NY/NJ here, but I felt the same way after visiting Tokyo. Another metro system I was really impressed with was Taipei’s; the trains were clean, safe and ran frequently.

It was so depressing coming home to our public transportation, especially because the airport connections are poor and make you cranky immediately after deboarding.

Even with the decreased ridership right now some stations and lines remain congested, and the narrower platforms can feel unsafe when there’s crowding. There’s a persistent stank during this swampy time of year and a layer of dust, skin cells and/or unidentified garbage particles on the tracks that cleaning doesn’t ever really fix. There’s just more vomit and pee to clean in the first place. Okay I’m being a little dramatic but it really do be like that sometimes.

Sure the newest stations are nicer, but the cost and the time it takes is crazy. And it’s impossible to retrofit most of the existing stations with new technology so we’re stuck having to work around this old infrastructure. Meanwhile, there are a lot of neighborhoods that are underserved. At least we finally have contactless readers. The technology has been around for almost two decades but better late than never? Sorry, this is becoming a huge rant but public transportation in the US is such a joke.