Ken wrote a short post about the differences of public transport usage between Australia and Japan. I ended up writing a long comment so I thought I would write down my own thoughts and experiences here too ^^;

He mentions no one tends to queue for the bus in Australia whereas in Japan, there are always orderly queues.

In Scotland here, no one really queues either. There can be lots of buses coming at once so you don't know where it will stop and maybe that's why, as Ken says, no one queues. Never really asked people why isn't there a queue. But interestingly enough, when the bus does arrive, people generally have the manners to let whoever was waiting at the bus stop longest to go on first. Unless there's kids or other selfish people. The bus driver will let as many people as he can on during rush hours.

It can be pretty funny sometimes when you have more than one person offering to let each other on first... I guess it's the slower pace of life here where most people aren't in a rush to get things done ^^;

On the other hand in Hong Kong, there are either rails or marked lines on the ground for people to queue in and during rush hours, the bus driver will stop people getting on after it's over capacity. It is the same with the subway - Queues happen but there's platform assistants to help squeeze as many people on as possible... That's why I try to avoid rush hour when I'm there. Feel very awkward trying to keep my distance ^^;

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The other difference I found is public transport in HK is a lot cleaner with little vandalism or litter and few people skip the queue. Probably because you'll have the whole crowd after you if you tried anything, lol. Here, you will catch people smoking and littering despite the signs that they maybe fined.

Many people have cars here but personally I still prefer public transport. Why? It might sound weird but I enjoy the longer journeys, listening to my music and just gazing out the window ^^;

Besides, maintaining a car can be costly with expenses such as annual MOT checks and fuel. That said, it's handy when you want to get somewhere quick, need to transport bulky goods or just want to take care of your loved ones so that they don't have to wait out in bad weather.