Objectively they are not profitable. If you count gas taxes that are collected, we're only covering about a quarter of the cost to maintain them.

Roads are not generating direct revenue, which is how you determine profit. There's no model where roads are profitable.

Additionally, we've been moving goods and services by rail for approximately two centuries in the United States - long before a car was on a road. Roads are not a requirement to move goods around.

That same argument should apply to public transport then. You can't on one hand argue that roads don't need to be profitable in the traditional sense because of their benefits and the turn around and ignore the same for public transport.