10 mins walk to railway station, 15 min on train to train to city centre. Faster and easier than driving. Cars were for short trips in the area, luggage, and out of town trips.
Even in a small town my kids used busses quite a bit.
"Transplant this pattern onto a suburb and it breaks." Well, we're talking about the city, aren't we?
Let's pick a city, I'll let you choose, and tell me which suburb within that city is a classic example of the pattern you feel is commonplace. Then we can discuss a concrete plan.
An example near and dear to me is Portland. Although there is an urban core, so some people would claim it is not in fact a suburban city, the footprint of the city is dominated by single family homes. And generally not the endless modern tract variety, either.
You've got:
Grand Chute, Kimberly, Little Chute, Combined Locks, Harrison, Fox Crossing, Greenville, etc.
Show me where you think the main hub of this area is that many people all want to go to that a train or more unused city buses will solve.
I'd focus on the college corridor. (Airport, Fox River Mall), Appleton Transit Center, Downtown Appleton, Lawrence university, maybe a little east. Theres some decent anchors along that line, but it might make sense to deviate from college ave to hit them.
Because this is a small town, this route is small. Probably need only 4-5 buses in active revenue service to achieve those 15 minute time tables.
Then I'd probably prioritize an intersecting route from Richmond, Oneida, and Memorial.
Both would need light and right of way changes to prioritize bus traffic.
Route 15, which strongly parallels my suggested route, Carries 15% of the whole transit network's total load and is considered a high revenue route despite only hourly service. This route heavily serves workers and students.
The route was decreased in frequency not due to flagging demand, but because they could not sufficiently staff the route. Their general manager is quoted as saying, "we are having trouble finding enough drivers to drive the buses". They lost like a third of their drivers over the past five years.
If the route was staffed and had priority right of way, making it a key means to get across town, you'd definitely see riders come back.
When i lived there it had a decent tram system and lots of busses.