The problem with mass transit is quite simply that most people don't want to use it, and have no reason to have to use it.  You can dress up light rail any way you want, and try to make buses snazzier, but that won't make it more convenient to use.  My car is always closer to me than the nearest bus stop, I can drive it faster than a bus, and I don't have to wait for a scheduled stop to turn the key.  And in general, I can drive closer to my final destination than the bus or train can.  You can dress up light rail in a myriad of different ways, and make busses look cooler, but those facts won't change.  That's why less than 5% of the population uses mass transit to go to work.  Yet it uses significantly more than that in dollars spent compared to road construction and maintenance.

Mass transit proponents have a sales problem.  They're trying to sell to two different demographics, and it's killing the system.  They're trying to sell to poor people who may not have a car, and have to use mass transit, and they're also trying to sell to more affluent people as well who generally won't use it.  That means that there are routes that go from places where most people drive their cars, to places where most people drive their cars.  What's the point?  If you want to try to sell me on mass transit as a means of welfare to take people from neighborhoods were car ownership is lower and jobs are fewer, to places where jobs are more common, then ok.  But why are we also trying to sell mass transit as competition to automobiles, when it's always going to be a losing battle?

Find your audience, and be realistic about it.  From all our experience, we've found that the "if you build it, they will come" theory doesn't work with mass transit.  People like their cars.  Period.  Instead of fighting that reality and losing, it's time that city planners accept it, and work the mass transit system in such a way as to serve the demographic that uses it the most... the poor.  Stop wasting money on mass transit schemes that make yuppies feel better about themselves, even though they never ride it once they get it.

In other words... dump KRM, and invest in smarter routes in areas of Milwaukee that need it.  For more on wasted transit dollars, check out this excellent article from Reason.