Thoughts About Public Transportation in America

Having grown up in Helsinki, the capital of Finland, I might be spoiled by the public transportation system but the state of America’s buses took me completely by surprise.

It’s always been an unquestioned necessity for me to have buses, metro’s, trams and trains running regularly and transporting me to wherever I’m wishing to go. That may be why I didn’t pay accessibility and transportation a second thought when I found out I was going to go to exchange in a little town in Western Pennsylvania called Indiana. Anyway, it was only 500 kilometres away from New York and the delights of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia were even closer. And Chicago and Niagara Falls for sure were easy to reach by bus. The four months would be so filled with traveling that I didn’t even know where to start.

However, after arriving to the small snow-covered town, the reality started finally to take in. This place was designed to people who left the comfort of their houses only with their big cars and even though Indiana is considered to be a student town, it was screaming for the lack of transportation which a European student finds as an absolute necessity. The connections from campus to the malls did exist, employing men and women clearly in retirement age, and transporting even older people and the few students who didn’t have the luxury of owning a car. But what it comes to leaving the town, it had been made extremely difficult for non-car owners. The bus to Pittsburgh (and to the closest airport), run twice a day, but there was no point of going for day trip because three hour’s city pleasure isn’t worth of six hour’s sweaty and bumpy bus trip. And having experienced the old, sometimes too hot and sometimes too cold busses, the 18 hour’s trip to New York by road didn’t seem that tempting any more. Neither did any other options. And there we were with my fellow exchange students, lying on our dormitory beds on evenings, listening to the whistles of the carriage train and imagining how easy it would be if it just would take people.

By writing this I’m not meaning to complain over things that can’t be done better by moaning. I’m simply wishing to share my astonishment with others, and maybe even offer a warning to people who are considering exploring America beyond the big cities. It introduces a European student a completely different mentality which is difficult to understand if not experienced in person. The concepts individualism and freedom which are cherished in the American culture show their distorted edges in this travelling issue. The well-off can access everything they need easily from the comfort of their huge cars but the other side of the society is left in the mercy of miserable public transport and the strength of their own will. Because you really need a patience of a saint and a good amount of strong will to sit down in a bus for 18 hours to access a city only 500 km away.

But eventually getting around in Western Pennsylvania wasn’t as difficult as it first seemed. You just had to adapt to completely new conditions, take your time to get into the closest airport and fly! Thanks to the countless budget flight companies and the excellent exchange rate between dollar and euro, I and my fellow exchange students managed to see plenty of interest places after all during our one semester stay.