Earlier quoted context omitted.
They go up if you build more densely and then hop in your car and drive an entire block to your destination, which some Americans insist on. But if you walk, bike, take transit, it gets better. People don't automatically adapt just because you build it differently and people typically have trouble imagining genuinely living differently without actually experiencing it.
Some people don't work a block away. Oh wait: Almost NO ONE works a block away. Increased density means increased traffic, period. Has this equation been reduced by working at home? Sure. But it remains a fact of life.
It's America's problem of its own making, you need to find a solution, just shoving more lanes for cars, more suburbs with single detached homes, is not solving absolutely anything. No, not every rural small town will have Dutch-levels of access to trains but you can definitely improve the situation on the densely populated areas of the East and West coast, just have to get rid of this obnoxious and gauche car-addiction.
The longer you take to transition out of car-dependence, the more painful it will be.
Good luck on solving it, doesn't seem like American society put much value in it, you seem to like to suffer in traffic.