I lived in an apartment in suburban Atlanta that was 4 stories in a county with no public transit whatsoever. Plenty of places in the U.S. have little or no public transit in the US but also have the density to support apartment buildings.
I have to say this debate is just exhausting. People just don't want to accomodate any solutions beyond "We Must Have Cheap Gas For Our Trucks In Perpetuity". I mean... that's just not the world we live in. And the rest of us (including and especially the urban poor!) have been looking at alternatives for decades.
[1] Here's Georgia's helpful site. Indeed Atlanta transit is sort of a mess, but it's there and it does work. No doubt you didn't take the bus when you lived there, but you almost certainly had options you weren't aware of. https://www.gatransit.org/page/TransitNearMe