I don't know about him, but I prefer the bicycle over public transportation for most trips.
When public transportation is improved to be better than private vehicles, regardless of the cost, that's when people will use it. Otherwise they will pay to the limit of their incomes to retain private vehicles. And those of us who can use bicycles effectively and don't like putting up with the nonsense common with and on public transportation will not get on the bus at any cost of fuel.
Right now, it would cost something like $15 on metra-pace-cta to equal my typical weekend drive one way and take at least 3 hours. Even in my mustang driving at my comfortable speeds, this trip takes less than 3 gallons of fuel. It only took 2 in the torqueless wondercar. Time is generally one hour. There is still no way I would take the existing public transportation system for this.
First, just to cost more to drive, gasoline would have to go beyond $5 a gallon and public transportation to eat the extra fuel cost. At this point, I would simply drive more in the fuel economy sweet spot of the car more. Maybe get another car, something that got over 30mpg. So now gasoline would have to cost more than $7 a gallon and transit to still eat the extra fuel cost just to make itself equal on cost alone.
But we know that at $7 a gallon, transit ticket prices will also go up, probably pushing that break even point out towards $9 a gallon. It's just not going to happen. I'll never take public transportation for my common long trip unless it changes how it operates. I'll use the bicycle more for short trips.
There is no gasoline price that gets me into public transportation for my usual trips the way it exists now in this area.
Transit will get riders when and where it makes sense. Transit that is functional for people is packed. The rest isn't.
