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I'm undecided if coronavirus is going to shift people away from public transit to private vehicles in the long run, but I'd be willing to bet quite a lot it will be trotted out frequently by status quo types as an excuse to oppose transit expansions and bus-only lanes.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of elected officials in this country—and, hell, many in our major transit-dependent cities—have long been susceptible to the implication that mass transit is undesirable and unhealthy. This will only make transit's recovery that much harder.
The density debate w/r/t coronavirus has also been fascinating to watch, because it echoes many of the same talking points as the anti-density arguments from back-to-nature types responding to the perils of the slums in the late 19th/early 20th centuries.
As with anything else, be wary of anyone claiming there is a single cause. It is not transit's fault, or density's fault, or whatever. But you can damn well better believe people who didn't like those things will latch onto those explanations for their own unrelated ends.
