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Incidentally, an argument you hear in Cyprus (which has a similar urban planning and car-dependency issues as the US but an extremely smaller scale) is that Cyprus is too small to be designed in an urbanist way.
Now, full disclosure, I kinda agree with that in a very specific way: there's a strategy, when talking about public transport in Cyprus, to pretend like the problem is the specific mode of transport. When Cyprus got buses, people boycotted them because "the bus-stops have no shade, no wifi, and anyway trams would be better". Maybe sensible on the face of it, but then when a tram feasibility study found weak support for tram and the bus infrastructure including the bus stops began tangibly improving, the tune changed: "trams are too slow, we need a subway in the major cities". They keep moving to goal post further and further into unnecessary infrastructure (some going even as fast as saying that Cyprus needs high-speed rail, which is ludicrous) so that they justify keeping the place car-exclusive.
In that specific way, I do agree that a country can be too small for some modes of transport. I don't think Cyprus needs more than buses and a few tram lines. Anything else is excuses to avoid doing anything at all.
Now, the USA is clearly big enough for high-speed rail and it has many cities that can support a subway system.
High-speed metro sounds sensible for Cyprus, it's not like you can't accelerate to 250km/h or such on stopless stretches between the large cities. Do you really want to have less rail than Mallorca.
Why would Cyprus need a high-speed metro, when over-ground light rail and electric buses can offer all the benefits (the distances are tiny) for a fraction of the cost and other regulatory hurdles (one of the biggest ones being the archaeological sites protections law that has enormously delayed countless underground projects before).
Do you really want to have less rail than Mallorca.
I want things that are fit for purpose, even if they are not flashy.
There's no requirement for metros to be above ground, or for that matter not use overhead lines. Inside the cities it's probably a good idea to bury them, though, as grade separation is important for service frequency and reliability and train viaducts come with their own issues.
That's pretty much the only reason I said metro: If you want to e.g. string up all the coastal cities in a rail system and have grade separation and high-speed sections you can do multiple stops in each city, a couple in between, and still cross the Island in under two hours. If you also make it low cost you can pretty much tear down the existing highways they're not going to see much traffic, any more.
If you don't have track separate from roads you can't run those trains through cities, much too unreliable to keep schedules. If you don't have grade separation you can't have frequent train service or you cause issues with road traffic. As such, not being able to run those trains through you'd have to switch trains a gazillion times to get from one corner of the island to another and everybody would hate that and that's never a good thing.
There’s no requirement for metros to be above ground, or for that matter not use overhead lines.
If we are talking an above-ground metro with overhead lines, that's what I know as tram/light-rail. So, we are talking about the same thing with different words. My objection is to anything either underground or highspeed as frivolous requirements that serve to stop the project altogether (anything over 120 km/h, let's say).
Inside the cities it’s probably a good idea to bury them
This will be how the project dies. The societal majority that you will have to build to approve of such an investment in public transport is also the societal majority that would be against choosing to bore through antiquities (if you respect the antiquities protection law as it stands, you will be stalled for multiple decades). The cost is also unbearable to begin with - the EU is not willing to fund any ambitious projects in Cyprus until bus usage cements itself.
It's far more realistic to convert existing bus lanes into dedicated tramways intra-city, take over some car lanes for exclusive use in other roads, and share the road where needed. Should you wish to connect cities by rail rather than bus, you can expropriate land along highways for inter-city service and go for the tram-train model.
Making perfect the enemy of good in public transportation planning in Cyprus made one thing certain: the number of car trips as a percentage of all trips has not decreased in any noticeable amount.
My objection is to anything either underground
Well I wouldn't object against not doing it underground, I just think that grade separation would be useful there's more than one way to skin that particular cat.
or highspeed as frivolous requirements that serve to stop the project altogether (anything over 120 km/h, let’s say).
There's plenty of Bombardier Talent 2 on S-Bahn duty in Germany, doing 140km/h, Talent 3 can do up to 200 which is technically HSR, same goes for the Stadler Flirt.
That is: You can get those things off the shelf. Building track capable of supporting those kinds of speeds doesn't really cost much on top of what you're paying for new track in the first place. At the very least you should make sure that, where it wouldn't explode costs, curve radii etc. are suitable for HSR.
If we are talking an above-ground metro with overhead lines, that’s what I know as tram/light-rail.
My understanding is that if it runs on rails embedded in the road, or at least at grade, that's a tram. If it's grade separated from the road for higher speeds, that's light rail.