>I wonder how much of that has to do with our country being much larger and spread out. Not just between cities, but the cities themselves as well? Probably harder to establish efficient mass transit.

I think it has more to do with money. We have the same situation (if not even greater) in Canada. We used to have a pretty good passenger rail system, but the railways realised that there is not enough money in passenger rail. The bigger bucks are in freight, so passenger rail has taken a real beating. In the cities (Toronto being the best example), there are not enough dollars being put into the system to grow it properly, so what happens is that the system has to settle for cramming more people into the same space. To the point where I simply refuse to ride on a Toronto Transit bus or subway unless I've reached a point of desperation rarely seen in civilised society. We do have a fairly decent commuter system called GO Transit, for people travelling into or out of Toronto from not too far away places. But within the city, the Toronto system is untenable as far as I'm concerned, and it all has to do with cash.

Not that I'm saying any company should have to operate at a loss, but the truth is in the dollars far more than the space.

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>>There's a lot of stuff on telly nowadays educating us on our "carbon footprint", and I'm just as guilty for taking frivolous trips out to Egypt for a week's diving, driving to work. But I do try by switching off unnecessary lights, switching off "stand-by" household appliances (PC, monitor, video, TV, digital TV receiver, broadband router, etc.), not taking the car when I can walk it, not having the heating on too high, et al. OK, I haven't been in many American homes, but film and TV representation of such always feature all lights on (even already on when returning home), 'puters always on, TV springs to life from the remote, driveways crammed with cars (and I HAVE seen this in Canada), the 6-lane highways (with 3 lane feeder strips) wall-to-wall with cars - again, seen for myself. I could go on. And don't get me started on styrofoam cups and burger cartons, etc.