours.

 

[Daniel740]

Is that actually true? Milton Keynes is probably quite similar to your average American town/city (give or take our roundabouts vs. US traffic lights and 4-way stops), and that manages to operate a mostly commercial service, albeit one that, like in the US, is very much a distress purchase.

I think the answer in the US is that for it to be commercial they'd need to put fares up to be more like ours.

Even Milton Keynes is compact by American standards, how far do you have to walk to find a bus stop? 5,10 minutes? In many U.S cities you could be 2 or 3 miles from the nearest stop.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Even Milton Keynes is compact by American standards, how far do you have to walk to find a bus stop? 5,10 minutes? In many U.S cities you could be 2 or 3 miles from the nearest stop.

Er, that rather depends on how many bus stops there are! There isn't one answer to that, it depends where you live. There are certainly places that are over a mile from a service, or that receive only one of the infrequent tendered routes.

In terms of density it's quite close to the US model town/city, which is why it's a challenge for decent bus operation.

 

[carlberry]

America is famously a right-wing country. So why aren't buses deregulated there?

What do you mean by 'deregulated'? If you mean can anybody run a bus service if they want to then do they have any specific laws stopping this?

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Is that actually true? Milton Keynes is probably quite similar to your average American town/city (give or take our roundabouts vs. US traffic lights and 4-way stops), and that manages to operate a mostly commercial service, albeit one that, like in the US, is very much a distress purchase.

I think the answer in the US is that for it to be commercial they'd need to put fares up to be more like ours.

Take two average places, picked entirely at random

Minneapolis - pop 382k - pop density 3071/km2
Nottingham - pop 305k - pop density 4073/km2

Of course, on a macro level, the difference is much more pronounced MK is more the exception rather than the rule.

You might have noticed, however, that I have pointed out various big cities where bus usage is reasonably popular and are of reasonably high density, for example east coast cities.

Population density in "sprawling" Philadelphia: 4,554.76/km2
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia

Population density in "bus friendly" Reading, and one of the few places in Britain cited as a major bus success story: 4,040/km2

Reading, Berkshire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Philly is six times the size of Reading with some highly densely populated areas where people do use public transport https://www.phillymag.com/property/2013/03/08/philadelphia-commuting-patterns/

Doubtless there are examples where people use public transport in some numbers but you asked a question in your initial post and it's been answered.

 

[Bletchleyite]

What's also worth bearing in mind is that UK local bus operation is "subsidised" (sort of; it's more of a tax break than a subsidy) by receiving BSOG. In the US you might be able to run a bus service if you like (I don't know) but you wouldn't be exempted from fuel duty in that sort of form.

I wonder how viable buses would be commercially were BSOG removed?

 

[radamfi]

What do you mean by 'deregulated'? If you mean can anybody run a bus service if they want to then do they have any specific laws stopping this?

This article from 8 years ago suggests there is no deregulation:

The American bus revival

British-owned companies are threatening to make bus travel cool in the US. How did that happen?

www.bbc.co.uk

Many on the right argue that the answer is to deregulate and privatise America's city buses, setting them free to pick up passengers at the kerbside or even operate door-to-door services.

But Jarrett Walker, an international transport planning consultant and author of new book Human Transit, argues that this would not lead to a better standard of service, pointing to the "free-for-all" that followed bus deregulation in Britain in the 1980s.

Since that article there has been a growth in taxi services and some smaller cities have experimented with replacing their scheduled services with subsidised taxis, but from what I have seen that has not been shown to be cheaper.

 

[Taunton]

There is a logic to subsidizing buses because a well-used bus in a city could be taking 50 cars off the road.

But it doesn't. Those days are gone. Apart from a very few specific areas, such as Chelsea in London with no Underground and zero easy parking availability, the vast majority of bus users do not have a car readily available. Young, old, no licence, can't afford a car, are alcoholics, etc make up the bulk of what patronage there is. Those with cars are using them. One bus taking 50 cars off the road is complete fiction. Yes, there are those such as singles living in the inner city who describe how they live without, but in all truth it's an excuse when they are in one of the groups I describe. They would love to live in a house with a driveway and their own car, and have the physical/mental ability to pass a driving test.

Look at the Greens who live in country areas as opposed to the inner city ... for example, I recently witnessed a Greens protest in Dorset winding up, their banners were being loaded a bit away into a (diesel, of all things) Mercedes, a car which was newer than mine

 

[RT4038]

If it doesn't then there is little point in buses, other than to provide transport to the few people without access to a car.

I would suggest that this is the general consensus towards buses, both in the US and here.

Dirt cheap fares may get the few people without access to a car travelling more often, or further, and maybe a few on the edge of affording access to a car to use the bus instead. Neither of these will generate anywhere near enough money to pay for the fares cut, nor make much difference to pollution and congestion.
A couple of examples:
The ENCTS scheme gave pensioners free travel on buses, but apart from an initial novelty flurry, has not moved them from cars to buses.
London has some of the cheapest bus fares in the UK, but there is an awful lot of empty seats travelling around (pre Covid) and still plenty of congestion and pollution.

 

[Harpers Tate]

I am fairly familiar with the local bus network in Orlando Fl. As a passenger, for a bus service, it's pretty good. Inexpensive and most routes are frequent enough, although some are just hourly and a tiny number are less frequent. It's integrated (since there is only one operator - the city) and inexpensive to use - $2 flat fare one way, with transfers to other routes inside of 90 minutes at no extra cost; all day $4.50; weekly $16. etc. Half fare for children and concessions. It has a clean modern fleet. Buses all have bike carriers.

It is obviously subsidised. One thing that does set the US "system" apart from ours is that they can, and do, raise taxes (on sales of merchandise, restaurants, etc.) at local level and determine locally what to spend it on. I don't know what the numbers are, but they could (and do), say, add 0.5% sales tax for transport; decision made and impemented by the city.

I suspect the political motivation is to keep the low-paid moving, but, of course, services are available to anyone. Sure - anyone with use of a car will probably use that, but as a visitor, I have saved a fortune (at the expense of some travelling time) on car rental and insurance. Two weeks trip, two weeks travel anywhere in the system for $32 each.

In fact - I see that network with a degree of envy, when I compare it to the machinations of First (and, to a lesser degree, Stagecoach) hereabouts, with, between them and the PTE, a totally bewildering plethora of tickets of varying coverage and provider and price and no practical integration (beyond premium priced multi-mode passes).

 

[radamfi]

But it doesn't. Those days are gone. Apart from a very few specific areas, such as Chelsea in London with no Underground and zero easy parking availability, the vast majority of bus users do not have a car readily available. Young, old, no licence, can't afford a car, etc make up the bulk of what patronage there is. Those with cars are using them. One bus taking 50 cars off the road is complete fiction. Yes, there are those such as singles living in the inner city who describe how they live without, but in all truth it's an excuse when they are in one of the groups I describe. They would love to live in a house with a driveway and their own car, and have the physical/mental ability to pass a driving test.

Look at the Greens who live in country areas as opposed to the inner city ... for example, I recently witnessed a Greens protest in Dorset winding up, their banners were being loaded a bit away into a (diesel, of all things) Mercedes, a car which was newer than mine

But we often hear about how some cities manage to get people to leave their cars at home in other countries. For example, Germany has been widely discussed on here recently. If it is actually impossible to get people out of cars, then there really is little point in buses and the buses part of this forum might as well close down.

 

[Bletchleyite]

But we often hear about how some cities manage to get people to leave their cars at home in other countries. For example, Germany has been widely discussed on here recently. If it is actually impossible to get people out of cars, then there really is little point in buses and the buses part of this forum might as well close down.

The dichotomy of buses is that to get people out of cars they need to be fast and direct, whereas to serve social needs they need to be slower and serve more places. The US I guess tends towards the latter.

 

[Daniel740]

The dichotomy of buses is that to get people out of cars they need to be fast and direct, whereas to serve social needs they need to be slower and serve more places. The US I guess tends towards the latter.

Actually in the majority of U.S cities, buses only operate on the main roads, especially in the Midwest. As I said in an earlier post, Oklahoma City has a metropolitan population of over a million and yet there are only 15 bus routes, none of them run into residential areas.

 

[RT4038]

But we often hear about how some cities manage to get people to leave their cars at home in other countries. For example, Germany has been widely discussed on here recently. If it is actually impossible to get people out of cars, then there really is little point in buses and the buses part of this forum might as well close down.

But you have already said that the point of buses is 'for those without access to a car' [post #29], and this could be permanently without access (can't/don't drive) or temporarily (can't afford a car, one car in household and other member is using it etc) and a few with other reasons. If the bus service serving this (fairly small) market can be operated commercially then surely it is better for the country to spend tax revenue on other priorities.

If you want to get people out of cars and into buses there will have to be some degree of coercion, such as restrictions on car driving space and/or economic sanctions so a smaller proportion of the population can afford to drive (or drive as much). The politics of this are much more difficult.

 

[Taunton]

If it is actually impossible to get people out of cars, then there really is little point in buses and the buses part of this forum might as well close down.

But buses have ceased to be a mainstream transport medium that some of us knew from our childhood, and are now, aside a few and diminishing exceptions, effectively a social service for disadvantaged groups. Covid has really done for much of what remained. When did you last see people in a bus in business suits?

 

[radamfi]

The dichotomy of buses is that to get people out of cars they need to be fast and direct, whereas to serve social needs they need to be slower and serve more places. The US I guess tends towards the latter.

Bus stops seem to be unnecessarily close in American cities which slows things down. But we have just read that buses don't tend to divert off the main roads into estates. Looking at selected bus maps buses do seem to be quite direct and follow the grid system. For example, the Philadelphia map shows a lot of routes going east-west and north-south following the grid system. That looks like quite a clever idea, as they cover the whole city with not that many routes. Just take one east-west bus then a north-south bus or vice versa. I guess the grid system makes it a lot easier to do that compared to UK towns.

https://septa.org/maps/region/pdf/septa-phila-transit-street-map.pdf

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But you have already said that the point of buses is 'for those without access to a car' [post #29], and this could be permanently without access (can't/don't drive) or temporarily (can't afford a car, one car in household and other member is using it etc) and a few with other reasons. If the bus service serving this (fairly small) market can be operated commercially then surely it is better for the country to spend tax revenue on other priorities.

If you want to get people out of cars and into buses there will have to be some degree of coercion, such as restrictions on car driving space and/or economic sanctions so a smaller proportion of the population can afford to drive (or drive as much). The politics of this are much more difficult.

I think you got the wrong end of the stick from that post. I meant that buses *should* be taking cars off the road, but if they aren't then that's far from ideal.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Nov 2020 ==

But buses have ceased to be a mainstream transport medium that some of us knew from our childhood, and are now, aside a few and diminishing exceptions, effectively a social service for disadvantaged groups. Covid has really done for much of what remained. When did you last see people in a bus in business suits?

That maybe the case in the UK and USA, but what about elsewhere?

 

[Bletchleyite]

But buses have ceased to be a mainstream transport medium that some of us knew from our childhood, and are now, aside a few and diminishing exceptions, effectively a social service for disadvantaged groups. Covid has really done for much of what remained. When did you last see people in a bus in business suits?

In London you see it all the time, and probably Edinburgh too, the latter being a very anti-car city. But I get your point for elsewhere in the UK.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Nov 2020 ==

Bus stops seem to be unnecessarily close in American cities which slows things down. But we have just read that buses don't tend to divert off the main roads into estates. Looking at selected bus maps buses do seem to be quite direct and follow the grid system. For example, the Philadelphia map shows a lot of routes going east-west and north-south following the grid system. That looks like quite a clever idea, as they cover the whole city with not that many routes. Just take one east-west bus then a north-south bus or vice versa. I guess the grid system makes it a lot easier to do that compared to UK towns.

Though it isn't how buses are operated in Milton Keynes, because people won't change.

I think it is in Barcelona, though, the routes are numbered V and H if I recall.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

But we often hear about how some cities manage to get people to leave their cars at home in other countries. For example, Germany has been widely discussed on here recently. If it is actually impossible to get people out of cars, then there really is little point in buses and the buses part of this forum might as well close down.

As has been explained before, this is NOT the case. It is not impossible to get people out of cars but it is not easy either. @Bletchleyite has explained some of this but @RT4038 puts it succinctly

If you want to get people out of cars and into buses there will have to be some degree of coercion, such as restrictions on car driving space and/or economic sanctions so a smaller proportion of the population can afford to drive (or drive as much). The politics of this are much more difficult.

It is not a scientific, definitive mix (A+B+C=Success) but there are a number of key things that have to come into place in order to make public transport, by whatever mode, work. The time penalty (more than the cost) of using public transport has to be lessened in order to make it more attractive. In practical terms, that is providing bus priority that is appropriate and well enforced, rapid transit systems (train/metro/tram) that can beat the private car over similar distances, etc, as well as limiting the amount of parking within town and city centres. In transport surveys, cost is seldom the prime consideration - it is reliability. No point in it being cheaper if you're late for work!

Achieving that reliability through the coercion that @RT4038 mentions, without alienating car drivers who are also voters, is the difficult bit. And before you say, well bus and rail passengers are voters too, that is indeed true but the politicians can always blame the rail or train companies. Bit more difficult for the authorities to blame anyone for road design and efficiency.

Anyhow, we're now drifting away from the original question.

 

[markymark2000]

I think it would be great if buses could be deregulated in America. I think as with most things in America, things are too fragmented and so making money would be far too hard. I think look at one operating model which works really well here in the UK is to run local buses between schools. That doesn't work though in america due to the obsession with Yellow School Buses. IF their school buses were allowed to be ran by normal buses or coaches (still a closed service just a different vehicle), bus operations would be hugely different over there. You would have companies doing their bit for local communities while also providing school buses.

You then have another issue of land ownership. I don't understand it fully but having had discussions with quite a few American bus operators, they say that they have to get landowners permission (land seems to include general pavements, not just land parcels) just to put bus stops up and landowners there want a lot of money and aren't very helpful when it comes to buses.

I think on top of that, you need to address walking distances to bus stops. America is built in such a car centric way that even if something is 30 seconds away (walking as the crow flies), in reality, it is a 5 minute car drive/20 walk.

The stigma around public transport in America as well is similar to how some people see it here in the UK but it's much more prominent. Americans commonly believe buses are for poor people and there is a lot of ASB onboard. I can see that being the case in some areas on some routes but it's so deeply ingrained into Americans that bus travel is not for 'normal' people, you have a huge issue encouraging people onto the network.

Operations wise, it's similar to how Wales want buses so everything links up together to accommodate those few people connecting (primerilly elderly or occasional travellers) rather than focussing on faster journey times and linking directly to where people want to go (which normally attract fare payers and regulars).


America has the chance to improve it's bus networks but there is a lack of will from current operators to try and get new people onto the buses and certainly a lack of will to innovate to make the network better (some areas still rely on ticket books). Some of the routes seem planned as Merseytravel ran a few years back with routes running to satisfy a minimal few and keep councillors/representatives happy rather than running to maximise passengers. As most have now realised, running to keep representatives happy rather than keeping the bulk of residents happy, leads to buses being cut due to low usage.
I think there are plenty of ways to make cost savings and thus make the networks more viable by modernising (websites and more payment methods) and timetable efficiencies (some routes have huge layovers and it's all time which drivers are paid which massively increases costs. I believe there is a lot of dead millage as well since routes tend to run end to end with few short trips or placement routes). I think Americas bus networks are made worse by some very poor planning and by how locally things are ran, it leads to government borders being bus terminus borders and no one want's to work with neighbours. Every tier of government there has it's own plans on how things should run and in some cases, you have that many transit operators, it's just bonkers. To switch it into a UK sense, i'll use Lancashire as an example. You would have Skelmersdale town buses, you then have West Lancashire Council running buses to run village routes to towns, you then have Lancashire County buses for interurban travel linking longer distances. If you live on a border though, you have to go into town on the city bus, switch to a higher government level bus and then go back out. To switch between counties, you need the deregulated coaches (Greyhound or Megabus). The point of this explanation being that if you travel across counties or towns, you could be spending 3, 4 maybe even 5 times longer on public transport than if you drove (and that isn't taking into account the walk from home to the bus stops and the connecting time between routes). This may sound familiar as some UK councils act in this way but it's done on a larger scale due to the amounts of government tiers.

 

[RT4038]

I think you got the wrong end of the stick from that post. I meant that buses *should* be taking cars off the road, but if they aren't then that's far from ideal.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Nov 2020 ==



That maybe the case in the UK and USA, but what about elsewhere?

Maybe they 'should' but it doesn't appear that they are, either here (with 'outrageous fares') or in the US (with 'dirt cheap fares'). Therefore, as I suggest with 'coercion', the key must lie in something else.

Elsewhere, in places where cars are restricted (either physically or economically) you will see people in business suits on buses. Invariably there is an element of coercion. As @Bletchleyite points out, this occurs in the UK where similar conditions apply.

 

[radamfi]

I think it would be great if buses could be deregulated in America. I think as with most things in America, things are too fragmented and so making money would be far too hard. I think look at one operating model which works really well here in the UK is to run local buses between schools. That doesn't work though in america due to the obsession with Yellow School Buses.

The American school bus system seems to be very well used and as I understand it almost all kids get some kind of school bus, and it is free. This must surely get a lot of cars off the road and parents driving kids to school is a significant cause of traffic congestion in Britain. So this looks like something that America does better than the UK.

 

[RT4038]

The American school bus system seems to be very well used and as I understand it almost all kids get some kind of school bus, and it is free. This must surely get a lot of cars off the road and parents driving kids to school is a significant cause of traffic congestion in Britain. So this looks like something that America does better than the UK.

The American school bus system is also very expensive. There is no such thing as a 'free' bus - it is being paid for somehow. There are few other countries in the world with such a system.

 

[edwin_m]

You might have noticed, however, that I have pointed out various big cities where bus usage is reasonably popular and are of reasonably high density, for example east coast cities.

Population density in "sprawling" Philadelphia: 4,554.76/km2
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia

Population density in "bus friendly" Reading, and one of the few places in Britain cited as a major bus success story: 4,040/km2

Reading, Berkshire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

There is a distinction between the few US cities that are high density, transit-friendly and fairly comparable to European conditions, and all the rest. The former group are mostly on the East Coast (plus others such as San Francisco and Chicago), grew big before the advent of the car and in many cases their expansion is constrained by geography. Public transport is a viable option within the urban area, provision is often comparable to European levels and car ownership lower than elsewhere. A few more recent cities (such as Portland Oregon) have headed towards joining this group through policies of transit-orientated development and others (such as Los Angeles) are low density but simply so big that transit is still viable.

Most other cities grew up after WW2 when car ownership was widespread and part of the American Dream. Many of the older cities grew suburbs with similar characteristics. in these places the density is far too low to make transit commercially viable.

But it doesn't. Those days are gone. Apart from a very few specific areas, such as Chelsea in London with no Underground and zero easy parking availability, the vast majority of bus users do not have a car readily available. Young, old, no licence, can't afford a car, are alcoholics, etc make up the bulk of what patronage there is. Those with cars are using them. One bus taking 50 cars off the road is complete fiction. Yes, there are those such as singles living in the inner city who describe how they live without, but in all truth it's an excuse when they are in one of the groups I describe. They would love to live in a house with a driveway and their own car, and have the physical/mental ability to pass a driving test.

Look at the Greens who live in country areas as opposed to the inner city ... for example, I recently witnessed a Greens protest in Dorset winding up, their banners were being loaded a bit away into a (diesel, of all things) Mercedes, a car which was newer than mine

If the bus users don't have a car available, maybe that's a sign of success that they don't consider it necessary to have one. Either way, if the bus didn't run there would be 50+ people who would either have to get cars, find some less convenient or more costly way of travelling, or restrict their lives by not making the journey at all. So maybe it's not 50+ cars off the road but it's 50+ people who would otherwise be denied an opportunity.

I think it would be great if buses could be deregulated in America. I think as with most things in America, things are too fragmented and so making money would be far too hard.

Hence they would have to be closer to the tendered rather than the commercial model in the UK. I believe a few cities have gone that way but it's one of the few industries that remains strongly unionized (even in the home of capitalism!), and the lack of established operators to bid is probably limiting it too.

Operations wise, it's similar to how Wales want buses so everything links up together to accommodate those few people connecting (primerilly elderly or occasional travellers) rather than focussing on faster journey times and linking directly to where people want to go (which normally attract fare payers and regulars).

Jarrett Walker (mentioned above, https://humantransit.org/, numerous relevant posts so not quoting a specific one) has a lot to say on striking this balance in the context of American bus operations.

 

[Daniel740]

The American school bus system seems to be very well used and as I understand it almost all kids get some kind of school bus, and it is free. This must surely get a lot of cars off the road and parents driving kids to school is a significant cause of traffic congestion in Britain. So this looks like something that America does better than the UK.

The American school bus system is only there because of the need to desegregate schools, if the Supreme Court hadn’t have ruled in favour of ‘bussing in’ there probably wouldn’t be any school bus provision in the USA.

 

[RT4038]

I think there are plenty of ways to make cost savings and thus make the networks more viable by modernising (websites and more payment methods) and timetable efficiencies (some routes have huge layovers and it's all time which drivers are paid which massively increases costs.

You must be careful not to assume that conditions in the US are the same as here. US transit drivers duties do not include breaks in the same way - essentially an equivalent of the UK domestic rule of an aggregate of 45 mins. break in 8 and a half hours is operated, with the longer layovers at off peak times making up for the lack of a break block.

 

[radamfi]

The American school bus system is also very expensive. There is no such thing as a 'free' bus - it is being paid for somehow. There are few other countries in the world with such a system.

From what I've heard from work colleagues who grew up in other countries, Britain is particularly unusual in driving kids to school, even if they didn't have a free school bus. In some other countries it is considered "uncool", especially for teenagers, if your friends see you being taken to school by your parents. Even when I was a kid, only a minority of kids went to school by car even though by then we already had near universal car ownership.

 

[RT4038]

The American school bus system is only there because of the need to desegregate schools, if the Supreme Court hadn’t have ruled in favour of ‘bussing in’ there probably wouldn’t be any school bus provision in the USA.

Not sure that is right. US school bus provision goes back much further than that [funded in all 48 states from 1919], and in areas where segregation has never existed. However, long(er) distance bussing allowed for racial desegregation in the 60s/70s

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Nov 2020 ==

From what I've heard from work colleagues who grew up in other countries, Britain is particularly unusual in driving kids to school, even if they didn't have a free school bus. In some other countries it is considered "uncool", especially for teenagers, if your friends see you being taken to school by your parents. Even when I was a kid, only a minority of kids went to school by car even though by then we already had near universal car ownership.

Sorry, I don't think Britain is particularly unusual at all. Lived in two other countries, with similar but subtlety different issues. Not every child in the UK is driven to school, by any means. Much of the congestion problems are caused by primary/junior schools in narrow streets, i.e. not teenagers at all. It doesn't take many parents trying to park no more than six feet from the school gate to cause congestion!
In teenagers, the 'uncool' consideration is tempered by the effort of walking up to 3 miles to school, or increasingly children going to 'out of catchment area' schools more than 3 miles away, who are then not entitled to free transport, and possibly no public transport option anyway.

Need to be careful comparing one country with another, because the conditions may be different.

 

[Daniel740]

Not sure that is right. US school bus provision goes back much further than that [funded in all 48 states from 1919], and in areas where segregation has never existed. However, long(er) distance bussing allowed for racial desegregation in the 60s/70s

Sure, school bus provision existed before segregation but it really ramped up after the Supreme Court ruled in 1971 that in order to ‘balance out the races’ bussing in was acceptable:

Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org