Anecdotally: I moved from Midwest suburbs into a coastal major city. I sold off my car when I did so. Even with the raised prices on things like rent, food, etc, I still couldn't figure out why I had so much money left over. I thought I was forgetting to pay a bill. Turns out, owning a car was much more expensive than I'd realized. I ended up saving quite a bit more by living in the "expensive" city.

But most of the major cities that I've been to in the US don't have a decent public transportation system. If they would fix this, then people could become less reliant on cars.