I was trying to not give out many details but I think I've already commented about Madrid in another post so here you go: https://www.capitalradio.es/amp/programas/movilidad-sobre-ruedas/cuanto-tiempo-pierden-madrilenos-buscando-aparcamiento_94445259.html (in Spanish sorry, but you should be able to make out the numbers, maybe some aid with automatic translation).

You are right that my case is a bit above the average, but it's not that uncommon as you could think, it's almost the same for all my tradesman friends, I drive more distance but having to go from inside the city to one of the surrounding towns or the other way around is super common.

From and to populated areas, or even some less populated areas really you can get everywhere by bus, when it's a couple connections most people choose public transports (as I said they all get saturated at rush hours, and I mean packed full. I don't know how you could push the system much further), but when it's a few of them, specially changing from one type to another (bus-train, or even bus-other kind of bus), it adds up. If you happen to work in an industrial area on the outskirts of another town the times can go crazy high, twice or thrice more than by car even with jams and parking.

As you said you don't understand the pain, but you sure understand that really most people just choose the less hellish option. For many of us that means a car, even with top notch alternatives, most of us hate it but the alternative is even worse.

I don't know if I'm sounding like a car lover or something, I'm not. I firmly believe if we put all the money we collectively put towards cars into good use we'd have futurama pipes or some shit by now, but we have to work with incremental improvements as you said.

Planed parking could improve the situation. For example here they've put lots by some metro stations at the limits of the city so people can park there and take the metro and not drive into the city. I must say I was thinking in 'regulated' as in the local government somehow controls and manages it, mandate business to build the lots/spots seems like a very American thing and I see now how it contributes to this necessity for cars over there. But having into account where the people are going to drive and park when approving any development like a residential building/area, or a mall, or anything seems like a good idea, people driving around without going anywhere is the absolute opposite of taking cars out of the roads.

About leaving it to the free market, I don't know some things that are inherently collective and limited like space and its use within a city/town should be administered more democratically by the people that live there through some rules. The market has shown it doesn't have any problem to fuck a lot of (poor always the poor) people in this regard if it's profitable when left alone.

I don't think your situation is much greener, but the costs of emissions are all but hidden over here we have a perpetual 'pollution bonnet' and all the children have lots of respiratory illnesses almost unheard of thirty years ago. Everywhere's grey and dangerous here too but not flat, you have to lean backwards to see a small portion of the sky most of the time, and everything's always full. This isn't quite optimal either.