In PR.China, public transport is highly competitive relative to other countries I've been to, and pretty efficient to boot. Sometimes feel that it's not a matter of PR.China's infrastructure and public transportation services being awesome, more that the mismanagement and price-gouging in other countries is so prevalent.

Net - net, it's cheaper to drive in most of Europe than to catch a train, and the opposite is true in China, as far as I'm aware. I guess there may be other factors, but mostly I think it's this.