The Case Against Free Buses

A reader makes the following point:

I am pretty sure you have never spent a significant amount of time in NYC. If you had, you would know that the only thing separating hard-working fare-paying riders from smelly, annoying, begging, disruptive sleepers-on-public-transit, it's the $2.00! Also re a car tax, forgive me, but driving into Manhattan for the privilege of being blown up at the corner of Lexington Ave & 41st Street just somehow seems punitive!