{"id":719,"date":"2026-07-15T12:36:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanlivingreport.com\/?p=719"},"modified":"2026-07-15T12:36:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:36:26","slug":"the-most-surprising-winner-of-the-world-cup-was-american-public-transit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanlivingreport.com\/?p=719","title":{"rendered":"The most surprising winner of the World Cup was American public transit"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Much like its indifference toward soccer, America\u2019s aversion to public transport has made it a global anomaly, an oddity encapsulated by the nation\u2019s sacred pre-game pastime: the tailgate.<\/p>\n

Read more What the current froyo renaissance is really about<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Here in the US, celebrating sports means driving your big car to a colossal suburban gridiron football stadium, where you\u2019ll grill, baby, grill until the smoky scents of burgers and bratwurst float across vast plains of asphalt. So entrenched is the nation\u2019s car culture that the average American spends about every year. In fact, while the US has tens of millions more cars than it has people to drive them, even its largest cities have far fewer trains or buses per capita than our global peers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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As a result, Americans are more than twice as likely to die in a car accident as Europeans, and nearly five times as likely to die in a car crash as someone in train-happy Germany. While many transit projects carry similar price tags, the US still boasts many dozens more college football stadiums than it does or subway networks.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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So, it\u2019s no wonder that critics doubted that US cities hosting this year\u2019s World Cup, the largest single sporting event in human history, could effectively find ways to schlep visiting fans around. After abandoning its initial pledges to shepherd fans for free, New Jersey earned scorn for trying to sell $150 round-trip train tickets to MetLife Stadium, prompting journalists to test how difficult it would be to reach it by foot, bike, or canoe. Kansas City\u2019s shiny new pop-up World Cup buses got caught in hours of ensnarled traffic on their way to their city\u2019s very first game, a match-up between Algeria and Argentina.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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And yet, on the precipice of the tournament\u2019s final stage, the nation\u2019s widely expected World Cup public transit meltdown has simply not materialized. To the surprise of pretty much everyone, US cities have managed to absorb the influx of fans with relative ease, even under the pressure of record ridership en route to stadiums, watch parties, and fan zones.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Eli Lipmen, executive director of the advocacy group MoveLA, said that he had \u201cactually been pleasantly surprised and quite impressed\u201d with how the Los Angeles transit system performed amid the World Cup. As he explained, that notoriously gridlocked city is in the midst of a \u201cmajor cultural shift\u201d around public transit. As Angelenos spend less time in their cars, the city has gotten quieter, he said. \u201cPeople are happier. There\u2019s more of a sense of community.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A renewed commitment to public transit infrastructure has played a part in that shift \u2014 and not just in Southern California. In the lead-up to the World Cup and the 2028 Olympics, Los Angeles unveiled three new subway stations in May, its first new stations to open in over two decades. Meanwhile, Seattle\u2019s Sound Transit shuttled a record-shattering 309,000 riders when Team USA faced Team Belgium, thanks in part to its completion of a light rail extension that had been in the works for nearly two decades. Atlanta overhauled its bus network, Miami made use of a new rapid transit line, and Kansas City spent millions to expand its tram service and rolled out pop-up shuttles.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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As it turns out, US cities can<\/em> build new buses, trams, and trains much faster than they may think. The harder question now is whether they can keep up that momentum when it serves locals, and not just visitors. Just hours after Kansas City\u2019s final World Cup match \u2014 Argentina 3, Switzerland 2 \u2014 its cash-strapped transit authority shut down its extended tram service with plans to slash a quarter of its regular bus routes by the end of this summer.<\/p>\n

Read more Why people think Mitch McConnell\u2019s hiding something<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Many host cities \u201care still not building [transit] as a serious modal shift\u201d away from cars, said Eric Goldwyn, director of the Marron Institute of Urban Management at NYU. \u201cThey\u2019re building it as a cutesy patootsie complement.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Americans learned to love soccer. Can they learn to love transit too?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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LA is among the exceptions, and not only because of its looming Olympics host gig. The city has made a concerted effort over the past couple of years to invest in and rebrand its transit system, which had long had a reputation for grime and danger. \u201cIf you\u2019d spoken to me two and a half years ago, this conversation would be about safety and security on the metro system,\u201d said Lipmen, referencing a bus that was taken hostage in 2024, one of several \u201creally horrible, very high-profile incidents\u201d that left many Angelenos feeling unsafe on the system. \u201cNow, the conversation is about joy and celebration.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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What changed?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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LA began investing heavily in building more trains, buses, and subway stations, and overhauled its public safety approach, which led to a 6.7 percent drop in violent crime on transit and a 33 percent drop in incidents like drug use and weapons possession. For Lipmen, the real shift came when the metro system opened its three new stations along the D line in May, and released a raunchy \u201cRide the D\u201d shirt to celebrate it. Almost immediately, the Metro\u2019s cheeky merchandise sold out, and would continue to sell out every time it was restocked for months to follow.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It might sound silly, but the hype genuinely helped dull some of the stigma associated with taking the train. \u201cPeople who were quietly riding transit all of a sudden felt comfortable in their own skin as a transit-rider, and proud to be a transit-rider,\u201d said Lipmen.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Overall, LA\u2019s big bet appears to be slowly working. \u201cLA is a transit city,\u201d Jennifer Vides, Metro Los Angeles\u2019s chief customer experience officer, told the Associated Press last week. \u201cPeople want to try to say that it\u2019s not. Obviously, we have a lot more expansion to do and we\u2019re working on it. But people really want transit.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Beyond adding new train lines or bus fleets, normalizing public transit requires \u201ca dramatic recast of how people get around and travel,\u201d Goldwyn said. Cities need a vision that ensures that there is an actual \u201cdestination on the other end\u201d of their new transit line, like offices or the kind of housing California\u2019s new bill aims to get built near transit hubs. Most cities will need a mixture of \u201ccarrots and sticks\u201d to help people who are used to driving everywhere see the value in hopping on a bus or tram as part of their everyday commute, not just to get to the airport or the stadium. \u201cIf your transit is not connecting you to places you want to go, you\u2019re not going to use it,\u201d Goldwyn said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A single tournament, like a single train line, will never be enough to change how Americans move. But if this nation of football fans can learn to love soccer, then surely they can learn to love the train a little bit more too. At the very least, with LA28 precisely two years away, Los Angeles just got closer to making its car-free summer Olympic dreams come true.<\/p>\n

Read more Modi\u2019s government brought Bollywood to heel. Hollywood should pay attention.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

See More:<\/span><\/p>\n
    \n
  • Culture<\/li>\n
  • FIFA World Cup<\/li>\n
  • Future Perfect<\/li>\n
  • Policy<\/li>\n
  • Sports<\/li>\n
  • Transportation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    The World Cup is leading America to a soccer awakening. 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