I remember I had two tourist books for my HS NYC trip, and one recommended never taking the subway ("because its mostly for locals, and hard and confusing" or something like that), and the other basically didn't mention it at all. Filling a Metro card was like discovering a secret power in how much of the city I was able to see in a short timespan.
One of my favorite stories from that trip was getting a call from my father that he got last minute Broadway tickets for us in a couple hours, while I was on the Ellis Island/Statue of Liberty ferry. When he heard where I was on the map he was concerned I might not make it to dinner/the show on time, and I knew I had the timing on my side with the Subway to get there right on time. (And I did.)
This is a favorite topic of conversation amongst New Yorkers, but, while there are no doubt real problems, New York's subway system is still an enormous benefit to residents and especially remarkable by U.S. standards.
This is certainly true, but I think it mistakes the concern?
If the NYC subway system had always been like it is now, and would stay this way indefinitely, it would still be worth having. It would be sweaty and crowded and unreliable for getting to work right on time, but it would work well off-peak and decrease congestion admirably. The heatstroke and crashes and fires would be objectionable, but it's probably still safer per trip than the sidewalks.
But it used to be better, and the city shaped itself around that, and all serious estimates say it's going to get even worse. If picked your apartment to suit your paycheck and give you a 30 minute commute by subway, and that suddenly goes up to 90 minutes (or to "track fire, everybody out"), you might well be worse off than if you'd never had the option in the first place.
NYC has fewer miles of subway than it did after WWII. On time rates are the worst of any major city in the world, and have been steadily falling for every single line in the city, outages have risen, injuries have risen, maintenance spending fell while budget rose. There's no plausible budget plan to fix most of that. Meanwhile, the North River tunnels have a lifespan of "20 years or until the next hurricane", and the most optimistic plans for fixing that require either 10+ years of construction and several billion in future funding, or a 50% capacity reduction for years.
The issue isn't that the subway is expensive and slow. It's that the city is reliant on the subway, but there doesn't appear to be any realistic plan for halting the decline or preventing crisis if it continues.
