That's the crazy thing with mass transit in NJ as well. DW wanted to take 3 girl scouts in to see a show. $23.50 per person RT into NY Penn Station. There were a total of 4 scouts and one leader, so $94 and the one way was going to take an hour and 10 minutes plus subway time and cost ($22 for all 4 for those round trips) to get to their destination so $116 vs. me driving them in to the theater door and it costing 1/2 of that with gas tolls/ wear tear for two trips (one to drop them off and one to pick them up).
In the end, I just drove them in and hung out in the city for a few hours, so it cost 1/3 of the train including parking for the car. That should simply not be.