I now live in Luxembourg and public transports are just totally free: buses, tramways, trains... All free, for everybody (locals and tourists alike). No pass, no nothing: you just hop in the bus/train/tramway and you're good to go.

You can also rent public bicycles and they're all e-bikes/pedelec and they're very cheap (but not free).

This is the way to do it. Public transport is tax paid, one way or another anyway.

This completely gets rid of bullshit overhead like ticketing, ticket checking, payment processing, maintenance of payment terminals, manning of ticket counters, planning departments, billing and finance departments, third party payment fees etc etc etc

Has it helped with the traffic? I’ve heard that air pollution was horrible as well

Is this something new? A few years ago it wasn't the case.

Since March 2020.

>if not making it an enjoyable and desirable experience

It will always be the worst part of my day and with more passengers and the regularly scheduled disasters that won't change any time soon.