I didn't use the bus system at all so I can't comment there. Barcelona in comparison has fairly easy to navigate stations and a much friendlier fare system.
This in turn creates this shitty illusion of "public" service that nobody wants to use, because:
- it's unreliable (delays and strikes are common) - short working hours - poorly planned (or no) interconnections with other public services - abusive service costs to recoup the costs
Even factoring all expenses of a car, several bus connections I was forced to take in the past where in the order of 5-6 times the total cost of car ownership. This doesn't even include the grave annoyances I listed above.
Sad :(
They are required to do so by law.
At least in the province of Venice, there was a complicated set of rules to pick between bidders of public contractors - so the law is certainly not universal in this regard.
If I recall correctly, it was based on percentiles instead of taking just the lowest bidder in an attempt to avoid companies racing to the bottom.
This in turn created a system where winning ad these bids was mostly by chance, and unsurprisingly was found to be rigged several times. But I digress...
If anyone wants to pour over the article and explain it to me: EMT is the TfL of Madrid, Mayor's office is left-wing, Regional government is right-wing.
The issue is not really the restriction, but the lack of alternatives. Very few cities have a decent metro zone: these cities are the only ones where I see no objections to stricter traffic policies.
Most cities are only served by public _road_ transport services. This doesn't have the same level of service, by a long shot. There's a huge, _huge_ difference between having to plan your move in 1hr intervals and just hop on a platform having to wait no longer than 10 minutes. Not to mention the cost, inevitable delays due to traffic, shorter service hours and so on.
I would ban all cars tomorrow and sell mine too if I could get anywhere in a metro. Reality is, this is only feasible for very few selected places.
The governments here should make public transport massively better first. The reality is that they just enforce restrictions and provide no alternatives. What do you do then?