One of the biggest hurdles that mass transit has in the United States is the fact that it is simply more convenient for someone to hop in a car than to take a bus or train to work.
You aren't going to convince someone to take mass transit on a regular basis if the person can't get a seat. You certainly aren't going to get people off the road if you are consistently finding that trains are regularly one car short, especially during the holidays when congestion in New York City is at its worst.
NJ Transit should be ashamed of themselves for not running longer trains during the holiday season as a way of enticing people to take the trains on a regular basis or at least running the normal train lengths.
The Bergen Line trains have been frequently one car short, and it was two cars short one day last week. There's no excuse for this, especially with the weather being as mild as it has been.
Of course, all those commuters need a place to park at the train stations, and that's next to impossible at many of the stations, but if you overcome that hurdle, the fact that the trains are packed tighter than a can of sardines will turn most folks off to taking mass transit when they have other options available.
Many people will do the calculation of convenience of driving into Manhattan to be superior to that of taking mass transit, and what you end up with is still more congestion, even with the looming toll and fare hikes.
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