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A couple quick thoughts about the NY MTA:

- I imagine it's not easy optimizing such a big transportation system. However, some bus lines are obviously misallocated. For example the M4 runs on 34th way too frequently. You can often see 3,4 or even 5 buses go by in matter of a few minutes, all of them empty except for a couple people. On the other hand, during the same period of time, the M16 and M34 aren't frequent enough (you guessed it, those are the ones I want to take ) Seriously though, they are packed at all hours, while you see M4's go by constantly empty.

- The way passengers get on and off the bus isn't particularly optimized. In Europe you mus exit the bus from the rear door. You can walk in quickly via a wider front door, and use one of several machines to scan your pass/id/ticket. Most surprisingly the MTA does not enforce the rule of leaving via the rear door, which causes inefficiencies since everybody has to wait to get on until all passengers get off. I understand it's related to the kneelilng mechanism on some buses, and some people having trouble with the steps, etc. Still, they should slowly replace them with better ones with a lower entry way, or a better full body kneeling system, and a wider entry way with multiple scanning machines.

Anyway, I am being very picky. Obviously, overall the MTA works pretty well, moving millions of people every day.