In cities where public transportation is expected, places you want to go tend to be clustered better, so you can walk/bike/bus/train to several things at once.
"Location location location" has to consider foot traffic.
Nonsense. Just because some people are unable to exercise their rights it doesn't mean that others should not, let alone that those rights suddenly become mere privileges.
You should try your best to improve the life of everyone around you, not drag down those who are better off just to force them into everyone's misery.
This makes coverage gaps in public transport less obvious or problematic than in the US. Cities modernized around the car are best traveled theough by car.
There are a lot of European cities and even whole countries including fairly developed ones with pretty shitty public transport.
You also need to check the walkability of many cities. In Europe it's better in the center of old cities but gets pretty bad, in the US the cities tend to sprawl much more especially newer cities like LA. You won't have a highway crossing a city in Europe in the US it's much more common.