Americans are deluded with cars. America is just huge and our cities (metro + suburbs) are huge. Meaning to use a train requires driving to the train stop, parking, waiting for train, etc. and if that entire process isn’t meaningfully better experience or meaningfully faster why wouldn’t I choose to drive.

It’s like Caltrain, for many driving is actually a faster commute than taking Caltrain. People took Caltrain though as the 20mins ish more the train takes makes up not sitting in standstill traffic.