The population of bus riders skews younger—even excluding the school bus, I think, lots of folks public transit are young professionals and college student. The nostalgia for a time that didn’t actually happen hits this crew early.
For college students they likely almost always find themselves surrounded by familiar faces, even classmates, because they are all going to class at the same time on the same transit
So yeah, it would be easier to strike up a random conversation with people you recognize from campus or just people who are all part of your similar demographic
