Not always true. TfL in London was (before COVID) famously unsubsidised, recovering its entire costs from ticket sales and adverts.
So the idea that you have to subsidise public transport is crap, the oldest, and one of the largest public transport systems in the worlds managed just fine without a subsidy for over half a decade, and is only struggling because government policy basically banned the use of public transport for a year.
So the idea that you have to subsidise public transport is crap, the oldest, and one of the largest public transport systems in the worlds managed just fine without a subsidy for over half a decade, and is only struggling because government policy basically banned the use of public transport for a year.