I suspect they may be thinking about growth here, since Seattle’s system has had a very impressive growth, and is improving at a rate no other city in the USA comes close. So in other words Seattle for sure has one of the best transit policy in the USA, however New York for sure has a much better system.

I do disagree with you vehemently about Seattle’s light rail being inferior to Portland’s. That may have been true 10 years ago, but it for sure is not true today, especially after the East link opened earlier this year.

That said, Your parent is wildly off the mark (and honestly quite reactionary) in describing harassment from fentanyl addicts. Such harassment is extremely rare, and in the few cases where it does happen it is a failure of public health policy, not transit and accessibility policy.