Adding a cost to driving will force people to reconsider their habits and when enough people have to change, we can demand the city do better with transit. Right now, if you have money, you will not take public transit. It doesn’t make sense for people with money and poor people have no choice to take public transit.
And if there is no viable alternative for then to turn to they will not change their minds. We build the infrastructure first, and change the public’s mind second with improved commute time, more money in their pocket, etc. I’d rather not wait several years after the public has finally got it through their “me first mentality” to start the decades long process of expanding our pathetic transportation infrastructure to bring us to s21st century standard. We are a half a century behind countries in Europe and Asian in regards to our transit infrastructure, the best time to build it was 50 years ago, the second best is today not in 5 years when driving a car is no longer possible for the majority of people.
I could take the bus to work, but it turns my 2hrs of driving a day into 5 hours of commuting. I would never give up my car until that option is viable, and that’s not going to happen until we have the infrastructure to make it viable.