The Pros and Cons of Public Transportation

One of the huge things I will miss about Europe when I return to the U.S. is widespread, convenient, cheap public transportation. Accustomed to having my car back home however, there are things that never even occurred to me as possible cons of using public transportation all the time. The worst thing is grocery shopping, because you can only take home what you can carry, which can be quite hard when trying to carry food for the week, laundry detergent, a laundry drying rack, and a pack of beer (trust me, I've done it, I know what you're thinking, leave behind the beer, but come on, really?!). Another thing that can occur with public transportation is safety, now I'm not talking about safety in terms of accidents, I'm talking about safety in terms of when you are riding a night bus home at 3 o'clock in the morning and there is a man sitting in front of you clearing inebriated and trying to come on to you in Polish, all the while drooling on himself.. I like taxis more and more. The last con of relying solely on public transportation is that if there is some sort of unfortunate accident, when in a car, it is easy to avoid traffic by taking some sort of alternative route via back roads, etc. However, when relying on a single line of tram tracks to get from point A to point B, it is a serious issue when the trams shut down for three hours, as can be observed in my photos below...