That's a fair criticism, but most of America does live in cities and urban environments and so the default context would be more akin to what I described. Where you live is the minority and the exception.

Unfortunately transportation policy is heavily influenced at the national level and the federal government doles out gargantuan amounts of funding to keep the highway lobbying industry happy. We can't only have a local conversation or even a state conversation, though of course those conversations happen as well and are arguably more important.