Most people, to get to work or visit somewhere, you are driving to it. Even old coworkers from Japan I worked with said it was awkward how we are set up. Our public transportation isn't up to speed.
The local LRT (or Light Rail Transit) system in Calgary, is roughly 50 years behind in development because of local politics and some pretty serious corruption, which has resulted in a very serious lack of employees, services, and so forth, all while increasing the cost of using the LRT system every 3 months.
So yeah, I'm not really surprised to see Japanese visitors in awe about how backwards our transit system is, like it's one of the 7 Wonders of the Modern World.
And the only recent good news... is that the city's mayor has just recently announced... *gasp* A FOURTH CAR FOR SERVICE! (when we really need about a 6 car transit system)