Mr. D., The schedule of your life and the various locations you have to tie together in a day, responsibilities and timelines you must work within, do not make it likely you are a candidate for public transportation. Perhaps, if travel, and work, and camp, etc. were all located close to each other it could work. But you live in this world at this time. For your life, it is important to have our roads in good condition, and I think it helps you if we reduce congestion as much as we can.
Part of my opinion about planning for the population growth that is coming, and the high oil prices and reduced supply we face, is to design and build our transportation system so those who can and want to, are able to commute, shop, and live using their vehicles much less often than our lives depend on our cars now. And even to make not having a car, not seem as unusual as most of us consider it now.
I personally don't think we should attach so much morality to these choices. By diversifying our options, we will spread out how people move about in their lives and reduce the pressure on any one of the options.
I work for Sam so you can easily say I am biased, and I don't really intend to sound objective. One of the parts I heard and really respected in Sam's speech, was the lack of judging those who do and will use the auto.
The future that lies ahead will bring many more people to Portland, ready or not here they come. I like the choice of being as ready as we can be. Portland is a great city; I think if we plan well we can be ready, and we can work to preserve the wonderful qualities of Portland while making room for the inevitable growth.